I just did something that I haven’t had to do in 5 years … update my title. I have taken on a new role in my organization – facilitating process improvement projects in addition to overseeing knowledge management. There is something that is missing from my title that has been there for a long time – the word Library. I have self identified as a law librarian since joining a law firm library team as a fresh graduate from a library technician program. Whether my actual title was Library Technician or some other derivation, that comforting word has underpinned my . . . [more]

As those who’ve read Slaw for a while might know, I’ve been critical in the past about the way the news media treat law. Simply put, law does not figure in their analysis of things that make the world go round. This is easy — and distressing — to see by looking at the way in which news media categorize their content. The Globe and Mail, for example, doesn’t include “Law” or “Justice” in any of its major menu headings, and only by looking at the website’s site map can we find “Law” among the 175 possibilities as a third . . . [more]

The American Association of Law Libraries (AALL) announced this week that Fastcase and William S. Hein & Co. were the joint winners of its 2014 New Product of the Year Award.

According to AALL:

“This award honors new commercial information products that enhance or improve existing law library services or procedures or innovative products which improve access to legal information, the legal research process, or procedures for technical processing of library materials. A “new” product is one which has been in the library-related marketplace for two years or less.”

Under the partnership with Fastcase announced last July, HeinOnline . . . [more]

Dean Beeby, “Justice Canada Chops Research Budget by $1.2 Million” (May 12, 2014) Globe and Mail online.

This report solidifies what librarians and critics of this government’s approach to evidence, information, data and research have been decrying since the discontinuation of the long-form census; information and data is to be manipulated so as to support the government’s political agenda.

“Previous legal research in the department sometimes caught senior officials “off-guard … and may even have run contrary to government direction,” says an internal report for deputy minister William Pentney.”

Some past projects have “at times left the impression that . . . [more]

Last year my oldest daughter worked in an office supply store. She has a remarkable gift for the retail concept of up-selling and because her store was across the street from my office, I was frequently a target customer. One of the items I purchased was a Kobo eReader (on sale, plus the employee family discount – a deal). For some time I had been wanting to experiment to see if providing a device loaded with firm owned eBooks was a workable concept.

The Kobo became the property of my law firm library and it holds a selection of ABA . . . [more]

The world of legal publishing – be it software or content – has finally tipped over into the Long awaited v3.0. Thomson (C-Track) have beaten a host of other enterprise and legal software specialists to deliver the new English Royal Courts case management system by the end of 2015.

V1.0 was the Word.

And the Word was Law. But frankly, it’s been some time since trudging around with a volume of Halsbury has given you the leading edge in legal information services. The Word was strong. Now? Not so much.

V2.0 was The Code. Not some Star Trek Fibonacci sequence . . . [more]

The Law Society has catapulted itself into the 21^st Century with a slick and well-designed online annual report that’s also readable on mobile devices.

Most of you are shocked that I wrote something complimentary about the Law Society of Upper Canada and must think I’m having an off day…

But credit should be given where credit is due.

LSUC is finally starting to look like the open and transparent organization that it was always supposed to be!

It even has a Google+ page with video of the TWU debate!

Is this a harbinger of things to come?

Light at . . . [more]

The May 2014 issue of the AALL Spectrum, the monthly publication of the American Association of Law Libraries, is devoted to law library architecture south of the border.

Lots of very pretty pictures.

The issue includes articles on:

• the new library at Irell & Manella in Century City, Los Angeles
• the new space for the Charlotte School of Law Library
• the renovated University of California, Irvine School of Law Library
• the brand new University of North Texas at Dallas College of Law Library
• the Thomas M. Cooley Law School’s new law library near Tampa Bay, Florida
• the renovated Los

In Alberta, it is Education Week. Education Week was established to call attention to the importance of education and to show the public some of the good things that happen in Alberta schools. Using the confluence of Education Week and the start date of our law firm’s summer students, I am choosing to write about some upcoming training sessions for law students and those who ensure law students are office ready vis-a-vis legal research.

• May 13 – Research in the Real World – summer students – University of Calgary Law School (Slaw post)
• June 19-20 – Head Start

The second annual FutureLaw Conference took place last Friday at Stanford University. Hosted by Codex – Stanford Center for Legal Informatics this was a conference “focusing on how technology is changing the landscape of the legal profession and the law more broadly.”

Judging by the comments in the storified #FutureLaw Twitter stream it looks like it was a very interesting and successful event. It was also live streamed and the day’s videos will be made available soon for those of us unable to attend.

Richard Susskind opened the proceedings with a talk entitled, “The Future of Lawyers: From Denial . . . [more]

Greg Lambert, prominent law blogger and Director of Library & Research Services at Jackson Walker LLP will be one of our plenary speakers at the upcoming CALL/ACBD conference. His topic is “Three Foot Radius of the Law Library” so I was curious what he has said recently about the law library on 3 Geeks and a Law Blog.

I was most interested to read his thoughtful post “So, What is Wrong with Law Firm Libraries Today?” from April 15th. It is in direct response to a provocative tweet put out by Patrick DiDomenico saying . . . [more]

I recently retold a story about a colleague of mine, who back in the very early 2000s asked me to investigate whether there was a satellite image of a particular point of interest to our file. It was certainly the coolest research I had done at that point – finding a source of satellite images to prove or disprove the location of an object…new and very interesting stuff at that time. Given the period in time when this task occurred, the point in my recent story telling was how lawyers that I work with are creative in their use of . . . [more]