The tagline for the African Law Library is “Innovative access to law”. The service, which requires a registration for which there is no cost, links to documents published by the African Legal Information Institute and other collections, including suggestions for research projects and the ability to support communities of practice (workgroups).

The African Law Library uses the online platform of Globethics.net for the integration of a broad variety of document sources and participants profiles. It offers the following features:

• Online library with documents that are full text, multilingual, from all countries in Africa;
• Access to legal texts, selected

. . . [more]

Canadian International Lawyer, a journal published by the Canadian Bar Association’s section on international law, has put out a call for submissions in all the journal’s sections (articles, case commentary, practice notes, legal developments) for its two upcoming issues (summer 2014 and winter 2015). According to Noemi Gal-Or, the journal editor:

Articles should have a practice focus, relevant to Canadian international legal practitioners. Instructions to authors can be found [via email] at CIL@cba.org.

The journal is published twice annually with articles in English or in French and is available free to CBA members who have joined the international . . . [more]

In 1936, Yale law professor Fred Rodell wrote “[t]here are two things wrong with almost all legal writing. One is its style. The other is its content.”

Some things never change, but the growth of legal blogging over the past decade would give hope to even Professor Rodell that not all legal writing must suffer from these twin deficiencies. In fact, the good professor might even be persuaded to accept that short form legal writing through blogs serves as a valuable source of legal scholarship.

In the context of a for-credit tech law internship overseen by the University of Ottawa . . . [more]

The Law Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. has published a new comparative report on the handling and adjudication of sexual offenses in the military.

The report examines how the military justice systems of Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Israel and the United Kingdom deal with alleged sexual offending by service members.

The Library occasionally publishes reports that compare the laws on a given theme in a number of countries.

Earlier comparative law reports from the Law Library of Congress have covered topics such as:

• Bioethics
• Campaign Finance
• Children’s Rights
• Constitutional Provisions on Women’s Equality
• Education of Non-Native Language Speaking

. . . [more]

1. The Conceptual Foundation for the Use of Electronic Records

The concepts and arguments developed below have been facilitated by what I have learned from experts in electronic records management. The following three analogies should be the foundation concepts for all that is written and said about the discovery and admissibility of electronic records:

1. An electronic record (an e-record) is merely an electronic impression upon an electronic storage device, which is but a part of an electronic records management system (an ERMS). An e-record in its ERMS, is like a drop of water in a pool of water. Like . . . [more]

Some exciting news today for fellow Hansard geeks:

https://twitter.com/LoPInformation/status/403177276843757568

The full digitized historical federal Hansard, Senate and House of Commons, is now available online, browsable and searchable. Canadiana.org’s Historical Debates of the Parliament of Canada portal was launched today: http://parl.canadiana.ca/

The project has been in development for some time. It complements the content that has been available on parl.gc.ca (House: 1994 onward; Senate: 1996 onward), to create a full collection of digital federal Hansard.

https://twitter.com/LoPInformation/status/402900381400719360

Full details about the portal and the search functions are here: http://parl.canadiana.ca/support/about. . . . [more]

Yesterday Google Scholar Blog announced the launch of Google Scholar Library, a feature that allows a user to:

. . . save articles right from the search page, organize them by topic, and use the power of Scholar’s full-text search to quickly find just the one you want – at any time and from anywhere . . .

You’re able to use “labels” to organize the material you’ve saved to your library.

A user must log in to Google and via this link activate the Library feature.

This is clearly of potential benefit to the profession, because Scholar’s database includes . . . [more]

Legal citation to the courts for the past few years has, in some jurisdictions, been different than legal citation in academic works. Here in Alberta, on November 12, 2013 there was a Notice to the Profession from the Court of Queen’s Bench adopting the 7th edition of the Canadian Guide to Uniform Legal Citation (Toronto: Carswell, 2010). There is a lovely example of a law library’s description of the Guide (aka the McGill Guide) from the Lederman Law Library (Queen’s U).

Bob’s column this month references the incongruity of law students being responsible for editorial oversight of law reviews, I . . . [more]

Preserving one’s reputation is a fine value – and one that the law of libel strives to protect. But it’s not absolute, and the law recognizes that some communications are so important that they must trump reputation. That’s why communications that enjoy privilege are defensible in defamation cases. So is there a qualified privilege when reporting relevant information to the police in good faith, protecting the individual reporting the information from a libel suit. The answer is Yes.

We know that today marks the start of the Senate reform reference at the Supreme Court of Canada. I am certain that many of us wish we had three days to devote to viewing the webcasts of this event. If you cannot make the time for full attention to the webcast, Eugene Meehan kindly tweeted some of the grab and go information sources.

Tweet by tweet coverage is being handled by:

• @cmathen
• @alisoncrawford5
• @pauldayesq
• @TondaMacC
• @journo_dale
• @fionahmcfarlane

There are some hashtags that are currently in use including #SenCa #SCC and #cdnpoli

If you are planning to watch an SCC Webcast, . . . [more]

…and a love-in for Roy McMurtry

The Osgoode Society held its annual book launch last Wednesday at Osgoode Hall. The event was a stellar occasion, with many celebrity authors and guests in attendance and four choice titles to applaud. Authors Charlotte Gray and Roy McMurtry in particular helped draw a record crowd that included among many notable jurists, Aharon Barak, a former chief justice of Israel, and Rosalie Abella, a justice of the Supreme Court of Canada and the leading cheerleader for legal research and writing in Canada.

McMurtry himself was the object of a virtual “love-in” as long time . . . [more]

Last week a joint report between the Financial Times and SLA was released: The evolving value of information management: and the five essential attributes of the modern information professional (free download with registration).

The report delves into changes in the work of information professionals, change in what executives believe information professionals should be doing, and any gaps between these perceptions. It then provides changes that information professionals should be considering and specific action items to achieve these.

From the introduction:

We encourage information professionals to question how the strategies in this report can assist you in enhancing the value you

. . . [more]