For the last few months, I have been tracking new issues of Canadian law journals for Bora Laskin Law Library’s Recent Law Journals Tables of Contents service (July issue here) . This was as part of a bigger project, that will hopefully see the light of day someday. One of my collaborators on that project Andrea Davidson (a lawyer who is currently a masters student at the University of Western Ontario’s Faculty of Information and Media Studies) thought it was worth noting that a number of the journals we were looking at were not available on either Lexis . . . [more]

The papers recently carried the news of the death of Paul-André Crépeau, C.C., O.Q., c.r., LL.D., D.h.c., m.s.r.c., who I would argue was the most influential law reformer in Canadian legal history.

From the initial invitation in 1965 from Jean Lesage’s Justice Minister Claude Wagner to take over the Office de Révision du code civil, originally set up during the Duplessis years with Thibaudeau Rinfret and André Nadeau, Crépeau’s vision and his life work was la révision du Code civil, and under his leadership the Office focused on the daunting task of updating the general provisions of a century-old . . . [more]

Canada’s Privacy Commissioner announced the release of “PIPEDA and Your Practice — A Privacy Handbook for Lawyers” (also available in a PDF version) at the Canadian Bar Association Canadian Legal Conference and Expo 2011. As the handbook says:

In some cases, the requirements of PIPEDA mirror lawyers’ existing professional requirements. In other cases, navigating the requirements of PIPEDA in a legal practice can add further complexity. Lawyers must not only consider their own privacy obligations but also the different obligations that each of their clients may face. Privacy obligations applicable to clients can sometimes restrict what lawyers

I am sorry to report that @ordersincouncil, a twitter stream with 318 followers and 25 listings seems to have gone silent. No ceremony, no fanfare, no last word, no announcement. The account sits, with a lovely background, the descriptive tagline “Monitoring updates to Privy Council Office listings of cabinet orders,” and a last tweet from May 2011.

I was among those who found tweets of federal Orders in Council extremely useful. I was happy to weed through tweets on government appointments and interesting tidbits like tax remission orders among the regulations and proclamation announcements that were of true interest . . . [more]

First to BC where a committee of the Law Society of British Columbia, under the chairmanship of Gavin Hume, has produced the best and most thoughtful piece on how to practice ethically and effectively using cloud computing. We’ve referred in the past to helpful work done by the Bar Association in North Carolina and the ABA’s 20/20 Commission – see Jack Newton’s posts from May and July, as well as Connie’s and Omar’s take on last week’s ABA discussion.

At the Canadian Lawyer, David Paul has a good tip sheet of practical advice on the intelligent use . . . [more]

Well only as an intervenor.

According to a Press Release out this week, CanLII and the Federation to Defend Free Access to Law at the Supreme Court

CanLII and the Federation of Law Societies of Canada have been granted leave to intervene at the Supreme Court of Canada in SOCAN v. Bell et al., a copyright case to be heard later this year in which the Court will be asked to provide guidance on the meaning of “research” as a fair dealing user right under the Copyright Act.

While the facts of the SOCAN case relate to online . . . [more]

Fastcase has just announced the Fastcase 50, the “fifty most interesting, provocative, and courageous leaders in the world of law, scholarship, and legal technology”. The entire list is interesting but let’s mention 5 friends who may be familiar to Slaw readers.

Congratulations to each of them:

David Whelan
David Whelan is a lawyer, librarian, and technologist who has truly seen it all. He currently serves as the Manager of Legal Information for the Law Society of Upper Canada (as head librarian of the Great Library, the job is often referred to as “the Great Librarian”). David previously served as . . . [more]

Last year, when Thomson Reuters acquired the Canada Law Book Company, we expected that CLB’s President and CEO, Stuart Morrison would enjoy a well-earned retirement, after winding up all the Cartwright Group businesses that West didn’t acquire. That is why we were shocked to learn that he died of leukemia on Saturday. . . . [more]

Does anyone know if there exists a comparison tool regarding the coverage of the major online subscription databases (such as Quicklaw and Westlaw)? I am envisioning a simple tool that would indicate their coverage of various courts over time, so one could know at a glance which database to consult for finding a particular case. I know that each database documents its own scope, but I was wondering if anyone out there has undertaken the project of compiling that information into a quick comparison chart. I realize that it would be a lot of work to keep up-to-date, but I . . . [more]

I am having an interesting day. Interesting in a cursed way.

Before I left for the day last night I was made aware of some “first thing in the morning” research needed for a 9:30 meeting. A simple case-gathering task looking for the most authoritative Alberta Court of Appeal decision on a point of law. No problem.

Also before I left for the day, I started the firm’s memo template, typed in the “you asked me to find” statement, did a very quick search of the CED headings (one not quite relevant hit, pasted into the memo) and a quick . . . [more]

These are notes are from a panel presentation session at the American Bar Association 2011 conference in Toronto last Thursday. Panelists included lawyer/librarian Matthew Braun, Legal Reference Specialist at the Law Library of Congress in Washington, DC, Sara Sommarstrom, Program Director, Minnesota Justice Foundation, and Prof. Nanette Elster, Vice President, Spence & Elster and Adjunct Faculty, The John Marshall Law School, Chicago, IL. Note: these are my selected notes from this session; any inaccuracies or omissions are my own. I welcome your comments and follow-up thoughts!

This session was made up of three very different presentations exploring . . . [more]

Yesterday Larry Alford joined the University of Toronto as its new Chief Librarian. Larry is responsible for the UofT Library system which is the largest research library in Canada and among the largest in the world. Mr. Alford is only the 6th permanent Chief Librarian at UofT since 1892. Larry replaces Carole Moore who retired earlier this summer after leading the Library for over 25 years and overseeing the transformation of the UofT Library system from a good Canadian library to one of the great research libraries in the world – matching the University’s aspiration to join the ranks . . . [more]