In honour of the McGill Guide 7th ed I’ve decided to write this entire post without any periods For the sake of simplification I have; however, retained commas, hyphens, semi-colons and capitalization at the beginning of sentences for the sake of clarity, at least until the 8th ed is published (I will admit, though, that I had to retain the periods in my links or they would not work; I’m unsure if that can be used as metaphor) As many are aware Nova Scotia and the Maritime Provinces have a sudden and acute interest in canceled TV sitcoms this weekend . . . [more]

The World Treaty Index began life in 1974 and has been in more or less continuous development since that time, as the output of the database moved from print to various electronic formats. Now it’s managed by researchers from the University of Michigan who have given it a new web interface. (See also the explanatory article on Computational Legal Studies.)

The WTI contains only metadata, as it were, about the treaties, and not the texts themselves, which likely can be found in other online databases, such as the United Nations Treaty Collection. Even so, the database is large . . . [more]

This post concludes a series of post on the subject topic:

• Presentation of the CCCT IntellAction Working Group on Court Web Site Guidelines (21 Jan 2010)
• Presentation of the Working Group selection of principles included in the subject guidelines; principles 1, 2 and 3 explained (The Right Information for Specific Audiences, Empowerment, Timeliness – 17 Aug 2010)
• Presentation of Principles 4, 5 and 6 (Notification, Content, Security – 20 Aug 2010)
• Presentation of Principles 7, 8 and 9 (Bilinguism, Accessibility, Interactivity – 25 Aug 2010)

As always, your comments and suggestions are welcome. . . . [more]

We didn’t get around to noticing the Law Library of Congress’ new blog In Custodia Legis, which explains its name and aim here.

Today, it featured a new post on the developments at Thomas to make legislative information more accessible. There aren’t a lot of comments yet, but it’s early days.

The high spots for me were on Social Media and a Legislative Map at the State level, which looks simple but is only simple to use.

Social Media Box

In addition to easier access to the Library’s social media, there is a new box to highlight ways . . . [more]

We all know that editing a Wikipedia entry is fairly straightforward – and that the Wikiguardians keep a vigilant eye over entries and edits that stray from the norms of objectivity and verifiability.

So the announcement that the Correctional Service’s internal operations arm is investigating an edit made to the Wikipedia entry on Canada’s Official Languages Act, which appears to have been made from a government computer connected to the Corrections Canada server at the department’s offices on Laurier Street in Ottawa, is arousing the interest of the mainstream media. Denis Coderre appears to have noticed the edit a . . . [more]

Earlier last week, I presented the CCCT IntellAction Working Group selection of principles that should guide the design and organization of court web sites and further explained, in a later post, principles 4, 5 and 6 on notification, content organization & search and security. In this post, I further explain the next three principles:

• Principle #7: Bilinguism
• Principle #8: Accessibility
• Principle #9: Interactivity

Comments and suggestions are welcome! . . . [more]

Because URLs are often clumsy and hard to remember, we use bookmarks. Right? If you’re like me, you’ve got certain critical ones strung across your personal bookmarks toolbar, more stacked in folders there, and perhaps hundreds buried in the entrails of your browser’s file system.

But sometimes you’re away from your own machines. Or you can’t quickly come up with one of your hidden bookmarks. It’s good, then, to be able simply to type in the URL and go to your destination. This, of course, depends on whether a URL is memorable. Some are — I have no trouble remembering . . . [more]

I know this will interest a number of us here at Slaw. From David’s blog post:

I’ve got a new job: I’m co-director of the Harvard Library Lab, a part of Harvard Law School. I’m excited.

The Lab (the name is going to change) was created by John Palfrey a year ago when he became head of the Harvard Law Library (and Vice Dean for Information and Library Resources at the Law School). JP had been executive director of the Berkman Center. The key thing to understand is that the Lab was established by someone with a commitment

Colleague Katharine Thompson has provided me a list of some of the changes she noticed in the new, just received 7th edition of the McGill Guide, known more formally as the Canadian Guide to Uniform Legal Citation, edited by editors of the McGill Law Journal and published by Carswell.

This is the leading legal citation guide in Canada, its counterpart in the US being The Bluebook and the more recent ALWD Citation Manual.

The biggest change to me in the new 7th edition of the McGill Guide is the aversion to periods (albeit, presumably they remain acceptable . . . [more]

Earlier this week, I presented the CCCT IntellAction Working Group selection of principles that should guide the design and organization of court web sites. In this post, I further explain the next three principles:

• Principle #4: Notification
• Principle #5: Content Organization & Search
• Principle #6: Security

Comments and suggestions are welcome! . . . [more]

The Virtual Chase, an online website for U.S. legal research founded by law librarian Genie Tyburski, is now powered by Justia.

Virtual Chase was launched in 1996 by Tyburski, a law librarian at Ballard Spahr LLP in Philadelphia. It was a popular destination for law librarians and legal researchers but was closed down a few years ago.

It is now back with a redesign and new content sections:

• Legal Research: guides to U.S. federal and state law, and links to subject-specific guides
• Community: links to law librarian blogs, Twitter feeds, the Law-Lib listserv, etc.
• Law Libraries:

Back in January, I announced the formation of a working group under the auspices of the Canadian Centre for Court Technology (CCCT). The objective of this working group was to draft guidelines facilitating the modernization of Canadian court web sites. Since that time, we have made progress and expect to have finished a first draft of the Court Web Site guidelines before the upcoming Canadian Forum on Court Technology.

One of the five parts of the guidelines is titled “Principles – Cutting Through Context and Issues: What Principles Should Guide the Design of Court Web Sites?”

In . . . [more]