The Ontario government passed Bill 118 last April and recently announced that it will come into force on October 26. The government has indicated that there will be a three-month period of education following which tickets will be handed out starting on February 1, 2010.

While some other provinces were quicker off the mark, Ontario’s legislation seems to have garnered the most media and other attention. Employer’s are busy drafting and distributing policies to their workforce and educating them on what the law means.

While the legislation will (or should) change the way people behave behind the wheel, we should . . . [more]

Allow me this short shameless plug for my latest endeavour. If you’re looking for an entertaining diversion from the high-stress practice of law, head on over to Precedent Magazine where you can read my first entry in a monthly travel column, cheekily entitled The Crime Traveller. This week, I bring you the adventures of summer in Alaska. . . . [more]

I’ve learned from Hughes-Jehan Vibert that his JurisPedia project has recently won the 2009 Dieter Meurer Prize for Legal Informatics [in German]. We talked about JurisPedia a couple of years ago here on Slaw. And last year Simon Chester posted about the 2008 winner, Case Matrix.

JurisPedia’s new front page operates as a search engine, using Google’s Custom Search, with filters available that let you focus your search on any one of 70 jurisdictions around the world. You can, as well, search the wiki that is the growing JurisPedia encyclopedia.

Hughes-Jehan, who studied at UQAM and is now a . . . [more]

Google honours Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi on his birthday by giving him pride of place at the front of their name today:

Mahatma (“Great Soul”) Gandhi was a lawyer, we should remember. I find that an encouraging thought. . . . [more]

Doomsday is coming. No, not Domesday of Book fame: that was 923 years ago, and has rather too much to do with law to be the subject of a fillip. I’m talking about February 28 or 29, depending, which is the day Rudy Limeback calls Doomsday for the purposes of his algorithm.

Now, I’m someone who had to use a calculator to figure out how many years ago 1028 was, so when I come upon something that begins “alg…” visions of my old math teacher, Amil H. J. Rintelman (I kid you not), appear before me and I quail. But . . . [more]

The US Legal Services Corporation has released Documenting the Justice Gap in America: The Current Unmet Civil Legal Needs of Low-Income Americans. From the press release:

“Many of these Americans in need of legal assistance are the most vulnerable among us-they are trying to escape from domestic violence, trying to avert foreclosure and homelessness, trying to qualify for disability benefits, trying to recover from natural disasters. Legal aid saves lives and makes communities stronger,” LSC President Barnett said.

Better than Canada, where 100% of civil actions are denied legal aid. Appendix A has a nice summary . . . [more]

I was reading my usual RSS feeds this morning, partly to see if I could find some inspiration for my Slaw post for today, and found the following post on Techdirt. I couldn’t agree more – and since this is one of those “like he said” posts that I can’t really improve on – I’ve simply reproduced it below. I know the author, Mike Masnick, won’t mind so long as I don’t take credit for writing it.

The Rule Of Law Over The Rule Of Reason

from the stop-the-insanity dept

While not directly a tech/business related story, Jonny sent . . . [more]

If there’s one time of year that should give us cause to pause and look out from our legal Fishbowls it’s the autumn. Given the season, I thought I’d invite us all to take a break from our computer screens and document briefs and look out our windows to reflect on nature.

I had just such a moment of distraction last spring that I let slip into a Tweet. Peg Duncan (keeper of the LexUM e-discovery case law digests) translated it into this wonderful English-style Haiku:

the tower creaks

in the cool east wind

ridable waves in Toronto

Author, Title, Publisher, Date. Doesn’t seem that hard, really. I guess that’s what the Google geniuses (see also Apple Genius) thought when they set up Google Book Search.

Turns out, its not that easy. Anyone who has been tempted by the promises of citation managers, and then had their hopes dashed on the rocks of bibliographic complexity, knows this too well. The criticism of Google Books Search’s performance is pretty trenchant. And now this article doing the same service for Google Scholar. Its a metadata tsunami. Something like that Fishbone song:

Karma Tsunami
comin . . . [more]

I’m a Saxon. Well, at least that’s what I tell my yoga instructor by way of explaining why I fall over backwards every time I attempt even a half lotus. The truth is that although I’ve got that chunky, big-boned morph-type I associate with Saxon heritage, I’ve got no real idea whether I’m related to Æthelred the Unready or, whether I’m Celt, Pict, Jute, Angle, Dane or, as is likely the case, a mix of all these tribes and more.

But I wouldn’t mind being an honorary Saxon, if it meant I could share some of the glory reflected from . . . [more]

Today’s CBA E-News contains a link to a report described as:

The CBA’s Ethics and Professional Responsibility Committee presents a new report interpreting the CBA’s Code of Professional Conduct in the context of the new media. Your presence in the e-world: Guidelines for Ethical Marketing Practices Using New Information Technologies covers everything from e-mail tag lines to blog etiquette to web-based lawyer referral services.

It is only a guideline – as provincial law society rules are what actually govern. For the most part, it encourages lawyers to use social media – but cautions that the usual rules apply.

For example. . . . [more]

I have a friend whom I can frighten by simply pronouncing the word tapioca. Not for her bubble tea or tapioca pudding. But I rather like those rubbery little eyeballs, having been introduced to them in early childhood in the company of sweet sauces and custards. The sticky, slimy concoction is a form of comfort food for me, I guess: a pablum that grownups can eat without shame.

Well, when it comes to comfort food in the form of edible slimy pastes — as it seems to have in this fillip — nothing can match ambuyat, apparently. I recently learned . . . [more]