Saturday’s Globe brought the sad news of the death of Heather McArthur, who Slaw readers may have encountered through her career in the Ontario Bar Association and in continuing legal education.

Heather had a strong interest in the use of technology to deliver CLE and was an early and enthusiastic backer of annual legal technology onferences in Toronto.

At the Ontario Bar Association, she had been, at various times, Director of Continuing Legal Education, Director of Technology, and Acting Executive Director.

She was warm, enthusiastic and committed. Our sympathy to her husband Paul Truster, who also has long been involved . . . [more]

There have been very amusing discussions of the improbability of things that happen in the movies actually happening—the ability of the hero or heroine to find a parking space exactly where he or she needs one, being a common one. In fact, I think that some were recently published on Slaw.

I am now seeing movies and television programmes in which software works flawlessly—the most recent programme that I saw was a (fictional) English TV series on MI-5 in which the good guys defeated a nefarious plot to take down the British Internet by first copying information in the Russian . . . [more]

Since Steve pointed the way, Slaw readers might well be interested to see from the Public Accounts volume III that Justice Canada appears to be a Lexis shop rather than a Westlaw-ECarswell.

Page 71 of the Accounts provide details of where “Canada’s largest law firm” – as Justice Canada is often described – spends its legal information dollars:

Lexisnexis Canada Inc Kingston Ont $1,146,011
Quicklaw Inc Kingston Ont $200,484
Carswell Toronto Ont $409,583

The DPP expenditures are similarly skewed.

Lexisnexis Canada Inc Kingston Ont 324,940
Quicklaw Inc Kingston Ont 102,476

Of course the really large cheques are cut elsewhere: CGI . . . [more]

The Beeb, home to much that is creative, has done it again. They’re hosting a site called Memoryshare, the title to which pretty much tells it all. The simple notion is that viewers log in to leave their memories of a time gone by, whether a day or decades in the past. Each nostalgic note is represented as a coloured blob in a time spiral that goes back to 1900. Hovering over a blog causes an excerpt to pop up so you can judge whether this is a memory you want to visit.

Now there’s not much in this . . . [more]

In honour of Canada Day I share with you a video introducing a new book about the Six String Nation project by writer, radio host and producer Jowi Taylor. I was recently fortunate to hear Jowi speak and had the opportunity to try out the guitar. The longer story is over on my personal blog.

Happy Canada Day!

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Yes, I’m in the office on Canada day. Decided that because the weather is lousy today, its a Wednesday, and taking Friday off made more sense for a number of reasons – I would work today and take Friday off instead.

Anyone else doing the same? . . . [more]

Thought Slaw readers might like to read my Free Press column this week about social media in the courtroom. It talks about some of the good things – like journalists (the real kind) getting permission to tweet during trials. And some bad things – like witnesses texting while on the witness stand.

My conslusion is that – like with most new technologies in general – Trying new technologies in the judicial process, questioning how things are done, and taking innovative approaches are all good things. But we must balance them with some thought about whether it’s the right thing to . . . [more]

Twitter launched a beta version of verified accounts recently, “to establish authenticity with people who deal with impersonation or identity confusion on a regular basis.”

We’ve had similar features on sites like ClaimID to help establish which online identities are really ours, and which ones are not.

This would shift the onus for celebrities and high-profile users to get verified, instead of suing retrospectively when others create an account in their name. And indeed, Twitter is starting with these folks first before expanding the feature to everyone else.

But you still have to be using Twitter in order to . . . [more]

According to the headline of an article in Wired, “Jackson’s Death Puts Lucrative Beatles Copyrights in Play.” Part of the tangle that is the estate of Michael Jackson is 50% ownership of the copyright to the songs composed by the Beatles. Jackson beat out McCartney in a 1985 auction of the rights (for a mere $47 million) and sold half ownership to Sony. Jackson’s half was subsequently given as collateral for one of the loans he obtained.

Of course, it will take some time to sort out who owns and who owes what. One imagines lawyers will be . . . [more]

This too shall pass, a wise man once said. It certainly was the case with the state formerly known as Yugoslavia. And for that reason it will soon be equally true for the stranded .yu country domain suffix. According to the Yugoslav Internet Domain Name Registry “propagating information on .yu domains on the Internet will cease on 30 September 2009.”

The fact of the matter is that nations come and nations go, as anyone with a less than recent map of Europe or Africa could tell you. And political change is not the only source of instability: global warming has . . . [more]

I like Alice. I have a (very) modest collection of her adventures, as told by the oddman Dodgson orse Carroll (including a “Wonderland” published in Moscow in English — 1 rouble 30 kopek — with Russian commentary and illustrations). I bring this up because Disney is at it again, it seems, and, traditionalist curmudgeon that I am, I have deeply resented what Disney has done to some of the great children’s classics in the past. But this time I wonder…

For one thing, the new movie is being directed by Tim Burton. Hard to think of anyone more a . . . [more]

Bonne fête de la Saint-Jean-Baptiste à nos amis et confrères dans la belle province.

  . . . [more]