3D keeps coming (and going). It’s here now in the movies and threatens to poke itself (John-Candy-like) out of our TVs. It was there for a while about sixty years ago also at the movies and in the glories of Viewmaster. And just before the turn of the century before this one, stereographs or stereograms were popular, those almost double photographs that were viewed through a device that look rather like a small library card catalogue drawer.

Well stereographs have been brought back, this time by the New York Public Library, and thanks to the “miracles of . . . [more]

Last year I told you about the plan to release a voluntary national standard for mentally healthy workplaces. The standard aims to help Canadian employers support the psychological health and safety of their employees by providing them with the necessary guidelines and tools to achieve measurable improvements in psychological health and safety in the workplace. A draft of the standard was released on November 1, 2011 without much coverage and a consultation period followed which ended January 6, 2012. The final Standard is expected to be published in late summer 2012.

Unfortunately, since the consultation period is over, the . . . [more]

Adding to David Canton’s post this week, updating us on privacy and data protection developments, here is a release from our friend, Ontario’s Information and Privacy Commissioner, Dr. Ann Cavoukian. And an interview with Steve Paikin at TVO.

It’s NOT “just a number!” Commissioner Cavoukian warns of the ease of data linkages in an increasingly online world

TORONTO, Jan. 25, 2012 /CNW/ – Ontario’s Information and Privacy Commissioner, Dr. Ann Cavoukian, says that people’s perceptions of their privacy and anonymity online fall far short of reality. In fact, technology has evolved to the point that the seemingly unrelated . . . [more]

The latest Statistics Canada job figures have made headlines again in Québec, with the numbers showing that about 3 people are unemployed for every available job (reported the Montreal Gazette today). Some say the numbers are a “blip” others say that they are very “serious debacle“. The next quarter’s stats will tell us more. While there is much dispute as to the source of these problems, it is clear they are resulting in a very tense labour situation.

Indeed, the new year has brought much high-profile labour strife in Canada, particularly in Québec in . . . [more]

The Caging of America

Why do we lock up so many people?

An excerpt, with some once (perhaps once again) Canadian content

For most privileged, professional people, the experience of confinement is a mere brush, encountered after a kid’s arrest, say. For a great many poor people in America, particularly poor black men, prison is a destination that braids through an ordinary life, much as high school and college do for rich white ones. More than half of all black men without a high-school diploma go to prison at some time in their lives. Mass incarceration on a scale almost

“phantosmia” means smelling bacon when there’s no one cooking breakfast.

That’s my definition. But don’t trust me. Take a look at wordnik, where, as the about page explains, you’ll find a better definition of this or any word, examples of its use, lists of (somewhat) related words, brief discussions of the phenom, and more. Indeed, I only came across “phantosmia” because I hit the random word button.

Now that site alone could lead to hours of harmless amusement, but this is your lucky day. I’m piling on. Here are three more word-ish sites that belong on your reference list, . . . [more]

Apple may have done it yet again.

The iBooks system launched today puts a powerful but easy-to-use authoring system into the hands of anyone who wants it, presaging the publication of dynamic ebooks by the millions—texts that will, of course, range in quality from the wretched to the superb—and, I should add, from the free to the expensive. Apple, being Apple, has tied this software in pretty tightly to its own iPad: books made by iBooks Author are made to be viewed on an iPad and may only be sold on Apple’s iTunes Store. (There is also an ability to . . . [more]

This is a small part of a stretch of ocean that’s being talked about a lot lately in connection with the Northern Gateway pipeline and the possibility of using Prince Rupert as an alternative western terminus. But this isn’t a fillip about pipelines, oil, or even oceans. It’s about those little coloured shapes that look like old-fashioned pen nibs — and even more about a website that tracks them. Some thousands of them all around the globe.

MarineTraffic.com gets data about ships’ positions and movement from AIS (automatic identification system) transponders on board vessels via VHF signals, the kind . . . [more]

As Connie mentioned, the annual Consumer Electronics Show is now underway in Las Vegas. The tech press is full of commentary on the latest and greatest things at the show. One trend is that everything is becoming more intelligent and more connected, ranging from TV’s to appliances.

That results in many great features and new capabilities. At the same time, a Washington Post article entitled Privacy rights activists worry about potential abuse of high-tech devices featured at CES event points out that we can’t forget about the privacy issues that comes along with this technology.

The article starts off . . . [more]

and not help one’s expert witness consulting practice

One bit of advice young lawyers are given – much easier to follow in the brave new world of reasons for judgment online and so easily searched – is to look for cases in which judges have commented on the expert’s objectivity. The words in square brackets are my interpolations for clarity.

From a trial decision not too long ago, about a witness who testified for the side that ultimately won at trial but lost on appeal.

•  Dr. S. called by the Plaintiffs, was qualified as an expert to give opinion evidence

Now that Christmas and New Year’s are safely tucked away, we can move on to things less ritual, less structured. But before we do, I’m going to take one last kick at the cans—because that’s the nature of the ghosts of Christmas past and auld lang syne, is it not? to linger nostalgically for a bit.

I seem to recall that as an adolescent I used to get a lot of shirts from Santa. Imagine my delight. And then one year my parents (yes, I knew by then: I was always sharp as a tack) gave me an LP with . . . [more]

The new year starts with a lot of news about wages.

As reported in various newspapers, including the Globe and Mail and La Presse, the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives has published a report entitled “Canada’s CEO elite: the 0.01%” (available here) regarding the annual compensation of Canada’s highest paid 100 executives in 2010. The titles of the newspaper articles alone reveal that these salaries are not insignificant.

Of interest is also the fact that Gildan Activewear Inc.’s Board of Directors will offer shareholders an advisory vote during the 2012 annual shareholders’ meeting on the corporation’s approach to executive . . . [more]