Volunteers are still need through the holiday period for the Lawyers Feed the Hungry Program run out of the cafeteria at Osgoode Hall in downtown Toronto. Most everyone at one time or another has thought of volunteering and this may be the opportunity to do something that you have always wanted to do but never quite got around to it.

There is a particular need for help at the special holiday dinner this Wednesday, the 16th of December, when over 600 guests are expected. Dinner is served starting at 4:00 p.m. Volunteers are needed as early as 1:30 p.m. to . . . [more]

Following up on Connie’s post (thanks!) earlier this week, I’d like to thank everyone who has participated in the 2009 nomination season!

We’ve got one more fun item to announce… a new look for the site! Please drop by & have a look. And if you haven’t done so already, consider endorsing your own favourite bloggers!

Happy holidays!
Steve . . . [more]

Some of you have probably seen this news(?) item, already.

The headline is “Canadian charged with sham witchcraft“.

Excerpts from the article:

A Canadian woman is to appear in court on Christmas Eve for posing as a witch in order to defraud a grieving Toronto lawyer in a case that invokes a century-old law, police said Thursday.

The bogus witching law was enacted in 1892 when witchcraft was no longer a punishable offense in Canada, but fears persisted that it could be used as a cover for fraud.

It makes it illegal for anyone to fraudulently pretend

Is law important?

Clearly the print media don’t think so. Look at the way in which they carve up our world — and you’ll look in vain for a category or a main topic-head, let alone a section, for law or for its fuzzy cousin, justice.

The home page menus for the big newspapers offer you a collection of stories on politics, the economy, sports, style, arts, science, cars, weather, and sometimes education and health. But never law. To look at how six highly respected English language newspapers (the Globe and Mail, the National Post, the New York Times, the . . . [more]

December 6 marked several unpleasant anniversaries; in this part of the country it was the 92nd anniversary of the Halifax Explosion. To mark the date the Dalhousie University Archives have mounted an interesting display containing the official report by Alexander MacMechan entitled the Halifax Disaster.

While the Halifax Explosion is well known what is not as well known is that every Christmas since 1971 Nova Scotia sends Boston a large Christmas tree, which is erected in the Boston Common, as a as symbol of gratitude for the assistance Boston provided Halifax in the aftermath of the explosion in 1917. . . . [more]

2010 will see some interesting and useful developments in the tablet / e-book reader space. The concept of a thin, light, portable device with a decent screen size (i.e. a letter sized piece of paper) and long battery life to read things on – such as newspapers, magazines, books, the web – is quite compelling.

There are a few products on the market already – such as the Kindle. In my view the tipping point to widespread adoption will be colour screens that can render glossy magazine resolution, the ability to get web content via wifi rather than just over . . . [more]

THE WIPO STANDING COMMITTEE ON COPYRIGHT AND RELATED RIGHTS

The nineteenth session will take place in Geneva from December 14 to 18, 2009. The Committee is currently discussing special provisions for education, libraries and persons with disabilities, as well as the protection of audiovisual performances and broadcasting organizations. Meeting documents are at: www.wipo.int. . . . [more]

You couldn’t buy this kind of advertisement — at least, I hope you couldn’t. Check out the pic on the front page of the newly revamped U.S. Open Government Initiative | The White House. Just in case they change it, and the earnest young man at the keyboard is no longer there when you go to look, I’ve put a screenshot below.

Apple is becoming so mainstream I may have to switch to Linux to keep my smug sense of computer specialness.

Oh, and while you’re on the White House site, look around. It’s a little different from what . . . [more]

Another (hopefully) welcome diversion for all those toiling in the legal field. Head over to Precedent Magazine to read my latest story. Gearing up for the Games covers my efforts to design the perfect Vancouver 2010 get-away for the upcoming Olympic Winter Games without re-mortgaging my home. . . . [more]

A meditation of sorts, today, on forgetting, re-membering, progress, civilization and all the small stuff like that. But fear not: I won’t be blathering on about these imponderables: I’ll do my best to let you consider them.

The material on which to meditate is a hoard of art work — at least, that’s how we might see it now — produced by what has come to be known as Old Europe. Around seven thousand years ago, in an area about the Danube River, groups of people settled, lived, worked, played and made artefacts for something like a millennium and a . . . [more]

Everybody here over 45, with an OHLS LLB, or who has been out more that 10 years, or has a settled position doing something acceptably remunerative, regardless of how long it’s been since you stopped regurgitating (sorry, graduated), put up your right hand if you can think of one valid reason to bother paying OHLS anything to issue you a piece of paper that has York U on it in bigger letters – oops, sorry, that says you can call yourself a Junior Dick(head) – other than it’s somehow more prestigious because it uses the same questionable Latin that would . . . [more]