Dear all,

For those who don’t have or won’t find more compelling reasons – without limiting the generality, etc., getting together with family, giving and getting presents, unwrapping presents, staking out garbage, getting a pedicure, washing the dog, herding cats, discovering the next unknown prime in Pi, successfully rendering coherent some of the jurisprudence of … [subject optional] – occupying their time in the immediate future, I’m pleased to announce I’m going to be a guest blogger on the University of Alberta, Faculty of Law, Faculty Blog.

What can I say? I’m sure my occasional musings, here, played some . . . [more]

I was reading Connie Crosby’s recent Slaw.ca post National: Canada’s Best Law Firm Websites. It described an article in the Canadian Bar Association’s National magazine about the best law firm websites in a variety of categories, including blogs.

And then, I came across an article in Legal Blog Watch on Law.com:

As the world goes to hell in a handbasket, the blawgosphere is abuzz with a debate over whether big firm blogs are boring. Blame it on the ABA Journal’s Blawg 100, which listed but two blogs from Am Law 100 firms. Not surprising, opines big-firm blogger Mark Herrmann,

From the Toronto Star report

A U.S. federal appeals court has upheld a US$290-million judgement against Microsoft Corp. in a patent case launched by Toronto-based i4i Inc.

The ruling also includes an injunction, set to go into effect Jan. 11, that would prevent the sale of at least some versions of Microsoft’s popular Word word processing software.

What does this mean to the Word/Office portion of the Gatesian Empire? I mean, apart from the judgment amount and whatever it’ll notionally cost it to recall Word & Office 2007 copies which can’t be sold if the injunction remains in place?

A . . . [more]

This week in biotech was all about action at a distance. Not the quantum entanglement kind, just the plain old mucking with things indirectly kind.

In a post on recent developments in electronic medical records, two items highlighted a role for remote access: a pilot program by the American Telemedicine Association that is using phone, email and videoconferencing to resolve over 55% of issues without an office visit; and a new pacemaker that transmits data to the doctor and the patient to allow proactive monitoring and planning.

Another phenomenon one step removed — BioMS, having had to abandon . . . [more]

The December issue of the CBA’s National magazine has been released, and includes the article “Canada’s best law firm websites” [pdf] by Luigi Benetton. Nine “legal technology professionals” were asked to rank and comment on law firm websites in a number of categories (including yours truly).

I encourage you to read the full article for the analysis, discussion and quotes, but here is the run-down of winners and honourable mentions with links in the various categories:

Big Firm (multi-jurisdictional)

Winner: Ogilvy Renault LLP
Honourable mentions: Gowling Lafleur Henderson LLP, Fasken Martineau DuMoulin LLP

Small Firm/Solo

Co-winners: . . . [more]

If you check out Steve Matthews‘ great post today, Web Law Predictions for 2010, there is one that is already starting to stand out:

I’ll go out on a limb, and predict that 2010 will be the year a law firm somewhere will declare smart phones to be a security risk, jamming transmission internally or banning usage from inside the firm.

The ABA Journal recently noted concerns raised by Sharon Nelson and John Simek of Sensei Enterprises about the use of iPhones by lawyers. The major issue is that handheld device takes screenshots of documents in order to . . . [more]

Google is always releasing new features or apps. Here’s a rundown of some released recently that may have relevance for lawyers…

Google Groups joins Google Apps

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/… – Permalink – Similar

Google Labs is collaborating with the New York Times and the Washington Post to present certain featured news stories in a web-sophisticated way. Essentially, stories chosen by the news sources — no searching for items that you select — are presented on a page in which you’ll find a summary at the top, a timeline of events immediately below, and excerpts from reports as the story has developed over . . . [more]

Simon Fodden recently quipped that Apple was becoming so mainstream that he might have to switch to Linux to keep his “smug sense of computer specialness.” This reminded me that, a little more than a year ago, I posted a little note here indicating that I was thinking about getting a Linux netbook and an internet stick. I eventually did just that, and thought I would offer some reflections on my experience so far.

The bad news is that most people using Linux (at least those without IT support) are going to feel “special” at least some of the time, . . . [more]

Yesterday the United States Supreme Court granted certiorari in the case of Ontario, CA, et al. v. Quon, Jeff, et al.. (No, not that Ontario; no, not that CA.) Quon is a police officer who sent hundreds of personal text messages to his girlfriend and others on a device provided by Quon’s employer, which had an informal policy that it wouldn’t inquire into an employee’s use of the device if he or she paid for the cost of extra usage. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals [PDF] ruled that the town’s review of Quon’s messages was an . . . [more]

In case you overlooked it in our selected #slawca retweets from last week, the ABA Techshow 2010 schedule has been released. ABA Techshow will be taking place March 25-27, 2010 in Chicago. View the quick web version of the schedule (session titles only, speakers aren’t listed here) or download the PDF schedule and registration info. Keynote is Ari Kaplan: “The New Big Bang – The Convergence of Technology and Marketing”. Faculty from our Slaw community and the larger Canadian legal industry include:

• Joel Alleyne
• David Bilinsky
• Jean-François DeRico
• Peg Duncan
• Dominic Jaar
• Nils Jensen
• Steven Matthews
• Donna S.M.

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]

When I closed an old Google account over the weekend, it appears that I inadvertently deleted the Custom Google Search of Canadian law firms that I had created (and that I understand is used a fair bit by researchers).

I have created a new Custom Google Search of Canadian Law Firms, now at a new URL of:

http://www.tinyurl.com/canadianlawfirms

Click here to see a sample search result on the phrase “fiduciary duties.”

The new site is free of ads and has more Canadian law firms included (now there are 51 or the larger law firms from across the country). I also . . . [more]