One area in which the new ways of communicating and collaborating that are discussed so often at this site are coming to the fore is in labour relations. Social networking sites are proving to be a valuable tool for labour union to bring a group of people together in a common cause.

In a widely-reported event last month, IBM workers in Italy wanted to stage a protest over a performance bonus they had not received. They decided to hold the protest in Second Life; IBM has long been a business leader in the virtual world. Protestors from around the (real) . . . [more]

The Future of Things has an update on the progress of electronic paper. The article is an interview with “the father of e-paper” Nick Sheridon, and includes some history, notes on current applications (including sony’s e-reader), and speculations about 2012, when he expects to see e-paper in widespread use.

The main advantage of e-paper, of course, would be the ease of editing. It might be especially useful for labeling foods and drugs, for instance.

via Stephen’s Lighthouse . . . [more]

I’ve blogged a couple of times already about Zotero, that impressive Firefox extension that operates as a note-taker and bibliographic software. Zotero can tell when you’re viewing a book or an article or, now, a legal judgment, but until recently it had no category, if you like, for blog entry. That’s changed.

COinS (ContextObjects in Spans) is a simple way of embedding citation metadata in web pages. Zotero developed a WordPress plugin that uses the COinS specification for making basic metadata available to it. ((There seems to be a problem with the way the plugin interacts with version 2.2.2 . . . [more]

Between 1998 and now Christopher Baker accumulated 60,000 emails, which, at something like 20 a day isn’t an unreasonable number. He knew that in that mine lay information that would show him the shifting relationships between him and his correspondents across the decade, and he also knew that it would be difficult, not to mention tedious, to assess these by reading the archive. Instead, he designed a custom program that illustrated the networks graphically. You can see this in a Flash movie demonstrating his program.

This is, for me, paradigmatic of what computers are about: processing great quantitites of data . . . [more]

Last time I spoke to Simon F, he was complaining that there was not enough WiFi service available to keep him and his new iPod Touch connected at all times. This in a city whose downtown is blanketed by a WiFi network provided by Toronto Hydro. I’ve never tried the service myself – for the time it was in a free trial, I didn’t live within the area covered.

Toronto is not the only city to attempt such a scheme. However, the takeup has not quite been as expected in cities across the United States, particularly where private companies . . . [more]

My friends and I like to travel. And yet, we also like to reduce our footprint on the environment. And really, the two things are so contradictory. Every time we step onto an airplane, we are doing inestimable damage to the environment. What to do?

Back in May Air Canada announced a carbon off-set program called Zerofootprint. The program has a website where you can submit your flight information, and using information it has on record for Air Canada’s planes, it calculates how much it would cost to plant trees to off-set your carbon usage: Zerofootprint calculator. Now . . . [more]

Announced yesterday, a new Canadian law blog is now available via the Financial Post blog community called Legal Post Docket. After blogging for a couple months behind closed doors, it *looks* like the wrapping was taken off yesterday morning (Oct. 10th). Not sure on that…. perhaps someone from LPD can chime in with an answer? Also a test to see if they’re following other Canadian legal blogs like Slaw. Timer starts now! ;-)

Most of the entries are from Jim Middlemiss, formerly connected with both Law Times and Canadian Lawyer, and two other notable Canadian legal writers . . . [more]

The Ontario Court of Appeal is the the middle of hearing Mississaugas of Scugog Island First Nation v. National Automobile Aerospace Transportation and General Workers Union of Canada (Caw-Canada) (on appeal from the Divisional Court), in which the First Nation is arguing that the Labour Relations Act ought not to apply on their reserve because of their self-government rights. The Great Blue Heron Casino (warning: sound) is on the reserve. Today the government lawyers will argue. The hearing is scheduled to begin at 10.30 EST and is being webcast.

By the way, the Court has archived all . . . [more]

I know we can count a number of sports fans among our readership, many of whom probably rely on today’s technology to help follow whatever game catches your fancy. The sports industry has been a leader in using the internet to get content out to its fans, and is also a leader in using technology to control the footage that does get out.

Last spring, for instance, the CBC began streaming its hockey playoff coverage online – but it was available only to fans watching from Canada. This follows a long-standing practice of the BBC to stream its soccer coverage . . . [more]

Second Life has received plenty of media coverage both here and elsewhere (for example, Simon’s post about a Canadian law firm opening up a virtual office). But there are a number of other virtual worlds out there where people congregrate to share their interest in everything from new music to Japanese animation.

For those of you with an interest in joining the “avatar age” (I haven’t taken the plunge yet myself), here’s a story with a list of some of the more popular sites. . . . [more]

Google just bought Jaiku, “an activity stream and presence sharing service that works from the Web and mobile phones.” (See also Slaw’s Jaiku Your Feeds.) Robert Scoble opines that this is a good fit for Google, which, he says, plans to compete with Facebook. Watch out for November 5, he tells us. (Which also happens to be Guy Fawkes day…the Gunpowder Plot… but I digress.) . . . [more]

The long-running One Laptop Per Child program is about to bear fruit this fall when the XO laptop becomes available. Last week’s NY Times had an article summarizing all of the innovative features included in this rugged machine. The laptop that is now to cost $200, or twice the initial goal of keeping the cost under $100. It’s features, particularly its networking and collaboration capabilities, look really interesting.

In a new direction in their strategy, the program is asking for a donation of $400, which will provide the donor with their very own XO and provide a child with another. . . . [more]