Deciding disputes is a big thing for human beings — as readers of this blog are bound to know. Sometimes we opt for a facsimile of reason, other times we court fate with chance, as when we toss a coin or throw a die. (We’ll leave aside the urge to cause harm in order to decide, with such lovelies as ducking, trial by battle, and peine forte et dure.) A variation on the theme of chance is the game of rock, paper, scissors. I say variation, because although the game is apparently unskilled, it involves two people in harmless contest . . . [more]

Almost a year ago, I closed my private practice and accepted a position as in-house counsel. It was an intriguing challenge: I had acted as a kind of “outsourced” in-house counsel to a number of companies, and I now had the opportunity to do that work full time. I was swapping all of my clients for one, and giving up being my own boss in exchange for having one (accompanied by a regular paycheque and a number of extra benefits).

I don’t regret the decision at all. It’s been a fascinating challenge, and I’m relishing all of the new opportunities. . . . [more]

The NYTimes is rolling out their digital subscriber plans starting on March 28th. Unless… you live north of the border!

Starting today, we Canadians have been designated the beta test country of choice:

Canada residents only: Please visit the order page to get unlimited access to NYTimes.com, plus the NYTimes app for your smartphone. Other subscription packages, which include our tablet apps, will be available on March 28, 2011.

Outside Canada: Digital subscription packages will be available for purchase on March 28, 2011.

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The Research Instruction and Patron Services (RIPS) division of the American Association of Law Libraries has just released its 19th Annual National Legal Research Teach-In Kit.

Every year, RIPS gathers together PowerPoint presentations, research assignments, lesson plans, syllabi, and instructional handouts on a variety of topics. It is a great resource if you need inspiration for developing your own legal research material. There is also a list of kits from previous years on the RIPS website.

Canadian law librarians have also been sharing instructional materials thanks to the efforts of the Courthouse and Law Society Libraries Special Interest Group . . . [more]

People have not been paying much attention to the application of standards under the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA); however, they are coming soon, are complex and require understanding and preparation. In the first part of this post, we discussed the Accessibility Standards for Customer Service (Ontario Regulation 429/07). Now, will take a look at what’s coming next, the Proposed Integrated Accessibility Regulation.

Multi-country outsourcing means customer engages supplier to deliver outsourcing services to its affiliated entities in various jurisdictions. Structuring and negotiating a long-lasting outsourcing relationship require the parties to effectively manage many risks. Multi-country outsourcing deals multiple the challenges.

There are different ways to structure a multi-country outsourcing relationship. The most commonly used approach is to have a framework agreement between the two principal entities and local agreement between local entities of the two organizations. The terms and conditions in the framework agreement will flow to the local entities except to the extent they have been modified in the local agreement. . . . [more]

The Canadian Privacy Commissioner’s most recent newsletter refers to a document entitled “Data at Your Fingertips: Biometrics and the Challenges to Privacy“. 

I believe that biometrics will ultimately be the right solution for authentication and identification, and will help reduce the use of passwords which, lets face it, are very difficult in practice to use to their best theoretical effectiveness.

There are however challenges in using biometrics relating to privacy and identity theft.

The document starts off by saying:

Canadians are witnessing a growing interest among government and private-sector organizations in adopting systems that use biometric characteristics to

. . . [more]

Just two weeks ago Supreme Court Justice Thomas A. Cromwell gave the Macfadyen Lecture, the second in the memorial series sponsored by the Scottish Council of Law Reporting. The Council has now made the text of that talk available online.

Justice Cromwell spoke on “The Challenges of Scientific Evidence.” A quotation from his introduction and an outline of the topics he addressed will give you a sense of the scope of his talk:

In virtually every jurisdiction, [the] courtroom encounters between law and science have also resulted in spectacular miscarriages of justice. This, along with the other concerns, have

. . . [more]

When evaluating print law-related books for purchase, librarians will consider a number of factors: the author’s expertise, the reliability of the publisher, whether the book is heavily foot-noted, and whether it contains good finding tools, such as a detailed table of contents, table of cases or legislation or an index.

Unfortunately, in the Canadian legal publishing market – which is relatively small – the quality of indexes in print law-related books is variable since most publishers put the onus on the author to create their own index (which makes sense, since the author is the subject expert and knows his . . . [more]

Android-powered phones and tablets are an increasingly prevalent option for lawyers. Android was the operating system on one-third of the smartphones sold in the fourth quarter of 2010, according to the Wall Street Journal. The power of these devices is not the operating system, though. Just as with Apple’s iPhone and iPad, the real punch comes from the small software apps that you install on your device. Unlike Apple, you don’t need any intermediary software like iTunes to access the Android Market. Let’s take a look at some of the apps you might want to grab for your . . . [more]

Michael Carabash, the founder and CEO of Dynamic Lawyers, was recently featured on the television show Dragon’s Den, where entrepreneurs make a a business pitch to a panel of potential investors.

Carabash was selling an interest in his website and legal forms, which seek to provide legal services in a cost-effective manner to the public. The Dragon’s turned down his proposal, but Carabash feels the experience was still worth it.

You can catch a clip from the show here.

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Over the last couple of decades as the rate of change in information technology has accelerated, it’s become fashionable for some to claim with pride and others to award with scorn the title of Luddite. As it happens, this March marks the bicentennial of the real Luddite uprising in the north of England. Richard Conniff has written a piece, “What the Luddites Really Fought Against,” that’s available on Smithsonian.com, correcting the misunderstandings that most of us have about who these followers of Ludd actually were and why they took to breaking machines.

Some facts surprised me: there was . . . [more]