At this time of year many legal bloggers are busy making predictions about what major trends, technologies and shifts we’ll be seeing in the legal space in the coming year. Here’s a roundup of what some of the legal blogosphere thinks is in store in 2011:

• What Surprised you in 2010 (and What Should Lawyers Expect in 2011)? by Adrian Lurssen on the JD Supra Scoop Blog
• 10 Legal Tech Predictions for 2011 by David Bilinski at Thoughtful Legal Management
• 2011 Tech Trends for Lawyers by Niki Black at Sui Generis
• 10 Legal Trends for 2011 by John Wallbillich at

Last month I wrote about the recent birth of my second son as being a happy reminder to keep things in perspective and to maintain balance in my life. With the winter solstice approaching later this month, this is perhaps the most important time of year to make balance a priority. Darkness is depressing. Going to and from work in the dark makes us feel as though we’re living in a cave. Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) is a clinically recognized phenomenon, particularly for those of us living far from the equator. Added to that are the complexities of the holiday . . . [more]

(Having allowed Simon F. the honour of the first 2011 post, not the least in recognition of all that he and the rest of the Slaw administration do to keep this place going. I trust that I am not presumptuous in thanking all of you, again.)

This isn’t quite a new year’s resolution but it will do.

Let’s hope that common sense (whatever it means) prevails this year.

Let’s hope that public (political, judicial, and other) and private reference to decisions supported by, or required by, common sense aren’t calls to the seeming authority of common sense because the conclusion . . . [more]

It’s a Sunday and the new year by a day, now, and the days have already been getting longer for nearly two weeks. Which not only pleases me but had me musing about time — clock time, that is. I wandered over to the National Research Council site only to find it was offline (the end of time?), except for its Java Clock, that told me my computer’s clock was wrong by -0.023 seconds. So over to the US Naval Observatory for some data as to the times for rising and setting of the sun. (Rise at 7.51 and . . . [more]

There is a wonderful spin-off magazine from the Economist called More Intelligent Life.

Like most other magazines, it does a year-end review of the best books of 2010.

But someone at the magazine didn’t quite check the clipart that accompanies that page:

Who actually thought that the Pacific Reporter was worth a plug? And thought that caselaw might be enhanced by snow?

Happy New Year – and a Guid Hogmanay. . . . [more]

Listen up.

This fillip’s about soundscapes. We’re all pretty familiar with those recordings of thunderstorms or surf or canoeing up a river, the ones that help us relax and, often, sleep. Strangely to some, there are city sounds that people enjoy as well, sounds for those who use their ears that are as characteristic of their burg as shots of the skyline. So think about the city sounds you like as you peruse the unorchestrated urban sonatas that follow here.

First is London, where the Favourite Sounds project seems to have had its greatest success. You’re probably best off . . . [more]

Information overload, and ways to overcome it, has been mentioned on Slaw several times. I came across this article from SSRN titled “What We Don’t Know We Don’t Know” and it reminded me of the consequences of ignorance. Although I thought the article was going to be about ways to overcome information overload, it quickly shifted to an analysis of scholarly research and the metrics used to measure it, such as the impact factor (IF). I found the use of measurement very transferable to legal research, such as the IF in a legal decision of the number of citations by . . . [more]

Louis reported earlier this month on the story of a US federal jury which awarded $2.5-million in punitive damages and $90,000 in actual damages to each of two law professors who said that Thomson West had put their names on an annual supplement to a leading Pennsylvania practitioners’ text, even though they had refused to update the supplement when their pay was unilaterally halved.

Surprise to no-one – Thomson West will be back in court next month seeking an injunction to restrain what they say is prejudicial publicity – and we suspect, saying that the punitives are excessive.

We . . . [more]

David Canton has kept Slawyers abreast of developments concerning Canada’s anti-spam legislation: FISA – New Anti-Spam Bill Introduced; Plethora of Pending IT Legislation. But we neglected to report that Bill C-28 passed third reading on December 14 and received Royal Assent a day later. Evidently, it won’t be proclaimed in force until September of 2011, to give us all time to get our acts together.

The text of the statute is available here [PDF].

I’ve been coy about naming the beast (78 pages in the official version), because the name it goes by appears nowhere in the act. . . . [more]

This time last year I wrote a post making Web Law Predictions for 2010. My success rate was admittedly mixed – the idea of law firms jamming cell phone transmissions was, in hindsight, a little odd – while my predictions in other areas were surprisingly accurate of the way things played out. The rise of the mobile legal web, rapid mainstream adoption (and increased noise) of social media channels, the game-changing impact of tablet computing, and the ramped up production of “real time” spam were all favorable predictions, in my view. I found the process to be a fruitful . . . [more]

There has been much in the news on stranded airline passengers due to the recent blizzard in the North East. A newspaper story here from Russia describes a fairly grim situation at airports in Moscow.

I too was affected, after having spent a great time in New York City over the Christmas break. We were due to return via Newark International Airport on Monday (with the heart of the blizzard striking Sunday evening). The iPad came in very handy to constantly check the status of our delayed flight, which was eventually cancelled and re-scheduled to Tuesday (we made it out, . . . [more]