I have been thinking about books recently while considering our firm’s own print and online collection. Paul Emond’s column last week on The Future of Academic Legal Publishing addresses head-on the challenges and opportunities facing publishers of law-related books (and casebooks). In my September 2007 SLAW posting titled Digital Law Books in Canada, I suggested that we have perhaps reached a (positive) tipping point on the availability of digital law-related books with (very) roughly 10% of the major Canadian legal treatises being available in digital format. Since that time, I have had the opportunity to consider and debate this . . . [more]

David T.S. Fraser, from McInnes Cooper, opened his plenary session by emphasizing the fact that the Internet is about relationships – whether one on one (emails), one to few (IRC, chat) or one to many (blogs, Usenet). In this context, the last few years have seen the rapid growth of social networking sites such as Facebook where the success of these sites depends on the voluntary disclosure of personal information by users. If you have a Facebook account… You probably know how the sharing of personal information is easy and attractive when you are “virtually surrounded” by your friends, . . . [more]

En séance plénière, le Professeur Pierre Trudel, Titulaire de la Chaire L.R. Wilson, a démontré de façon convaincante à quel point le modèle de protection des renseignements personnels (hérité des années ’70-’80) est dépassé. Ce cadre n’est plus adéquat pour protéger les individus contre les dangers réels associés aux nouvelles technologies de l’information puisqu’il vise essentiellement la censure des informations publiques.

Le prix d’un cadre juridique dépassé et conçu pour un autre âge est élevé. Il permet la généralisation de pratiques visant à transférer les risques aux Internautes – dans les mots du Professeur Trudel: “le droit de cliquer”. . . . [more]

En guise de séance plénière, Me Jennifer Stoddart, Commissaire à la vie privée du Canada, a énoncé deux grands défis pour le Commissariat concernant les technologies de l’information:

• Faire respecter la loi dans un contexte virtuel; et
• Faire respecter les normes canadiennes dans un contexte global.

Me Stoddart a illustré le premier défi avec l’exemple du jeune Torontois interpellé par la police et soupçonné de meurtre: bien que bénéficiant d’une ordonnance de non publication, l’identité du jeune a rapidement circulé sur Internet – que faire dans un tel cas où les contrevenants sont des centaines, voire des milliers de . . . [more]

La deuxième édition annuelle de la “conférence national sur le potentiel et l’impact des technologies et de l’information pour la pratique du droit” a lieu aujourdhui à Montréal, au Centre Mont-Royal, et il est tout à fait remarquable qu’en si peu de temps la conférence ait acquis autant de crédibilité auprès de la profession juridique. Sous la présidence d’honneur de Madame Jennifer Stoddart, Commissaire à la vie privée du Canada, et du Professeur Pierre Trudel, Titulaire de la Chaire L.R. Wilson; la conférence a inauguré ses travaux avec les mots de bienvenue de Me Bernard Amyot, Président . . . [more]

On April 17, 2008 IT World Canada published “The 10 Best Technology Bloggers in Canada” a list compiled by ComputerWorld Canada editor Shane Schick [currently accessible; may require free registration later to view].

Congratulations to Rob Hyndman of Hyndman Law for being included. Schick’s rationale for selecting him:

The Toronto-based lawyer works with both vendors and corporate enterprises to untangle the intricate contractual issues that come up in their relationships. His interest in IT is best expressed by a quote, attributed to Gregory Benford, that appears at the top of his home page: “Any technology distinguishable

Olivier Charbonneau, bibliothécaire professionnel et chercheur à l’Université Concordia, and blogger behind the excellent CultureLibre.ca, posts about a petition started by Le député provincial de Mercier à Montréal, Daniel Turp, aiming to persuade ICANN to grant Quebec the top level domain designation “dot qc.”

Apparently the Deputy discovered that the semi-autonomous regions of Catalan and Greenland have their own dot suffixes.

The full list of top level domains is available on the IANA site. .GL, Greenland’s code is listed as a “country code”; while .CAT is said to be “sponsored” and “Reserved for the Catalan linguistic and cultural . . . [more]

The Internet is getting big and ugly. While our personal experience is still what we make of it, web-culture is seldom more than a reflection of our greater society. We take the good along with the bad; unfortunately, when it comes to web marketing, things don’t appear to be shaping up much different.

How bad is it? I recently came across this April 9th post by Steve Rubel that drives the point home: “94% of all email is spam, 64% of all English language blogs are splogs, and click fraud for sponsored links rose by 15% last year alone. Can . . . [more]

Apparently the University of Chicago Law School has stopped giving students access to the internet in classrooms, at least on an “experimental basis,” according to the Dean. Inside Higher Ed has the story on the situation, first broken by the blog Above The Law. Students are not happy about it, according to reports.

This seems to be the first time a law school has shut off wireless connectivity as a matter of policy.

I’ve just finished teaching a law school course and I’d have to say that, looked at from the other side, there are few if any good . . . [more]

It’s a science fillip this Friday and I’ve got three mildly related stories for your delectation.

1. The Complete Works of Charles Darwin is/are online. Here you’ll find “Darwin’s complete publications, thousands of handwritten manuscripts and the largest Darwin bibliography and manuscript catalogue ever published; also hundreds of supplementary works: biographies, obituaries, reviews, reference works and more.” You might want to take a look at the celebrated Voyages of The Adventure and Beagle — and you can, both in a scan of the original work and in the plain text version alongside. Or you may want to give your eyes . . . [more]

A legal low-tech note for a Friday — which is still law and technology and, so, fit meat for Slaw:

The Premier of Ontario will announce today that a regulation taking effect immediately will undo any existing bans on the use of clotheslines by homeowners and preclude any such bans in the future. The regulation, which hasn’t yet made it to the e-laws site, is made pursuant to the Energy Conservation Leadership Act, 2006, S.O. 2006, c.3, Schedule A:

s.3(2) A person is permitted to use designated goods, services and technologies in such circumstances as may be prescribed, despite

John Ruggie, appointed UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General on business and human rights has recently released his report, “Protect, Respect and Remedy: a Framework for Business and Human Rights.” [PDF]

From the summary:

Responding to the invitation by the Human Rights Council for the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on the issue of human rights and transnational corporations and other business enterprises to submit his views and recommendations for its consideration, this report presents a conceptual and policy framework to anchor the business and human rights debate, and to help guide all relevant actors. The framework comprises