There’s an interesting essay in today’s NY Times, “How to Speak a Book“The free NYTimes link maker doesn’t work with this URL because it’s to a special section, I think, so you may need to have registered with the Times., by Richard Powers. It’s essentially a paean to dictation as the means of writing a book. Powers, once a serious computer geek and now a novelist of some renown, dictates his novels to his tablet PC. (He doesn’t say what software he uses but my bet is that it’s Dragon.)

I find the piece interesting but . . . [more]

On Monday Simon Fodden pointed out some of the legislation coming into force as of January 1st. For those of you working with Ontario legislation, thought I would mention some major statutes have been proclaimed into force, and subsequent regulations published. The good people who bring us e-Laws, usually on the top of their game having things updated within a day or two, are working hard to get all changes incorporated into the service, but they are behind right now. If you are working with the conslidated statutes on e-Laws, check the notes at the top of the . . . [more]

The question often comes up whether we are losing our ability to think in a complex, in-depth manner with the gradual shift to electronic sources. As we try to balance paper and electronic formats for legal research tools, it is something we do need to consider. This seems to be an underlying idea in some of the comments that have come up from Michael Line’s post about the legal research training tools being developed in B.C. earlier this week.

Since Simon Fodden is professing his love for information, I will state the equally obvious and tell you that: I . . . [more]

After last year’s unusual acquisition of Brad Hildebrandt’s firm by Thomson, comes news that Baker Robbins, one of the best regarded legal technology consulting firms is being acquired. Good for David Baker and Brad Robbins.

Now how West capitalizes on the acquisition is an interesting challenge:

The Thomson Corporation Acquires Baker Robbins

The Thomson Corporation
1/5/2007 11:27:38 AM

Strengthens position in law firm IT, operations consulting

EAGAN, Minn. 01/05/2007, The Thomson Corporation (NYSE: TOC; TSX: TOC) today announced the acquisition of Baker Robbins & Company, the leading provider of technology and information management consulting to law firms and law departments.

I love information. This is a silly thing to say, I know, and a silly thing to have an affection for, perhaps. After all, “information” is so general as to be useless. But don’t despise the useless, because some useless things are quite worthwhile, such as art, for example — which leads me to this week’s fillip.

information aesthetics is a website that posts finds from around the web that present information graphically. There’s a world of wonder here for the infomaniac or the visual communicator. Take, for example, his entry on creative calendar design, where he draws together . . . [more]

This from Sharon Wang, Reference Librarian, Osgoode Hall Law School:

There are two electronic publications on the web on Chinese law, for those who are interested in Chinese legal research or who practice internationally.

China Law Reporter, a monthly newsletter published by the ABA China Committee. It has recent legal development, summaries of newly enacted laws and regulations, a list of recently published articles and books on Chinese law and even some job opportunities in this field.

China Law and Governance Review, created by Su Lin Han, a native of Beijing who practiced law in New York for

WTO NEWS: 2006 PRESS RELEASES. With a cursory glance the previous link looks like an official WTO press release, even looking at the URL it seems fairly official; however, upon closer inspection something doesn’t seem quite right. That is because this WTO Press Release is brought to you by the same people who brought you the documentary The Yes Men, “Changing the world one prank at a time.” Some might remember The Yes Men as an official selection of the Toronto Film Festival. A full description of their activities can be found at Wikipedia. To quote from . . . [more]

The Fall 2006 issue of Perspectives (this latest issue was not posted on the website at the time of writing this note) contains two articles with a refreshing approach to legal writing instruction: “Homer Simpson Meets the Rule Against Perpetuities: The Controversial Use of Pop Culture in Legal Writing Pedagogy” (Louis N. Schulze Jr.) and “Using DVD Covers to Teach Weight of Authority” (Michael J. Higdon).

While I have spent many hours thinking about effective legal research and writing training, it was not until I picked up this newsletter that I was reminded of one of the keys to learning . . . [more]

According to today’s The Hindu, Chief Justice of India Y. K. Sabharwal and Chief Justice-designate K. G. Balakrishnan inaugurated a Legal Information Resource Centre at the Indian Law Institute in Delhi on Thursday.

The computerised centre will provide access to a large number of Supreme Court cases as well as cases from other important courts across the world. Cases dealt with by international courts, case studies of various law institutions, commissions and human rights commissions would also be available online. It will also have links to other related websites.

A publication, enumerating the services offered by the centre is . . . [more]

via the fast fingers at the BCCLS What’s New Blog:

Prime Minister Stephen Harper has appointed the Honourable Robert Douglas Nicholson as Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada.

Former Justice Minister the Honourable Vic Toews has been named President of the Treasury Board. . . . [more]

Business 2.0 Editor Erick Schonfeld has a nice post that introduces the concept of Web Widgets and why they will be important in 2007 (& in the future). If you want a short concise explanation, link on over.

The idea behind these Widgets, is that web companies (often of the 2.0 variety) will offer the ability to plug content (eg. a Youtube video) into another website’s pages (think, a blog, Netvibes, or myspace page). And the big issue, or concern, is that these web companies won’t get credit under the traditional form of web metrics – the page impression . . . [more]

Here at the University of Victoria Faculty of Law, we recently compilted the results of th IT/Computer portion of the annual 1st year student survey. Here is a link to the three page survey.

Here are some highlights from the Survey:

• 94% of incoming students own laptops, and 98% of those laptops are wireless.
• 87% have high speed internet at home, and only 1% do not have any form of internet access from home.
• The average purchase price for laptops dropped again to $1358 (down from over $2000 in 2004).
• See the last page of the report for