I don’t know if I’m the only Slaw reader who has to rattle around the Canadian or British Government sites to find what I’m looking for. It seems as if the new Conservative government was simply concerned to do a top level rebranding, but not to re-examine how the site actually worked.

Two developments today, one at Westminster and the other in Delhi.

The announcement in Delhi this morning that the new national portal will be based on open standards and multiple entry points.

For Canadian users who may not be fully familiar with the allocation of powers between the . . . [more]

Coming from a family where almost every man in my life (my Dad, three brothers, and my son) is red/green colour challenged, it’s been something that I consider in almost everything I do. I won’t regale you with stories of disastrous wardrobe choices, fondue fork confusions, farming challenges (Is it still green?), non-option careers (no pilots, electricians, police officers or firefighters in my family) or tales from school (Why did you colour your Mom’s hair green?) but believe me, I have a few stories to tell!

Naturally, colour interpretation has always been of personal interest to me. But I’ll make . . . [more]

Next week is Banned Books Week and there’s an interesting entry page which Google has mounted.

Each year, the American Library Association’s (ALA) Office for Intellectual Freedom receives hundreds of reports on books and other materials that were “challenged” (their removal from school or library shelves was requested). The ALA estimates the number represents only about a quarter of the actual challenges. “Most Challenged” titles include the popular “Harry Potter” series of fantasy books for children by J.K. Rowling. The series drew complaints from parents and others who believe the books promote witchcraft to children.

The challenges reported

. . . [more]

As I was preparing a presentation I will be giving at Marcus Evans’ Document Retention and E-Discovery: Best Practices for Canadian Corporations conference in Toronto on October 19th regarding the understanding and management of E-docs and records, I realised that these three concepts are confused by everyone, even the Legislator. Here is a list of the confusing definitions you will find in different statutes from Canada, Ontario and Quebec. If you know of any other interesting ones, I would love to know! . . . [more]

Corn today.

There's a really interesting video of a keynote given by Larry Lessig to the LinuxWorld conference. It's long -- more than an hour -- but like most of Lessig's presentations, really well done.

...

While I may be in Halifax, I am a native New Brunswicker so with the New Brunswick Election slated for Monday, Sept. 18 I feel that I need to be rep-re-sentin’ by providing a quick primer on the election. Prior to the election being called the membership of the Legislature was composed as follows: Progressive Conservative 28, Liberal 26, Independent 1.

I will edit this post with the results and media reports after the election.

NB Office of the Chief Electoral Officer

Bureau de la directrice générale des élections

Registered Political Parties

Political Parties (alphabetically)

Liberal Party of NB

Liberal

. . . [more]

This morning, courtesy of Joel Alleyne, I’m at Borden Ladner Gervais, at the Toronto – New York Knowledge Management Roundtable.

The session started off with a presentation by Irene Taylor of Praxis on The Rise of the Knowledge/Creative Professional which reprised her Lexpert articles analyzing the factors that appeared to characterize a group of lawyers, whom Lexpert chose as especially creative.

Ms. Taylor used a lot of psychometric measures, which the audience had some difficulty with. I suspect that lawyers are naturally sceptical of some of the more prescriptive parts of psychometrics, as they are of . . . [more]

This is a posting I received through the AALL FCIL listserv which I thought a worthwile addition to SLAW’s discussion on preservation and digital archives:

The USIP report prepared “Temporary Courts, Permanent Records” examines and makes recommendations for the permanent retention of the records of the International Criminal Tribunals for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and Rwanda (ICTR), the Special Court for Sierra Leone (SCSL), the Special Panels and Serious Crimes Unit in East Timor, and the internationalized courts and prosecutors in Kosovo.

I was astounded that there was even an issue about whether or not to preserve these records. The . . . [more]

The Library Research Seminar IV, The Library in its Socio-Cultural Context:
Issues for Research and Practice, taking place at the Univsity of Western Ontario on October 10-12 2007, has issued a call for papers:

We invite papers that critically explore:

• the intellectual contexts that inform library research and practice
• the local, community contexts that shape the development and implementation of library programs and services
• the policy issues and general social forces shaping libraries
• the broad cultural trends affecting libraries
• multi- or interdisciplinary perspectives on the everyday contexts of libraries affecting their collections, services, budgets, user groups, external relations etc.

. . . [more]

CanadExport is Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada’s flagship newsletter. Its articles promote Canadian exports abroad by discussing trade policies and agreements, general market intelligence, potential markets, and trade and investment opportunities.
This FREE publication always surprises me with the useful and valuable information it provides. Examples of such gems include:

–data on China-India trade

–overview of the tax agreement between Canada and Finland

–Brazil’s growth forecast

–China’s consumption of natural resources

–Canada’s international trade and investment performance

You can search the articles going back to 1999, and you can also subscribe to the email . . . [more]