Revisions to the U.S. Patriot Act still don’t adequately protect the rights of American librarians and readers of library materials. As set out in the New York Times story today, under the original version of the legislation:

[a] Connecticut librarian …was visited by the Federal Bureau of Investigation last year and presented with what is known as a national security letter demanding patron records.

The subpoena, issued as part of a counterterrorism investigation, not only barred him from disclosing the target of the inquiry, but also forbade him and others at his place of work to ever discuss the letter

Courtesy of chaos kitty’s WebZen site, have a gander at the Google Image Quiz, which will doubtless amuse many Slaw readers.

. . . [more]

Please welcome Martha Foote to Slaw as an occasional contributor. Martha, a law and business librarian, is, as many of you will know, currently president of the Toronto chapter of the Special Libraries Association.

I look forward to Martha’s special contributions. . . . [more]

For those of you auditioning for reality shows, the prepixilated t-shirt may give you the edge you need (linked through Sivacracy). One comment points out that pixilated logos on TV are about “not wanting to give free advertising, and wanting to perpetuate this rights clearance culture”, not about IP law. Supporting this opinion is a guide to best practices for documentary film makers produced with counsel, which states that (in the US),

…the most common situations where producers have fair-use rights:
“[…]”Capturing copyrighted media content in the process of filming something else.” The producer unintentionally catches incidental sounds or

As reported today, Microsoft is delaying the launch of their new OS Vista until January 2007: story.

Does this mean anything for the widely held belief that Google is trying to replace the notion of an OS? . . . [more]

[cross-posted on Information Management Now]

For the past several months, I have been diligently exploring how Web 2.0 technologies could better support the work of lawyers. I’m happy to report my findings in this discussion paper, albeit in a particular context, using a TiddlyWiki. If you are interested in what it takes to write a document like this, make sure you check the About section in the paper.

Comments and suggestions are welcome. . . . [more]

I’m happy I get to post this, especially after Simon’s kind words on last month’s KM article.

Fellow Slawyer, Simon Chester makes a number of inciteful quotes in this month’s National article on the Commoditization of legal services. The article addresses the concept of commoditization generally, as well as some of the current trends in outsourcing. It’s well worth a stop & gander. :-)

Readers might also be interested that Commoditization is one of Ross Dawson’s Seven MegaTrends of Professional Services. As information and technology professionals, we should remember that these things do affect us.

Well done Simon! We’re . . . [more]

I received a flyer today from UVic’s Technology Transfer Office giving me some information about a research database called “flintbox”. It appears to be designed as a central place for all Canadian universities to disseminate, download, and licence research. Individual researchers post descriptions of their research.

I could only find one project that interested me – an open journal system” project developed at UBC which gives open sources access to the public.

Technology transfer is not particularly new to academic institutions and research centres, and I’m sorry this is so university-centric, but it brought me back to an idea I . . . [more]

Have any SLAWyers knowledge of Supreme Court plans to make the full-text of transcripts of argument available via the Web? The information on their Web-site simply notes that copies may be requested for a fee. This is something that the High Court of Australia has been making available via AustLII for over ten years now and is tremendously useful for researchers. Not only do you get an idea of the judges’ thinking from their comments, but the transcripts are a goldmine of useufl information and insight into complex issues confronting the highest appellate courts. Perhaps SLAW could take a role . . . [more]

According to AP, a class action has been launched by a group of websites claiming that Google’s techniques for weeding out dubious content and those who deploy tools to manipulate search algorithm to move up the rankings chart. This is a matter of some detached amusement to Slaw since a Google Search for Justice Marshall Rothstein brings up the Slaw website higher than the Supreme Court of Canada’s or the Federal Court pages.

The civil complaint, filed in U.S. District Court in San Jose by KinderStart.com, seeks to be certified as a class action representing the owners of all

We are very open to comparative law.
Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin

Given the extent to which the Supreme Court of Canada routinely cites comparative law, and all law students are taught as much English law in first year as Canadian, it is fascinating the passions aroused by comparative law elsewhere.

We’ve discussed this before, but a piece in the Post on Friday and in yesterday’s Times, really brought it home.

Death threats have been made to two justices of the USSC, because they’ve stated publicly that it may, on some occasions, be helpful for the Court to . . . [more]

I came across an article in the Financial Times after AT&T announced their intended acquisition of BellSouth that questioned the impact of this acquisition on ‘net neutrality’. [See the Wikipedia entries on Network Neutrality and Net Neutrality].

I became interested in the subject and did my usual routing around on the Internet to see what the buzz was. To my surprise, the buzz is alive and well in the US and Canada.

In the US, the camps have lined up on one side or the other. The telcos, large ISPs and equipment vendors claiming there is no need for . . . [more]