The global legal services market needs optimistic contrarians: strong people who think fast and clearly, and whose actions are decisive and fearless. Their power needs to be united, harnessed, and used for good.

The legal services sector has always had a reputation for being tough. It’s getting tougher by the minute and unlikely to let up.

While disruptive factors are many, the three most daunting are:

• Accelerating advances in generative artificial intelligence that are usurping service-oriented tasks and upending how various types of legal work get produced and priced – all of which is impacting traditional law firm pyramid structures

As we start to come out of the winter season, I thought it was important to remind everyone that at times, there are friends and colleagues who are having a harder time shedding the heaviness of the dark winter months.

Recently I watched a commercial, where a man is sitting quietly at a football game in the midst of cheering and laughter from everyone around him. Let’s call him John. The person in the next seat, let’s call him Adam, is cheering loudly and tries to encourage John to participate and enjoy the game.

The action progresses to show that . . . [more]

Renowned for its dysfunction, the leadership of the Ontario Superior Court deserves some credit for belatedly admitting the court to be in crisis. Acknowledging the need for bold, fundamental reforms it tasked the Civil Rules Working (Working Group) with identifying ways to reduce complexity, costs and delays and stated that “minor amendments (to the Rules) would be insufficient.” Despite that mandate, the Working Group in their Phase 2 Consultation Paper has proposed implementing further rules and procedures, changing a handful of existing Rules and rearranging the balance. One step forward, two steps back.

Handicapping the Working Group

Initially, the Working . . . [more]

Both Lexis+ and Westlaw Canada allow you to restrict your search to just the table of contents of a book. Restricting a search to just subject headings — rather than the full text of a book — can be an effective way of reducing the number of extraneous results.

To search the table of contents of a specific book in Lexis+, go to the title of the text you want to search and select Table of Contents (TOC) only below the search bar.

Similarly, to search the table of contents in Westlaw Canada, go to the title of the text . . . [more]

Every week we present the summary of a decision handed down by a Québec court provided to us by SOQUIJ and considered to be of interest to our readers throughout Canada. SOQUIJ is attached to the Québec Department of Justice and collects, analyzes, enriches, and disseminates legal information in Québec.

PÉNAL (DROIT) : Déclaré coupable d’avoir déchargé une arme à feu dans l’intention de blesser une personne et d’avoir commis des voies de fait graves, l’appelant n’a pas démontré que le juge de première instance aurait commis une erreur de droit en inférant qu’il conduisait le véhicule à bord duquel . . . [more]

How will generative AI impact the legal profession? This was the big question in late 2022 when ChatGPT was first released. How would this seemingly magical word machine collide or coexist with a profession that is, if not “essentially word merchants” (to use phrasing in a New York Times article), certainly deeply engaged with language?

Much has changed over the last two and a half years. To give just one illustrative example: fueled by hundreds of millions in investment, there are now over 500 legal tech tools that incorporate generative AI. The interest, money and work being poured into . . . [more]

Several times each month, we are pleased to republish a recent book review from the Canadian Law Library Review (CLLR). CLLR is the official journal of the Canadian Association of Law Libraries (CALL/ACBD), and its reviews cover both practice-oriented and academic publications related to the law.

Constitutionalising Social Media. Edited by Edoardo Celeste, Amélie Heldt & Clara Iglesias Keller. New York: Bloomsbury, 2022. 352 p. Includes bibliographic references and index. ISBN 9781509953707 (hardcover) $175.50; ISBN 9781509953745 (softcover) $86.50; ISBN 9781509953714 (ePUB) $77.85; ISBN 9781509953721 (PDF) $77.85.

Reviewed by Kyla McCallum
Student Librarian
University of British Columbia . . . [more]

As the April federal election approaches, an issue that has receded from the public consciousness is the significant loss of social legislation upon the prorogation of Parliament that preceded the Liberal Leadership Convention. Such pauses are commonplace, but in this instance, it drew widespread criticism across strata of society due to the threat of unprovoked economic warfare from the Trump administration and the number of government bills that died on the order paper.

The Public Service Alliance of Canada, for example, criticized the government for failing to pass the pension fairness measures and tax breaks promised in the 2024 . . . [more]

In file 9110-2023-0067 the CRTC reports on enforcement action taken against the Hudson’s Bay Company for allegedly violating Section 6(2)(c) and Sections 11(1) and 11(3) of CASL Canada’s Anti Spam Law.

Since CASL came into force in 2014 a large portion of enforcement action has been taken on the need to include in commercial electronic messages (CEMs) an unsubscribe mechanism that could be readily performed.

The investigation led to an allegation that the Hudson’s Bay Company sent CEMs between January 1, 2022, and November 30, 2023, without including an unsubscribe mechanism that could be readily performed.

The Hudson’s Bay Company . . . [more]

As artificial intelligence and digital tools transform nearly every professional field, dispute resolution is no exception. But are these technologies merely enhancing traditional ADR—or are they fundamentally reshaping it?

The widespread adoption of video conferencing, AI-assisted case management, and online negotiation platforms has rapidly moved dispute resolution online. What was once the exception is now the norm. As a result, the boundary between Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) and Online Dispute Resolution (ODR) has become increasingly blurred. But does this distinction still matter? I believe it does—because how we define and design these processes directly affects fairness, access, and the role . . . [more]