British novelist and journalist John Lanchester wrote an interesting piece in last week’s Guardian, on his review of material leaked by whistleblower Ed Snowden.

He starts by admitting he does not share the instinctive opposition to state secrecy. As he puts it: “Democratic states need spies”. Because democracy has enemies, he argues, the right to privacy must be qualified, just as other rights are qualified. But the danger in the digital age is that “with a couple of clicks of a mouse an agent of the state can target your home phone, or your mobile, or your email, or your . . . [more]

BC’s Civil Resolution Tribunal Act, passed in May 2012 (not yet in force) sets the stage for an ambitious new tribunal that embraces modern notions of technology and access to justice.

The Civil Resolution Tribunal, expected to launch in the Autumn of 2014, will be North America’s first online tribunal. It will provide an alternative to court for people seeking to resolve small claims and strata property (condominium) disputes in BC. Users will have access to a full array of online tools to help manage and resolve their disputes fairly, quickly and cost effectively.

Online dispute resolution (ODR) processes . . . [more]

The College of Law Practice Management’s held its 5^th Futures Conference last Friday and Saturday at Chicago-Kent College of Law. Unfortunately, I was unable to attend due to work and personal commitments. However, those of us who missed it are in luck as the presentations were recorded and are available online.

If you listen to any of the sessions from the conference, I strongly recommend you listen to Stephen Mayson’s keynote: The Future of Law – Who Will Perform It? Who Will Regulate It? Stephen has said much over the years about the changing nature of law practice . . . [more]

A class action lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court in the Southern District of New York on Friday against BlackBerry and some of its executives, including chief executive Thorsten Heins and chief financial officer Brian Bidulka.

The lawsuit claims that the company misled investors about their financial situation and inflating the stock value by misrepresenting how BlackBerry 10 would fare on the market against competitors. The proposed class would include shareholders who purchased stack between Sept. 27, 2012-Sept. 20, 2013.

The suit claims that BlackBerry was aware of these challenges and lay off about 40% of its workforce . . . [more]

Responsabilité de l’État : La condamnation du procureur général du Canada à verser des dommages-intérêts de plus de cinq millions de dollars à Réjean Hinse, victime d'une erreur judiciaire, est annulée.

This week's summaries concern: Coroner's inquests / Right to counsel for child / Prisoner transfers / Bankruptcy and non-arms-length transactions / Sentencing / Right to counsel for adult / What constitutes a weapon / Summary judgments:

… am an Information Addict. Information overload, also known as infobesity or infoxication, is a constant in my life. How about yours? Both conferences I attended this summer had sessions on time management, organization, workflow, productivity; topics that are directly related to how well we cope with the amount of information in our lives and the work that we produce using it. So I know I’m not alone on this island.

My quandary exists in that I want to get the most out of both my professional and personal life. Each feeds the other, and yet it is extremely important . . . [more]

If you are not able to attend the 2013 Futures Conference, they are offering a live webcast of the keynote and TED presentations. Please click here for the link to the live webcast.

2013 Futures Conference agenda:

Friday, October 4
9:10 – 10:00 am CDT — Keynote Presentation by Stephen Mayson
10:00 – 10:15 am CDT — TED #1, What is the Market for Legal Services in the Future (from the buyer’s point of view), Ann Lee Gibson, Ann Lee Gibson Consulting
2:00 – 2:15 pm CDT — TED #2, Innovation in the Law Firm, Jordan Furlong, Partner, Edge . . . [more]

Whenever there is an auto insurance claim, insurers must determine fault. If you are found to be at fault for a claim, the insurer will consider you an increased risk and use this information to increase your premiums. If you are not at fault, the claim will not directly result in an increase of your premiums. This probably makes sense to most people, but you may be surprised to learn that things are a bit different when it comes to home insurance claims.

Assume you make a claim to repair a roof damaged by a hail storm, or your expensive . . . [more]

I cannot resist employing useless things. One reason, I guess, is that I’ve been taught and brought up since the year dot to be useful. Naturally, this leads to a hankering after the useless, that which is instrumental to no purpose and the disappearance of which would not materially change the world. Music is one such. (Note, I said materially.) As is poetry and, indeed, most art. There is no point to any of it — and that is the lovely point, of course.

But poetry, painting, music . . . these are the heavies, when it comes to uselessness. . . . [more]

Here are a couple of new features in relation to searching.

1. I’ve taken to using DuckDuckGo as my basic search engine because, if they are to be believed, they don’t track my searches as some other search engines do and, consequently, don’t feed me back ads they imagine I’ll like. (I just wish the name were less silly.) I think you’ll find a bunch of things to like about it, among which is the potential to search within certain other sites through the use of a “bang” marker: !

   It’s not exactly same thing as using the site:xxxx.zzz search

. . . [more]

The Law Library at the University of Windsor is pleased to announce two new Google Custom searches.

The first is a meta search of policing journals, magazines, reviews, reports and news feeds.
The second is a meta search of police review board decisions from across Canada.

Both are available here, along with the full list of the sites being searched:
http://www1.uwindsor.ca/law/library/research-on-policing-in-canada

This is a new addition to our offerings. Two years ago, we had also announced the creation of a meta search
for military law journals: http://www1.uwindsor.ca/law/library/canadian-military-law-articles . . . [more]