RSS FeedCould Osgoode Law Students Sue Over Strike?
Most of our readers would be aware of the ongoing strike at York University led by CUPE 3903. York administrators have also indicated serious financial difficulties.
What people may not have realized is that the strike also affects law students at Osgoode Hall.
A second-year Osgoode student, Thomas Wisdom, shares the challenges some of his peers are facing,
First- and second-year students with summer jobs: A lot of people are ecstatic about the fact that they will be gainfully employed at law firms in the summer months… [but] they face the frustration of renegotiation start dates with their employers.
Daniel Simard, also in his second year, points out how graduating students are also impacted,
…third year students could potentially be detrimentally impacted if they have to complete their studies well into the month of May; the period perennially allotted for the fulfillment and preparation of licensing requirements mandated by the Law Society of Upper Canada, including Bar Admissions.
Parents and students have also expressed that the reputation of York University, and by extension, Osgoode Hall, may be affected.
But do all these concerns give a right to sue? The Globe & Mail mentioned yesterday that some of the families are considering a class-action lawsuit against both York University and the union.
See the rest of the post at Slaw; Simon Fodden points out that classes have resumed at Osgoode, but could a cause of action be made in the future, depending on the fallout from these students’ legal careers?
The “Letters” of the Law for 2008
Michael Geist has an article in the Toronto Star on tech related issues from the past year.
There was rarely a dull moment over the past twelve months in law and technology with no shortage of legislative proposals, controversial court cases and public battles over the future of the Internet in Canada. A look back at 2008 from A to Z…
Spamming and Free Speech!!
In September, the Virginia Supreme Court ruled that the State law that prosecuted those involved in sending spam emails was unconstitutional and in violation of the 1st Amendment of the Constitution that guaranteed free speech. The judgment used a rationale that doesn’t make much sense to me ;
“As Justice (G. Steven) Agee said in the court’s opinion, if the Federalist Papers were written today and disseminated by e-mail, the sender would be guilty of a felony under Virginia’s anti-spam statute”
With more than 1 billion spam emails sent out in a year, it is estimated a spam network rakes in somewhere to the amount of $3.5 million each product. While the statute has been declared unconstitutional, the Attorney General for the State has now decided to take the matter upto the Supreme Court of the United States and ask the decision to be reversed.
Earlier, the ACLU president commenting on the judgment stated;
“”The internet is a uniquely democratizing public forum that provides ordinary people with an outlet to express a wide variety of opinions. Some of those views may be controversial, making anonymity or the use of pseudonyms essential for giving those ideas fair consideration in public debates. Speech on the Internet deserves no less First Amendment protection than in any other medium.”
Cross - posted from The Social Blog .
Essential tech skills for law students
David Canton continues a discussion of essential tech skills for lawyers on Slaw.
In addition to my comment to his post, I suggest learning to back your data up. USB keys and external hard drives don’t cut it. Back up your data off-site over the Internet to protect against hardware failure, fire, flood, or theft.
Make sure the backup provider encrypts your data both in transit and on their servers. I use Amazon S3 with the Jungle Disk client software. It’s not free but it’s cheap.
I wouldn’t trust free services when it comes to data anyway.
Copyright in an Age when IP is not Based on Geography
Neville Hobson, a communications and tech guru, has a recent post on digital IP and how it applies to our globalized world,
One topic I’ve written about before in this blog is copyright, prompted in particular by my continuing puzzlement about why we continue to use laws that are based on geography in an age where intellectual property is increasingly digital and largely not based on geography.
He continues, and introduces a new video by Michael Geist and Daniel Albahary, Canadian Voices on Copyright Law, on Bill C-61.
Canadians from across the country are intereviewed on the issue of digital copyright:
10 Things You Shouldn’t Put in an E-mail
Roger Mathus of Death by Email quotes Elizabeth Charnock, CEO of Cataphora on 10 things you should probably never write in an e-mail:
- “I could get into trouble for telling you this, but…”
- “Delete this email immediately.”
- “I really shouldn’t put this in writing.”
- “Don’t tell So-and-So.” Or, “Don’t send this to So-and-So.”
- “She/He/They will never find out.”
- “We’re going to do this differently than normal.”
- “I don’t think I am supposed to know this, but…”
- “I don’t want to discuss this in e-mail. Please give me a call.”
- “Don’t ask. You don’t want to know.”
- “Is this actually legal?”
He suggests that if you find yourself writing this, you probably shouldn’t do it to begin with.
h/t to Anne Reed, who adds “do not forward,” Walter Olson, and Pete Warden.
Updates
The ABA Journal picks up on this too.
Law Blogs, Aggregated (Courtesy of Garry Wise)
Everything I know about social media I learned from PR professionals in my brief career in that field prior to law.
Neville Hobson (a social media guru in the U.K. who hosts one of my first podcast subscriptions, For Immediate Release) launched an RSS feed yesterday that combined over 60 of the best PR blogs around the world.
He based the selection on a PR Network previously created by David Jones, a local PR guru based in Toronto (he also hosts one of my other first podcasts, InsidePR).
I thought it was a great idea, so I decided to do the same for law blogs. I started by cloning his RSS from Yahoo Pipes, and it seemed simple enough. I wasn’t presumptuous enough to decide for myself who the best blogs were, so I began adding from Steve Matthew’s Canadian Law Blog Awards (CLawBies).
I didn’t get very far though.
I made it to Garry Wise’s blog and noticed a recent entry, Launching Wise Law Reader. Yes, Garry beat me to it.
The Wise Law Reader doesn’t use Pipes, but seems to accomplish the same goal. I can’t seem to find an RSS feed there yet, but I suspect it’s only a matter of time before he gets that up.
The best part about the Wise Law Reader is the top profile video prominently featured on it’s launch date, starring one really familiar law student.
Cross-posted from Slaw.ca
The President’s a Twit. Sorry, Tweet.
Well it seems as if Barack Obama might be the first black Twitter president of the United States. The Twitter blog indicates he will be the first to have an official account.
They also indicate an enormous spike in Twitter usage during the election.
Canadian politicians seem slightly ahead of the game in this respect, with our own Prime Minister having an account. But his number of followers, around 2,000 at present, pales in comparison to that of Obama with over 120,000.
Sure, we can cite population differences between Canada and the U.S., or talk about the impact of American politics in the world versus Canada.
What makes this really interesting is that Barack Obama is the Twitter user that has the most followers, period, and by a healthy margin. That’s more than Digg founder Kevin Rose, technology reporter Leo Leporte, or even CNN.
This has prompted some Twitter users to wonder whether he will also be the first president to send presidential announcements via email. If any other politician were to try this it would quickly be resisted as spam or propaganda. But Obama might just be able to get away with it, and if so, the nature of civic communications may be transformed forever.
It seems hackers have caught on to this as well, with the Washington Post reporting that Obama e-mails are being used to carry Trojans.
Other American political offices and politicians can also be found on Twitter.
Cross posted from Slaw
CIRA, whois and IP Osgoode
Check out my post about CIRA’s ‘whois’ policy on the recently launched IP Osgoode wesbite. I wrote it as an assignment for my IP law class with professor D’Agostino.
Social Media Election Sites
Great site for social media tools during the U.S. election.
Polling problems are being reported via Twitter.
Citizens and media are actively using social media to monitor the election.
And a widget courtesy of MSNBC.
h/t Doug Haslam
Green Party Website Hacked!
The website of the Green Party of Ontario was hacked last Friday. Malicious hackers have put up a blog post mocking GPO leader Frank de Jong, by impersonating him and putting ridiculous words in his mouth. I am, of course, assuming that this is what happened. Obviously Mr. de Jong would never say something as inane as:
Greens should never vote strategically. Even if your vote was the one vote that would elect another Harper Conservative you should still vote Green. Even if that additional Conservative MP meant Harper would get a majority, you should still vote Green.
I hope that once the Green Party webteam returns from the Thanksgiving holiday they will swiftly remove the work of these hackers and attempt to track them down. Our website has also been hacked, you have our sympathies, Green Party.
(h/t Macleans)
Law is Cool Makes CBC News
We’ve been covered in local papers before, and frequently cited in other blogs. But Law is Cool just made CBC News.
You can see the link to here from Ormiston Online’s page on bloggers. Check out the site for more election related coverage.
Omar Ha-Redeye and Devin Johnston were interviewed for the CBC on web tools related to the upcoming Federal election. The footage has already been used from coast-to-coast, and emphasizes the increasingly important role of technology in politics.
Which Lawyers Should Get an iPhone?
Jeff Richardson of Adams and Reese, LLP writes on the ABA Techshow,
I don’t recommend an iPhone to all lawyers. Many don’t need a smart phone — just a simple flip phone will do. Others never use anything but e-mail and want a physical keyboard, and for them I say just get a Blackberry. But for any lawyer that wants an advanced smartphone, the iPhone is now simply the best in class.
He describes some of the features of the new iPhone, and how it can be useful for some lawyers.
The Hidden Dangers of Document Metadata
To follow up on Omar Ha-Redeye’s post about the ethical challenges of practicing law with new information technology, I received the following interesting excerpt from the CBA newsletter in my email inbox:
Metadata: A cautionary tale
Two lawyers are working together on a contract for a client, using a similar contract prepared for another client and fine-tuning the wording to suit this situation. They have used technology to full advantage, saving the original contract under a new name, tracking changes, and writing comments to each other as the drafts evolved. When the draft is ready, one of the lawyers switches from “Final Showing Mark-up” to “Final”, and sends the document to the client by e-mail.
Imagine their distress when the lawyers find out that the client was able to access the document metadata to learn the name of the other client, read the original document prepared for that client, and see all the changes and comments made.
Not only is this embarrassing, it is a breach of professional ethics.
It’s important to understand that most word processing and other “office suite” programs automatically attach metadata to documents, often without the lawyer’s knowledge. Usually this “automatic” metadata would contain things like: the author’s name; the date the document was last saved; and how much time was spent working on the document.
If the lawyer makes use of commenting or revision tracking features, as described in “cautionary tale” above, the metadata would be rich with all sorts of juicy - and confidential - details that could come to the attention of a client, adversary, or third party. For example, anyone with tech savviness could discover the names of reviewers, the number of revisions, and might even be able to see the hidden reviewers’ comments that do not appear on printed copies of the document.
The CBA’s new “Guidelines for Practicing Ethically with New Information Technologies” recommend that lawyers clear the metadata of their documents before sending them out to the client or adversary, just in case:
Lawyers have an ethical obligation, when transmitting documents electronically, to exercise reasonable care to ensure that clients’ confidential information is not disclosed in the
metadata.There are practices that minimize the creation of metadata, as well as ways to remove the
hidden data before distribution or publication so it is not accessible to people for whom it is
not intended. Before removing metadata, lawyers should ensure that there are no legal
requirements to retain the metadata (e.g. discovery obligations).
The new guidelines provide instructions on how to eliminate hidden data, which can be found in Appendix 2 of the document.
New Info Tech Practice Guidelines
The development of technology and its extensive use in the legal field now requires technical competency for ethical practice.
The Ethics and Professional Issues Committee of the Canadian Bar Assocation (CBA) has developed a new Guidelines for Practicing Ethically with New Information Technologies.
These guidelines are intended to help lawyers take full advantage of technology while remaining in complaince with the CBA’s Code of Professional Conduct.
The marketing section mentions blogs starting on page 13, saying that marketing principles and advertising rules must also be abided by. I never thought until today that broken links could be unethical.
More relevant are the Online Discussion Best Practices starting page 17, which state the following principles when writing online:
- be clear when writing as a lawyer and offering legal services, and provide contact information when doing so;
- avoid jeopardizing professional integrity, independence or competence through online discussions
- be courteous, civil, and act in good faith;
- encourage public respect for the administration of justice, and provide criticisms in a bona fide and reasoned manner;
- be aware that the mere fact that one is a lawyer will add weight and credibility to any public statements; and,
- hold the same respect for the administration of justice online as in other forums and media, complying with rules on advertising, solicitation and marketing
Appendix 1 has links to similar guidelines by several provincial law associations.
Cross posted from Slaw.
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