Funky-looking Management Course

"Funky" as in "cool" not "fetid". Heh.

I was just poking around the web and came across this course from the McLuhan Centre at University of Toronto: Applied McLuhan for Managers. It is a non-credit course.

Canada NewsWire has new name and logo

Canada Newswire has announced a new name and logo with its press release. It is now known as "CNW Group". The logo is an orange underlined "c" in a circle. They say it is a variation on the copyright symbol. I'm not sure why that would be desirable in a logo. Didn't I say something earlier about orange becoming fashionable during difficult times since it is the colour of optimism? Hmmm.

Books for Business has new site

Our favourite work-related bookstore, Books for Business, has revamped their website. Now it is more than just tombstone details, including photos of the friendly faces who serve us, plus they are adding a "shop online" feature. The shop online doesn't seem to be fully functioning just yet, since I couldn't find a book online so called them and of course they had it, so I expect this is just being set up. Overall the redesigned site looks fresh, cheerful and helpful.

Say Cheese, Google!

Article talking about enhancements to Picasa, Google's electronic photo service that I have used to add photos to this site: Fool.com: Say Cheese, Google! [Motley Fool Take] January 18, 2005. I want to come back to this article to see what enhancements have been made. I have been contemplating switching to another service I found the other day.

What Do Your Clients Really Think of You?

I finally--FINALLY!--have time to do a little extracurricular (or, perhaps more accurately, extra curricular) reading. Found this excellent article on the Canadian Bar Association website:
What Do Your Clients Really Think of You? by Ann Macaulay.

It goes into detail about what clients really think of their lawyers, mostly negative things clients experience but are too shy to mention directly to their lawyers, and then gives recommendations for specific things to work on to improve in those areas.

An excellent article to pass along to the lawyers in your life, but also excellent for those of us in other service areas as many of the lessons can be related. For example, when a client calls for help, never talk about how busy you are with other work, since it gives the impression his/her work is going to get a low priority. Macaulay gives some specific ways to handle this situation when you really ARE too busy to handle the client's work immediately. Good stuff.

Sound Bytes/Sound Rights: Canada at the Crossroads of Copyright Law

One-day conference being held at University of Toronto on February 11, 2005 called: Sound Bytes/Sound Rights: Canada at the Crossroads of Copyright Law. They will be looking at the future of copyright law in Canada, especially regarding music and entertainment.

Update - Tsunami Relief Info

I'm glad my posting last week was of help to others. I sent it out before contact info was readily available in the media. Getting onto all those websites was difficult since, happily, so many people were making donations.

For an updated list of organizations taking donations from Canadians, I refer you to CBC's webpage. Don't forget bank branches will also take monetary donations and, for those in Toronto, police stations as well.

Canadian Government announcements regarding tsunami relief and foreign aid. Excerpt from that page:

>>>
Until the UN donor conference in mid-January [January 11, 2005], when needs will be reassessed, the Government of Canada through the Canadian International Development Agency is matching dollar for dollar contributions that individuals make to recognized Canadian non-government organizations already involved in responding to the disaster in South and Southeast Asia. Some of these organizations include:

Canadian Red Cross
World Vision Canada
Doctors Without Borders
Oxfam Canada
Oxfam Quebec
CARE Canada
UNICEF Canada
Development and Peace
Save the Children
>>>

As well, the date Canadians can claim donations on our 2004 income tax has been extended to January 11, 2005. See the announcement from the Dept. of Finance.

Let's do our best to make 2005 a happy new year for everyone!

Why So Generous?

The question is being asked in the media: why have individual Canadians been so generous with monetary donations for tsunami relief?

I believe there are three major reasons:

- we have seen the devastation immediately in the media. We see film footage (including horrifying amateur videos) continuously on television, and whole sections of our newspapers devoted to personal stories and developments on the emergency relief and foreign aid front;

- the continual images of destruction, death and people in need sharply contrast with the bounty many of us have experienced in this holiday season. Getting luxury items, clothing, a handful of gift cards and Christmas money suddenly seems horribly out of whack with the reality experienced by the rest of the world; and

- the ability to easily make donations to major relief organizations by credit card over the Internet. It is easy to get carried away with one's emotions and donate significantly more than usual. In this case, this isn't necessarily a bad thing.

I've also heard it said that people are feeling more generous because of the "holiday spirit". Perhaps this is so, but I expect most people feel generous at least to their immediate circle of friends and family most of the time. To give generously to people in need on the other side of the world, we have had to feel something extraordinary.

I believe many people's eyes were opened with the tragedy of September 11, 2001. This greater loss may have solidified the Western World's general understanding of how we are all needed to support each other on this little blue marble called "Earth". I only hope we don't forget this generosity of spirit.

LISFeeds.com Library and Librarian News Feeds RSS Feeds

I had a look at LISFeeds.com Library and Librarian News Feeds RSS Feeds. Read all your library blogs in one place!

The Essential Law Library

I was poking around in the terrific law library resources on LibraryCo's website once again, and found The Essential Law Library. This is a list of essential texts that should be in all Canadian (or, at least, Ontario) law libraries. It was compiled by Karen MacLaurin, Anne Matthewman, Janine Miller, Suzan Hebditch and Wendy Hearder-Moan, and is a great resource for anyone starting to put together a basic collection, or for someone to check an existing collection for gaps. It appears to be current to 2002, so quite current. They give a good explanation of their selection criteria at the top.

Internet Librarian 2004 on its way!

I had a call yesterday saying my copy of the CD of proceedings from Internet Librarian 2004 is now ready and being shipped. Now, there's a nifty little Christmas surprise! I can't wait....will promise to post anything good I learn.

Leading Parallel Lives....

In a Parallel Universe (let me call it, say, "Vancouver") there is a law firm library manager, heavily involved in the local Association of Law Libraries, keeping a nifty little blog for Canadian law librarians that points out neat new things and makes lots of personal comments. Check out Steve Matthews' Vancouver Law Librarian Blog.

Wow! I had heard about him, and the rumours are true. We are leading parallel lives. I had a nice note this week from Steve introducing himself and finally had a look at his blog for myself as a result.

I'm relieved to finally have another Canadian law librarian blogging. Welcome, Steve!

Cheers,
Connie

Hooked on Reading - Online Bookclub Idea

Western Counties Regional Library (in Nova Scotia) offer several Online Book Clubs. You provide them with an e-mail address, and they provide you a portion of reading from a book via e-mail each day. Each week you read 2-3 chapters. If you like what you have read, then you are supposed to sign the book out of the library. They have various book categories, including one of books before publication.

I haven't signed up for anything yet, but it is an interesting idea. I wonder how we could use this idea in law libraries? Make sample newsletters available to lawyers before they commit to signing up? Feed them portions of our personal diatribes each day until they have read 2-3 rants per week. Oh, the ideas are endless....

Google Versus the Library - Why Can't We All Just Get Along?

Word is spreading far and wide about today's press release from Google: Google Checks Out Library Books. Google has made agreements with a number of prominent libraries to digitize large portions of their book collections.

Google co-founder Larry Page quoted in the press release: "Google's mission is to organize the world's information, and we're excited to be working with libraries to help make this mission a reality." Well, apparently the library world is excited about this prospect also.

Here are the related headlines from around the world courtesy of (who else?) Google News: News about Google.

I particularly like the write-up in the New York Times: Google Is Adding Major Libraries to Its Database". (You will need to register for a free NYTimes password if you don't have one already. Which leads me to ask: why don't you?) The second page in particular includes a discussion of how this could potentially affect libraries, with roles changing from storehousing and indexing of printed materials to organizing and retaining digitized materials. Looks like the experience of law libraries and other specialized libraries could be increasingly felt in academic and public circles as well. If it isn't already, which really would be hard to believe.

Perhaps what we are most thrilled about is the world apparently excited about accessing library materials that, for the most part, have been forgotten in this Age of Google. Which, if it really happens, would be a good thing. After all, there was life before 1996. It may be difficult to remember, but that is what the Library is there for, isn't it?

Reference re Same-Sex Marriage

Apparently I've been AWOL the last few days...too busy getting caught up from being off sick in September and October!

I would be remiss, however, if I didn't post a link to the Supreme Court of Canada's Reference re Same-Sex Marriage. The outcome, that the Parliament may put forward legislation regarding same sex marriage and that it is constitutional, is a positive one. Now we wait for the proposed legislation to be introduced, reportedly sometime in the new year. Stay tuned!

Great New Look @ the Great Library

I just popped onto the Great Library's website (Law Society of Upper Canada), and noticed they have a great new design to their web page. It looks terrific: lots more info directly at the user's fingertips, including a web-enabled photocopy request form, livelier catalogue interface (AdvoCAT), staff directory, and lots more. I use this website a lot, so will enjoy the changes.

Orange You Glad?

The December issue of Quill & Quire has an article on page 6 about the recent trend of orange covers for literature releases. A quote from Melanie Wood, former president of Color Marketing Group, says that people who feel overwhelmed by the state of the world "want to get the war behind us, start anew and have fun again. Colors that refresh and rejuvenate will lead the way, with innocent tones of pink and peach giving us a sense of freshness and promise of tomorrow." The article goes on to say orange restores an optimism of life.

Okay, so that explains why I picked these particular colours for my blog; however, I STILL don't regret getting rid of those orange chairs that were in our library....

Shirley Elliott - A Life Well Lived

There was a wonderfully written obituary in the Globe and Mail about Shirley Elliott, Nova Scotia Legislature Librarian from 1954 - 1982, written by Allison Lawlor. Article on the The Globe and Mail website. The paper edition has her photo--my edition has it on page S7. She sounds like a very interesting person; I'm sorry never to have known her!

(Idea for the title of this post from Martha!)

Buying Mittens When You Really Want a Hat

Okay, back to the REAL world after that lovely interlude. Law libraries had been notified by Factiva that we will no longer be served by Factiva, that they had made an arrangement with LexisNexis to provide us support. Okay, LexisNexis knows us better so perhaps that makes sense. We were complaining about Factiva service since, unless you are a big customer, you just don't get any personal service. So maybe this would address that. My one big concern was: how is LexisNexis going to support two platforms?? (Three in Canada, what with Quicklaw).

Well, today my concern was answered with another notice: they are not going to support two platforms. As of March 1, 2005, they are putting the Factiva content onto the LexisNexis platform. Now, this may be nice business for LexisNexis, but the two interfaces function completely differently and how am I going to make this work?

I feel like the kid being kicked out of the house by her parents: "You're 16 now, you're old enough to work.". Yikes. Or better yet, what about this analogy: "Sorry, we don't sell our hats to people with blonde hair. But we have an arrangement with the fellow down the street who will sell you some mittens instead...".

I'm sure regretting whining about difficulties using InfoGlobe years ago!

Stop and smell the roses....

Thursday night I helped out with a firm client event. Actually, I kind of invited myself along. But they seem to have appreciated my presence, and I was given this beautiful flower arrangement at the end of the evening as thanks. Posting here for all to enjoy! 

Flowers 

Flowers 

Legal Blog Watch

The people at American Lawyer Media are catching the wave, bringing us the Legal Blog Watch. For now they are monitoring seven lawyer blogs, including Matthew Homann's blog the [non]billable hour which I've spoken of in a previous posting. Congratulations, Matt!

The Party's Over...

I'm sad to see the Internet Librarian conference end. And I wasn't even there! Reading the blogs each day was quite thrilling. Thank you, IL bloggers. I've learned a lot from their postings, both snippets and full-blown commentary. It was like watching the highlights reel, really. And now I will count the days until my CD comes in the mail. I will have to report back as to my impressions once I've seen it.

Not only has it given me a few ideas for work, but also various professional activities I'm involved in. Can't you see the wheels turning in my brain? They've definitely given us a glimpse of the future of conference-going.

New Digs for LexisNexis Canada (a.k.a. Quicklaw)

LexisNexis Canada had a nice reception last night for library managers in their new downtown Toronto office at 181 University Ave. (at Adelaide St.). For those who didn't have the privilege to attend, I must say it was nice to see they have increased capacity for classes, adding a few more computers. Our friends from the former Quicklaw, Inc. have more individual work space, with larger offices and/or cubicles (depending on their position). They aren't quite as close to the downtown core as in their former space, but it is well worth the trip over. Those of us who were there have decided all future contract negotiations must be held in their offices rather than ours. Just so we can stretch out a little more! Heh.

I was one of the later people to arrive, and it was fun to see lots of familiar faces from the law librarian community and also meet a few new ones.

I also got a kick out of Pat's framed photo of the old 9600-baud Quicklaw-designated terminals that ruled when I first started in law libraries in the 80s. How far we have come! And I still remember when 9600-baud seemed like lightning speed. Whew! Okay, so I've been on this computer train longer than some might have thought...I even remember 300-baud. Heck, I've even used punch cards. So there. And I wonder if anyone under 30 understands what I'm talking about? I've said too much already....

Teaching Library Staff How to Blog

Link to PowerPoint presentation from Internet Librarian 2004, presented by Stephen M. Cohen and Michael Stevens: Get
'Em Started: Teaching Weblogs to Library Staff.

Blogger in League With Factiva?

I was just posting a rant with links to Factiva's website, and it was "zapped" by Blogger. Do I smell a conspiracy?!? News at eleven....

Just Like Being There! - CD of Internet Librarian 2004 available

I've been reading along with a number of blogs, and can't help wish I was there! Soon I will be able to at least pretend, once I obtain my copy of the sessions on CD-ROM. It's available from The Digital Record Inc. website (scroll down to "Internet Librarian"). Cost is $96 US if you purchase online; $160 US otherwise. Also available in cassette or audio CD flavours. It will be sent out approximately 3 weeks after the conference.

Search Engine Optimization

Article in Backbone Magazine, The Strength of E-Business, discusses search engine optimization (SEO). Overall I believe it's an excellent article, although I disagree with the use of metatags; I think their usefulness for SEO is waning. I think Google disregards them nowadays.

Can't be in Monterey?

Like me, you can instead subscribe to the Feedster RSS Search and read all the blog postings about the Internet Librarian conference instead. Think positive thoughts, and perhaps SOMEDAY we'll get there in person!

Thanks to Jessamyn for the tip on librarian.net.

CIRA - Proposed Policy for Internet Domain Name Privacy

CIRA (the Canadian Internet Registration Authority, the body that registers the Canadian domain .ca) today released a draft policy to restrict information available to the public from its "Whois" directory in a bid to give domain owners increased privacy. See the press release: NEW POLICY TO SET STANDARD FOR INTERNET DOMAIN NAME PRIVACY. Public comments are being taken via a web form until January 12, 2005.

BloggerHacks

For my future reference: BloggerHacks

Legal Periodicals Blog

Where was I? Oh yes, before the CALL 2005 e-mail came in and got me all excited, I was checking out this new Legal Periodicals blog by John Doyle, Washington & Lee Law Library as pointed out in Sabrina Pacifici's newsletter beSpacific .

Posting it here merely for my own future reference. Of course, you are allowed to look at it too, I suppose!

CALL/ACBD 2005 Conference Website

The website for the Canadian Association of Law Libraries/Association Canadienne des bibliotheques de droit 2005 Annual Conference has just been opened up! CALL/ACBD 2005 will be held in St. John's, Newfoundland May 15-18, 2005. I can't wait!

Shoe on Other Foot

California-based library school student Marielle is hoping for entrance to Canada: sensible shoes...waiting for the revolution since 1965. She doesn't allow us to post comments on her blog or e-mail her; however, with her sense of style, I think she should be a shoe-in for admittance!

Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic (CIPPIC)

Just discovered the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic (CIPPIC) based out of the University of Ottawa's Faculty of Law. I was hunting around for info on the Creative Commons, in particular Canada's involvement, and found CIPPIC. Hmmmm....wonder how many of my colleagues know about this?

David Boies Biography a Hit!

I purchased the new David Boies biography Courting Justice: From New York Yankees v. Major League Baseball to Bush v. Gore, 1997-2000 for our office on a whim. Boies is the litigation powerhouse who represented Al Gore during the controversial 2000 U.S. elections.

The partners here LOVE it and are passing it around. Great idea if you have a general reading collection or are looking for a Christmas gift for that favourite litigation lawyer. Read the review on law.com.

United Church Ministers to Unionize?

Ontario and British Columbia ministers in the United Church are investigating
signing on to the Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) union.

CTV story: United Church minister in union drive with CAW.

Official response on the United Church of Canada website.

Uh Oh! I goofed.

I'm in the process of setting up a few different blogs for various personal purposes under my Blogger account. Thought I was changing templates for one of the other ones, but turned out I was working in this one and lost all my customized settings. So, all the links down the side and the statistics link are all gone. Yikes! A hard lesson. Will take me a few days to get things posted again. Sorreeboutdat!

Hallowe'en 2003 Challenge

Hallowe'en 2003 - Costume Challenge  

I now have the capacity to add photos to this website! Last year I challenged others to wear costumes at work so I wouldn't be the only one in costume. This is a costume from the movie "Kill Bill". At the time the movie had only been out a week or two, so few people knew who I was. However, what more could you want for a costume with a wig, mask and sword?

Hallowe'en 2003 - Connie as Crazy 88 (No. 3) Girl 

ISBN-13

Changes are afoot! The International Standards Book Number (ISBN) will be changing from 10 to 13 digits on January 1, 2007. It's reported on the BookNet Canada website under ISBN-13. A couple of highlights:

The ISBN will change from 10 to 13 digits on 1 January 2007

Existing ISBNs will be prefixed by 978

Practice blog and blog app discussion

In my posting Hectic week! from Oct. 30th, I promised to post any good practice blogs I set up. I decided to play around more with my trial subscription on Typepad (a pablum version of Movable Type) before it closes down. Here it is if you want to check it out: conniecrosby.typepad.com . It is a trial blog for my book club. Unfortunately it will only be open until approx. Friday and then I will be canning it.

Looks great, doesn't it? I really like the look of it. Here are the reasons why I won't be continuing with this software:

- I used their terrific book list feature to set up photos and links to all 70 books my book club has read. I thought this was great until I loaded it onto the blog itself. Unless I show all 70 books on the front page (see down the right side), there is no way for others to view the archives of past books. I asked about having this added as a feature, but was told it would be low priority. Therefore, I am going to try to find a similar low-cost function somewhere else and add it onto a blog set up with a different shop.

- inflexibility of the application. I can't do much in the way of playing around with the look of it since they don't give access to the underlying HTML code. I LOVE Blogger for this reason. Apparently the grander software Movable Type is a lot better in this respect, but it would mean hosting it on my own server.

I have also been playing with WordPress in my Blogs course. It has the flexibility of Blogger, plus the complexity of Movable Type. It is free, open source apparently (so my instructor Amanda tells me). The only drawback is the need for a host; however, this gives more security. Right now Blogger can go down for the day or my blog can get zapped, and I would lose it all. So, might be worthwhile seeing what kind of hosting my Sympatico.ca subscription includes!

The Business of Blogs for Lawyers

Today I attended a "webinar" (a.k.a. web seminar) along with our marketing manager. It was put on by the Legal Marketing Association, and presenter was Kevin O'Keefe. The session was entitled: Maximizing Your Law Firm's Web Site. A lot of it was common sense, but he had some great insights as well. He talked a lot about the importance of blogs for lawyers, as a way to get rich content onto a website and thereby improve listings on Google. Pretty interesting stuff. The PowerPoint presentation should be posted shortly somewhere.

In the meantime, check out his company LexBlog's website LexBlog.com. They are in the business of building blogs for lawyers! Kevin's blog, linked from LexBlog in the upper right corner or accessed directly at kevin.lexblog.com, also entitled "Real Lawyers Have Blogs(TM)", has a lot of great tools and info for getting lawyers blogging.

I'm quite taken with the idea of having individual lawyers and/or practice groups posting internally, and he has a piece on that called "Blog software for large law firm intranets and knowledge management". It doesn't have quite as much technical info to help me get started as I would like, but it does tell me what they have used blogs for internally, and that Movable Type was the application used.

Reasons to Get Out of KM

This essay by Dave Pollard on his blog "How to Save the World": If You're in Information Technology, Please Get Out is brilliant. As organizations become more focussed on cost savings rather than innovation, they are pulling resources out of Knowledge Management (KM). Pollard argues that those intelligent, creative people who are currently in KM should get out of the organizations while they can and become entrepreneurs. He has expressed some of the sentiments I have felt for a while.

Tips for Mastering E-mail Overload

Good article with some excellent ideas: Tips for Mastering E-mail Overload. The basic premise is to set a good example for others, and then he lists some principles for good message sending. I admit to being guilty sending some poor messages. I notice when I am out of the office I have fewer messages than when I am in, evidence that I help to generate a lot of the e-mail that comes back to me.

Hectic week!

Sorry to be incommunicado this week, everyone. I was in budget hell getting my numbers together (still have to finish the whole report), we ran a Hallowe'en costume challenge in our library today so I spent a good part of my evenings making my costume, and I had lots and lots of professional activities-type work to do. Despite the stress it really was a lot of fun. Yes, even getting the budget numbers together. It's my one big time of the year to use my advanced math skills! Plus I learned more about using Excel spreadsheets this time around. 8-)

I hope at some point to get the photos working on this website so I can post a photo or two of my Hallowe'en costumes (this year and last year).

This weekend I will be setting up another blog for the blog course I am taking, likely using a different software so I can try something else out. I am learning A TON from the course. If I create anything interesting I promise to post a link here. Some ideas:
- health and wellness blog for librarians (not to be confused with a blog by a medical/health librarian)
- Crosby family blog
- books I have read
- music or movie links and reviews
- photos of things in my house. Okay, this sounds weird but there are some interesting architectural features and piles of stuff that might look cool if photographed in the right light....
- personal diary of stuff I am doing (which could pretty much incorporate all of the above)

None of these really grab me just yet. I love the idea of a family blog, but will work on that later. I am already working on drafts of two other blogs: one for my bookclub, and one for my association (TALL). Okay, I'm a little blogged right now...

....can't wait for the extra hour of sleep when we turn back the clocks tomorrow night!

Button Maker

If you would like to create small buttons for linking, such as the Bloglines, Blogarama and BlogsCanada buttons to the right on this blog, there is now a free buttonmaker here: Button Maker from the Kalsey Consulting Group. Very cool. I just created one for my Intranet, although now I've got to figure out what to do with it! Heh. I like these little buttons, however, because they all look similar and give a neat, professional appearance to links on a page. The button is created as a graphic, so to use it you need to save it to a server and link to it on the server. Since I don't have my own server (yet) to link to I won't be able to show you my new button unfortunately!

RFID in Libraries - Who Does Tagging?

As they did with barcoding, Wal-mark is now mandating their suppliers mark their products with RFID tags: Wal-Mart to Expand RFID in 2005. Why do we not do the same with libraries; why do we not require the publishers to include tags on books? Possibly the "big box" booksellers will require this, and we will be able to use this to our benefit. But in our industry, law librarianship, we often purchase directly from the publisher. When, then, will this just be an industry standard? Is it in our own interest to force the issue, or should we wait it out? And then the question of older books: will it be worthwhile going back and tagging books we already own?

Federal public service employees in strike position

An advisory on strike activity can be found in the Strategis (Industry Canada)"Message Of The Day".

Toronto and North York Bylaws

York University has an excellent guide page on Toronto and North York Bylaws. It gives guidance as to where to find these By-laws before and after the Greater Toronto Area amalgamation a few years ago. The page is a little slow at opening, but worth the wait.

New E-mail Address

I have now changed e-mail addresses for this blog. I have switched to an account with Sympatico. Hotmail had recently changed their settings so that I have to use very low security settings in my browser to access it, and even when turning my security off, I still have problems accessing the account. I tried to discuss this with one of their customer service reps, but that was not helpful (he gave me advice on how to close the account!) So, I will be closing it down sometime this week.

WestlaweCarswell - Quebec cases & French language option added

News bulletin from Carswell about changes to their online product WestlaweCarswell. They have added some cases previously only found on the Quebec system SOQUIJ, which is good news for those of us outside Quebec who do not access SOQUIJ.

Church Law Texts

I noticed someone today on one of my listservs asking for a loan of a couple of these books. From U.S. publisher GospelPublishing.com, they look of interest for anyone with a church law collection. Since we do have a practice in this area, am going to consider a few of these titles for our own collection.

Major Canadian Newspaper Loses Copyright Case

Recent report from the CBC: Globe and Mail loses copyright case.

The decision, from the Ontario Court of Appeal website:
Robertson v. Thomson Corporation (October 6, 2004).

This decision goes back to an issue from 1995 when freelance writer Heather Robertson disagreed with the Globe and Mail's publication of her articles in Info Globe (long since absorbed by Dow Jones Interactive, now known as Factiva), the CD-ROM version of the Globe, and an electronic version of the Canadian Periodical Index in addition to the hard copy of her newspaper. The Court of Appeal upheld the lower court's decision. My favourite quote of the decision, included in the CBC article and here taken completely out of any sort of context, is from Madam Justice Karen Weiler: "...a database is not a newspaper..."

The CBC speculates as to the implications for future uses of freelance material; however, this is a moot point. Since this decision (and possibly others like it) went to court back in the mid-90's, newspapers have presumably been covering themselves with appropriate terms of agreement when signing on freelance reporters and writers. I doubt we will see much in the way of change as far as users of electronic databases go.

It is unlikely, however, we will ever see articles from the past reinstated to electronic databases. In many ways this is a shame. They will likely only be retrievable through a paper search which, for those of us who have searched manually through years' worth of old newspapers, is largely dooming those articles to obscurity.

Note this decision makes references back to the recent Supreme Court of Canada decision CCH Canadian Ltd. v. Law Society of Upper Canada, [2004] 1 S.C.R. 339; 2004 SCC 13 for definitions of copyright.

Thanks to Canuck Librarian for the tip on this!

On Being a Librarian

For those just starting out in the library industry, or thinking about becoming a librarian, there are some excellent posts on this site: Library Information.

RFID blog

This blog on RFIDs (radio frequency identification tags): The RFID Gazette tracks the latest news and advances, and includes a category for libraries. This is a method of tagging inventory that will hopefully come down in price enough so we can tag individual books. Information can be read from the tags with a reader via radio frequency. This will be a boon to those of us who walk the halls looking for that one missing book....

UBC's Law Library Reference Blog

The Law Library at University of British Columbia has a blog for its reference staff: Law Library Reference Blog. I like how they have categorized postings in an "Archives by Category" feature on the left of the screen. In addition to great links, they also post some of their own research tools. Very useful.

Course on blogging and RSS

WorkingFaster.com is putting on a course called Getting Started on Weblogs and RSS. Instructor is Amanda Etches-Johnson of McMaster University. It runs six weeks starting October 12, 2004. It is a web course, with readings and exercises sent weekly by e-mail, a discussion via bulletinboard (the original blog software! Long live BBS!) and one teleconference. WorkingFaster.com has lots of other great courses as well, including Internet and search engine topics.

Parliamentary Website - Main Page Redesigned

The main page of the Parliament of Canada website has been redesigned--just in time for the new session! It seems to have a more 'current awareness' focus with links to the site's new additions. Colour scheme has changed with more orange. Why orange? So far it looks very functional, however.

WSIB Operational Policy Manual - Ontario

The Ontario Workplace Safety & Insurance Board will be putting its Operational Policy Manual onto its website later this fall. It will be free, unlike the paper subscription we currently carry. We plan to switch to the website once available. To be notified when it is available on the website, send an e-mail to OPMreminder@wsib.on.ca .

Speeches on video

C-SPAN has speeches and other important news items on video "archived" on their website. For example, British Prime Minister Tony Blair speaking on Iraq in a number of venues. Content is primarily U.S. sources and issues. For example, the Kerry/Bush debates are currently featured on the front page. Thanks to Vanessa for pointing out this great site!

The Future of Integrated Library Systems

This Library Journal article was sent to me by a colleague earlier this year:The Future of Integrated Library Systems: An LJ Round Table. I haven't had a chance to read it yet so won't comment now, but am putting it here for my future reference.

Client experience - lessons from Starbucks

Today I cleaned out a pile of old e-mail, about 4,000 messages or so (you think I'm kidding, don't you?). Came across a few interesting tidbits to share. I will put them here under separate cover.

See this article: The Starbucks Experience. I've long felt the trend for Libraries is toward becoming more like the trendy bookstores (Chapters, Indigo, Borders). Being more like Starbucks is a similar concept.

"Cyber-Librarians" at University of Toronto

This story from University of Toronto's on-campus paper, The Varsity: "Cyber-Librarians" to take over . I have successfully used a similar service offered jointly by York University, University of Guelph, and Ryerson University and found it useful.

Article on Associates' Exodus

There is an excellent article in the inaugural issue of magazine The Bay Street Bull. It is called "The Mid-Year Itch: Mid-level associates are stepping up their exodus from Bay Street law firms. This time, it's not about the money" by Janice Zima, pages 23-25. Unfortunately this article is not on their website, but you can request a free sample copy of the first issue.

Canadian blawg - privacy law

I have just come across this "blawg" from lawyer David T.S Fraser: PIPEDA and Canadian Privacy Law. Great use of a blog for a specific legal topic. Hey, and check out whose blog is at the top if his blogroll on the right side! Looks like he has good taste also. 8-)

Bloggers beware: don't trash your boss

Stories are emerging about bloggers being dismissed from their jobs for blog content. This story by Graeme Smith on the front page of today's Globe & Mail (Toronto edition):
"Bloggers learn lesson: Don't trash your boss" about a woman working in Iqaluit (the capital of Nunavut, one of Canada's territories in the north) as an agent for Nunavut Tourism. Seemingly benign comments were seen to be negative and she was dismissed without warning. Quoted from the article:

"The general rule is you can get fired if your off-duty conduct reflects badly on the employer," said Howard Levitt, lawyer and author of Law of Dismissal in Canada. "Her case is really close to the line."

Other rules of thumb: don't name names, and always assume your blog is publicly available, no matter how private you intend it to be. See these comments about a Toronto Starbucks employee who recently was dismissed for blog postings that were not so benign, courtesy of BlogCritics:

The original story: Employee fired by Starbucks over Blog

A rebuttal: Starbucks' blogging barista fired fairly.

Finally, Blogger has this article: How Not to Get Fired
Because of Your Blog.

Law Librarian quoted in Florida news

Okay, the "Law Librarian" in question is me. I was quoted by an Orlando Sentinel movie critic on assignment covering the Toronto International Film Festival. See: OrlandoSentinel.com: Movies. Never mind the poor grammar; I spoke quickly and he didn't really get my quote down perfectly onto paper. Could be worse: at least he spelled my name correctly and my quote made it in. My partner Marty's quote didn't even make it.

Canadian Inter-Corporate Ownership

Canadian Inter-Corporate Ownership is a corporate family tree product produced by the government agency Statistics Canada. It has long been considered very reliable for this type of information. Until now it has been available on FP Infomart. Those of us who use the product rarely were able to use it on a "transactional" basis under our Infomart subscriptions. It now appears to have been removed; I have heard it is because they were not able to obtain current information from StatsCan.

To obtain this information, the CD-ROM from StatsCan must be purchased. Details are on the product main page. Website indicates it is available for full subscription (quarterly) at about $1,065. Individual quarterly CDs are available for $375.

I need to think about how often we use this product, if it is worth purchasing a quarterly CD at $375 and if we can live with out of date information toward the end of the year? I suppose I could just wait until the information is needed to buy the CD, providing I could obtain it fast enough to answer the question. Or, hang on to see if Infomart reinstates it.

Hmmm...seems to be the latest fashion in vendor problems. Wonder if we could negotiate a lower subscription rate with Infomart since we have lost some content?

Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation - Run for the Cure

Librarianship is a female-dominated profession and, with that, comes female-dominated issues. As in past years, I am taking part in the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation Run for the Cure. In past years I have organized a team through work. This year I am walking with my sister-in-law Lyne. If you are interested in making a donation (or perhaps just seeing my photo) visit my personal donation page. I am quite impressed with how they have upgraded their technology and made donations through a webpage possible.

Thank you,
Connie

New feature - e-mail from this blog

I have now added the new Blogger feature that allows you to e-mail a posting from this blog to someone else. Just click on the little envelope under each posting.

U.K. Law Reports to reappear on LexisNexis

I thought I had posted about this earlier, but apparently not. This was reported in a few places elsewhere in blogland: U.K.-based Law Reports were removed from LexisNexis back in late July or early August during negotiations between LN and the database supplier. A little bird has told me the databases will likely be reinstated shortly, as soon as September 11th.

Technorati: Searching the World Live Web

I just discovered the weblog search tool Technorati. It appears this blog has been indexed by it (try searching "LexisNexis" and you should see posts put in here the last couple days). It appears to index this blog a lot faster than Google.

I have not signed up for a membership but it looks like you can use this tool to watch for discussions in blogs. Over 3 1/2 million blogs are tracked! I like the features "BookTalk" and "NewsTalk" which indicate which books and news topics are currently being discussed in blogs. Doubt I will ever make the "Top 100" popular blogs but it is interesting to see what has made it. Not surprisingly BoingBoing is right up there.

McLuhan 2004: Toronto International McLuhan Festival of the Future

This upcoming event caught my eye in the Toronto International Film Festival programme: McLuhan 2004: Toronto International McLuhan Festival of the Future. Includes something called "Hot & Cool", a look at interesting new technology applications. The whole programme doesn't seem fleshed out just yet. Inaugural programme takes place in October.

LexisNexis Spotlight on International Librarians - Louis Mirando

My friend and colleague Louis Mirando is currently the featured librarian in LexisNexis' Spotlight on International Librarians. Congratulations, Louis!

Quicklaw Classic Note

For anyone running Quicklaw Classic on your system, you will want to check that it is still working. It is no longer supported by LexisNexis in favour of their web version at www.lexisnexis.ca. That much I knew a while back, but it appears our Classic version stopped completely working the last day or two. My understanding is one can sign on, but searching does not work.

Apparently it is possible to download a more recent version that still works from their website. I wonder, however, how long this version will continue to work? This will be impetus for us to switch our researchers over to using the website exclusively, but it will require training. We may download the more recent software in the meantime to make the transition a little smoother.

For my own part, I have weaned myself off the Classic version and have been using the Browser version. Now it is time to help others do the same, I suppose.

Finding breaking news for an intranet - Toronto / Canadian news

We try to keep our home intranet page fresh by including late-breaking news as I have time to add it. Someone recently asked me how I find this information; following is a quick list:

In addition to signing up for the usual Supreme Court of Canada and other government e-mail news, I also receive FlashMail from Pulse24.com ("CP24", the all-news TV station from CHUM City). They send out e-mail as news is breaking as well as headlines for the day's upcoming newscast.

I also listen to the news throughout the day, either the audio from CP24 (available from the website, the left toolbar) OR CBC News, livestream from their website. I listen to Toronto news, but there is news available for all Canadian regions.

Another great source is to receive press releases from Canada Newswire's Portfolio service, free with registration. You can target specific releases or, my preference, receive the Media Daybook each morning. This tells of upcoming press conferences in the day. This is particularly useful for indicating when a government department is going to be releasing big news that day so you can listen for it. You can also view the Media Daybook directly on the website at http://www.newswire.ca/en/daybook/index.cgi.

If nothing of interest to the firm is available from these sources, I troll around various pages including Law Society of Upper Canada, Bar Association pages and the like.

Unfortunately none of this is in RSS (that I have noticed), so I do not put live feeds directly onto our intranet. I pick and choose and manually update our "Home" and "What's New" pages.

If you know of another source for this type of business/legal/general interest information, let me know. I'd love to add to my little collection of sources.

Cheers,
Connie

Article on advanced Google features

I was reading the May 2004 issue of Backbone Magazine and found this great article about Google: "The Google Guide: What You Don't Know About the World's Favourite Search Engine" by Garratt Washy. I knew about some of the features, but not all. It is a great brief summary of what is currently available.

Gems found again on LLRX

Some great articles in this week's LLRX:

- article on blogging from the queen of law library communication herself, Sabrina Pacifici: "Blogs: Are they here to stay? Should you be blogging? How do I find relevant blogs?" (in PDF).

- article on electronic storage: "Notes from the Technology Trenches: How Permanent Is That Storage?" by Cindy Carlson. Something many of us are trying to deal with.

- and a timely article for me since I was doing some proofreading this week, "Wisdom From the Grammar Goddess: My Pet Peeves" by Diane Sandford. Some great reminders and clarifications.

LLRX always has fantastic resources. Check in periodically to www.llrx.com or, better yet, sign up for its e-mail service.

Blog applications comparison - Blogger and Typepad

Blogger has been adding numerous features, and everything is now free! I tried to upgrade to a paid level, but was told all features previously at paid levels are now available at the one level. Plus, they keep adding new features and have now removed the advertising. Since Blogger is owned by Google, my guess is this was changed as a result of the company going public. But, how do they plan to bring in revenue? I'm not sure what they are doing.

One feature I thought has been lacking is a search window for the individual blogs. You will see one now appears in the toolbar at the top of this blog. I haven't tested it out yet, but since my blog seems to have been picked up by Google, it should be indexed. If you run into a problem, do let me know. The other feature I would like to see is subject indexing, so that I can categorize individual posts with subject headings.

There are some other nifty features on the toolbar at top, including a link to another randomly chosen, recently updated blog ("Next blog"). Kind of fun to surf through other blogs, especially to see the variety in layouts.

I have been testing out blogging on Typepad as well. You can take a look--I have started creating one for my book club: http://conniecrosby.typepad.com/bookclub/ . I haven't put any postings in it yet. I do like the calendar, and the ability to add books and their photos. However, it doesn't have the flexibility of Blogger--in Blogger I can work with the underlying HTML and adapt things whereas Typepad has preset features that you pick and choose from. I could add a calendar and the books feature if I can find them available somewhere (I have a lead on the books function). They do have another version, Movable Type, which is software for use on your own host and which allows you to fully adapt. Typepad is meant to be basic for those who want a quick set up.

So far, I would say if you are just starting out into the blogging game, Blogger is your best bet and keeps on getting better.

Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online

I just noticed this on the National Library and Archives of Canada website: Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online. It currently covers people who died between 1000 and 1920. Great idea for basic historical research. Includes names listed in alphabetical order and lots of search capability.

Canadian mediators & arbitrators - web directory

Tracking down a mediator or arbitrator has always been a pain. To fill this gap, a number of Canadian ADR organizations have gotten together to create the Canadian Mediators & Canadian Arbitrators : National Online Directory.

New in-context search tool: blinkx

Thanks to Maggie for pointing this out. New tool takes whatever you are writing or reading and provides links to related material, both on the web and on your machine: blinkx. I haven't tried it out yet but initial reports are good.

"$100 from 100 lawyers" - rebuilding law libraries in Sierra Leone

I posted this on our intranet at work, and thought it might be of interest to others so am posting it here as well:

The headline on the Law Society of Upper Canada home page is an eye-catcher: "Urgently needed: $100 from 100 lawyers". It refers to the $10,000 needed to ship 6,000 lbs of donated law books to the Sierra Leone High Court library and Special Court library. The High Court library was Sierra Leone's principal law library until it was destroyed during ten years of civil war. The Special Court was created under United Nations Security Council mandate.
Lawyers' Rights Watch Canada is joining forces with the Bar Human Rights Committee of England and Wales (BHRC) to rebuild these libraries.

Further information:

Full details from the Lawyers' Rights Watch Canada website

Sierra Leone's Special Court from Global Policy Forum

"Bringing Justice to Sierra Leone" - BBC News article on creation of the Special Court

Ontario County Law Libraries profiled

I just had a look for the first time at the LibraryCo website. LibraryCo is the name of the Library system of Ontario Law Associations. My favourite part of this website is under "About County Law Libraries", the profiles of the county law libraries that were recently added. It's especially great seeing a photo of each. It's amazing how much the addition of photographs can boost a webpage and make the reader feel more connected to the subject on the screen.

Centre for Innovation Law and Policy

For anyone who hasn't seen this website, it is worth a look: Centre for Innovation Law and Policy based at University of Toronto Faculty of Law. The centre supports courses at various law schools, not just U of T. On the website I particularly like their "Innovation Law Forum - research Resources" section which has links to articles and video clips on these topics:
Communications
Computer Law
Electronic Commerce
Innovative Ventures
Intellectual Property
Internet
IT/IP Careers
Privacy
Health & biotechnology law

The website also offers e-mail of new events, and they have a new publication called Innovations.

Sooin Kim, the Librarian from Bora Laskin Law Library keeps them well organized and up to date!

Blogging for intranets

I was researching blogging application software and looking to find out what is available for blogging inside a firewall for the purposes of our intranet. I found this recent article: "Intranets - moving from information to knowledge: The role of blogs and wikis" by Martin White, Managing Director of Intranet Focus Ltd. in the U.K. Discussion was easy enough for a rookie like me to understand, and gives a good discussion of different applications available. Presented May 3, 2004 at the Croinfo 2004 Knowledge Management Conference put on by the National and University Library and PLIVA Pharmaceutical Industry Inc., in co-operation with the Croatian Information and Documentation Society.

I'm interested in other articles/web pages on this topic if anyone has a good one.

SCC Copyright decision - summary

There is a summary/interpretation of the Supreme Court of Canada copyright decision Law Society of Upper Canada v. CCH and other publishers in a recent issue of Intellectual Property a newsletter from Federated Press (link is not to the correct issue): James Tumbridge, "CCH Canadian Ltd. v. Law Society of Upper Canada - Supreme Court Defines 'Originality' and Specifies the Limits of 'Fair Dealing'," Intellectual Property (Vol. X, No. 4), p. 618-623.

Changes to Globe & Mail website access

I was just reviewing an article on the Globe & Mail website and wanted to send an e-mail of it to someone else. It appears the Globe now requires registration (albeit free) for using their "e-mail" and "print" features. They say that it is for the purposes of monitoring how their website is used; however, since their major competitor the National Post made most of their articles pay-per-view I wonder if the Globe is evaluating similar positioning?

While I haven't minded so much registering for free access on the New York Times website, for some reason I find this more offensive. I'm not sure why. Perhaps it is because the pop up registration page was poorly created and I cannot actually access the whole page to fill in the form? Perhaps the Times put a lot more value into their product and so I don't mind giving a little something back in return? More likely it is because I already have subscriptions to the Globe at both home and work so have more of a sense of entitlement. I'm likely not the only one--it's going to be hard for them to change this sort of attitude I think.

Renewing "WeeCarswell"?

It's about a year since the last big push for firms to subscribe to WestlaweCarswell. With many renewals now coming up, it is a good time to have a fresh look at Catherine Best's comprehensive review "WestlaweCARSWELL:Third Time a Winner?" Some of the features may have changed, but it is worth a look at this article to see what needed improvement when it was last launched and whether any changes have been made since then.

It seems to me, overall, that it makes most sense to purchase the most basic level available on flat rate and then access other areas of the product on a transactional basis until such time that use of outside areas is comparable to flat rate use. Certainly their renewal levels encourage this type of strategy since signing on for an additional chunk of flat rate is just an invitation for an increase of prices in the future. I'm interested in whether others have differing strategies.

Some people are reporting a drop in the percentage of the cost that is billed back to clients in the second year. Presumably once lawyers saw the cost charged to clients in the first year, they thought the rate was too high and instead charged back to office files.

CNET guide to RSS

Some basic information on RSS and product reviews from CNET: RSS: news you choose.

LLRX.com - Trends in Blog Searching

Good article on LLRX.com on searching blogs - "Trends in Blog Searching". Includes tips for searching Google and others.

Prime Minister announces new Cabinet

Announcement with link to list of new Cabinet from the Canadian Prime Minister's website. Hey, Ken Dryden was one of the top picks! He is now Minister of Social Development. I had the good fortune of meeting him last year when I had a copy of his book The Game autographed for my brother, a long-time fan. Despite a huge line of eager fans, he took the time to inquire about my brother and what he is doing with his life. Seems like a good guy--let's hope it translates to Parliament Hill. I think this was a good move on the part of Martin's team since I'm sure there are a lot of people who think highly of Dryden.

RSS news feeds from Government of Canada

Looking for ways to boost your intranet or stay on top of Government news? Check out Government of Canada Newsroom - Choose Your News. Thanks to Matthew Skala for pointing this list out on his blog (which in itself is available by RSS feed). He mentions that news is sparse, but at least it is a start.

Better link for Paralegal Regulation meeting

This page is better for the subject discussed below: "Paralegal Regulation in Ontario". Cheers!

Regulation of paralegals

On the evening of Monday, July 12th, the Canadian Association of Paralegals will be holding a meeting to discuss regulation of paralegals. Event details here. Here is a related consultation paper from the Law Society Task Force on Paralegal Regulation, Law Society of Upper Canada, called Regulating Paralegals: A Proposed Approach dated May 2004 that will presumably be discussed.

The Hill Cam

Here is a camera viewing Parliament Hill (our federal government buildings, in Ottawa, Ontario) for Canada Day. You may need to refresh your browser to see the picture. I'm looking at it right now, and there are hundreds of people facing the stage in front of the Peace Tower, and the sun is peeking out from behind the clouds. Looks like a great day for a celebration!

Happy Canada Day!

Happy Canada Day everyone!!

Law Society releases new Model Policy

In time for Pride week, the Law Society of Upper Canada released this Model Policy for law firms called "Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity: Creating an Inclusive Work Environment." (35 pages PDF file).