An exciting new initiative in open access to law debuted today with the publication of the first issue of the Journal of Open Access to Law. A peer-reviewed academic journal, the journal is pretty much as advertised in the title, as its ambit "is to promote international research on the topic of open access to law" […]
It's that time of year when the nights get longer, the air gets colder, snow falls, and the holiday spirit descends upon Toronto... and law students can't enjoy any of it due to the end-of-term frenzy of caffeine, summaries, studying, and writing papers and, finally, exams. Last year I wrote a post trying to mitigate the […]
While much of the world's attention on Canadian politics has been focused on the bizarre scenes that have been unfolding in Toronto, the Senate scandal that dominated headlines prior to the Mayor's crack admission has continued apace. Much as in Toronto, the scandal has elicited popular hue and cry for something - anything! - by […]
Lo, those many months ago, before newspapers were reduced to printing articles about explaining crack to their children, Rob Ford, the Mayor of Toronto, was embroiled in what now seems to be a quaint conflict of interest issue. An Off the Shelf post, entitled "Shooting Fish in a Barrel" was written, and that was seemingly […]
Every first-year law student is taught the thin-skull principle, wherein the tortfeasor finds the victim as they find them, even if they have a pre-existing condition. I've been thinking about this over the past few weeks as I've been laid up at home recovering from a concussion and making the slow return to "normal" day-to-day […]
As a child of the Napster generation, the idea of "free" music is something that has a long and fraught history. Until Napster's debut in 1999, it was simply assumed that you would fork out $20 for a CD because what other option did you have? Online music was largely relegated to downloading (in retrospect, […]
It is no secret that the eating habits of Osgoode students have recently fallen somewhat under the microscope. However, this focus has been largely limited to what students are snacking on in the classroom, and not in the library. The obvious reason for this is that food is strictly forbidden in the library - crunchy, […]
It's that time of year! The 1Ls are being initiated into the ways of the law student today, and soon the rest of the Osgoode community will return from what was hopefully an extremely relaxing and invigorating summer next week. While I'm sure that many students are not even thinking about the library while it's […]
In the wake of this year's spate of wild (and wildly destructive) weather, including July 8th's record-breaking torrential deluge that flooded swathes of the city, crippling transit, leaving thousands without power for days, and which will ultimately cost upwards of $600 million in property damage, there are a number of questions of a legal nature that […]
The following is an extended passage taken from the wonderfully cranky and pedantic book The King's English by the wonderfully cranky and pedantic Kingsley Amis. Intended as a highly subjective and opinionated "guide to modern usage", the passage below is taken from the entry on "Capitals and full stops". It should be noted that in British […]