Archives: November 2003
Mon Nov 24, 2003
Is the fourth party ready for dispute resolution?
Katsh & Rifkin predict that ODR “will change as new online tools and resources are developed.” [1] This reflects the influence of what they call the “fourth party,” a term that has already become part of the ODR lexicon. Rather than view the technology underpinning ODR as an extension or emanation of the third party neutral in a dispute, Katsh & Rifkin view it as a distinct “presence”. The fourth party concerns more than just technical infrastructure, as the design and implementation of an ODR platform will directly affect the manner in which disputes are handled. The fourth party also affects the development of ODR through the ongoing creation of new methods of communication and new technologies, or the evolution of existing ones. It is quite likely that such development will not only change how disputes are handled online, but will also increase the range of disputes that can be handled online. Such dynamism will also affect any regulatory or legislative measures adopted in relation to ODR, as the subject matter of regulation will be subject to constant change. [2]
More...
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AI Boosting Smarts of Online Auctions
AI Boosting Smarts of Online Auctions
Tuomas Sandholm, a researcher and professor at Carnegie Mellon University, has developed techniques using artificial intelligence to help make business-to-business online auctions more fair, flexible and powerful.
To read the entire article, along with any photos, charts, graphics or
sidebars, go to:
http://www.computerworld.com/newsletter/0%2C4902%2C87391%2C0.html?nlid=EMC
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ODR chapter in UN report
The UN report on ecommerce and development that was issued yesterday and that is the subject of a news story in the NY Times this morning also has a lengthy chapter on ODR (written by myself and Colin Rule). http://www.unctad.org/en/docs/ecdr2003ch7_en.pdf
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Sun Nov 23, 2003
UNCTAD ISSUES REPORT ON GLOBAL E-COMMERCE AND DEVELOPMENT
UNCTAD ISSUES REPORT ON GLOBAL E-COMMERCE AND DEVELOPMENT
The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development has
issued a new report on e-commerce and development. The
report estimates that half of all email is now spam costing
us much as $20 billion.
http://www.unctad.org/Templates/Download.asp?docid=4228&lang=1&intItemID=2644
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Thu Nov 20, 2003
Internet Access
Geneva, 19 November 2003 — The first global index to rank Information and Communication Technology (ICT) access has turned up some surprises. Slovenia ties France; and the Republic of Korea, usually not among the top ten in international ICT rankings, comes in fourth. Apart from Canada, ranked 10th, the top ten economies are exclusively Asian and European. The Digital Access Index (DAI) distinguishes itself from other indices by including a number of new variables, such as education and affordability. It also covers a total of 178 economies, which makes it the first truly global ICT ranking.
http://www.itu.int/newsroom/press_releases/2003/30.html
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Tue Nov 18, 2003
ICODR 2004 eNegotiation Competition Attracts Teams from 17 Countries
The third annual International Competition for Dispute Resolution (ICODR 2004) is under way with our first of its kind eNegoitation competition. To learn more about the competition please visit the ICODR portal here at ODR.info.
Currently the eNegotiation competition has 259 participants from the following countries:
Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, Finland, Germany, India, Israel, Mexico, Netherlands, Poland, Russia, Serbia, Spain, Taiwan, USA, Venzuela
The following schools are represented in the eNegotiation competition:
University College of the Fraser Valley, Hamline University School of Law, Trinity Western University, The Mediation & Conflict Resolution Institute, University of Ottawa, University of Vienna, National University of Singapore, Wayne State University, University of Melbourne, National Sun Yat-sen University, Indian Institute of Management Bangalore, New Jersy Institute of Technology, Warsaw School of Economics, Helsinki University of Technology, Rotterdam School of Management - Erasmus University Rotterdam, Tilburg University, Utah State University, The karol Adamiecki University of Economics in Katowice, University of London
A selection of the classes participating:
Industrial Relations, Decision Support Systems, Organizational Design, Rational Choice and Prospect Theory, Mediation, Negotiation in E-business, Internet systems analysis, Digital media, Multi agent systems, Computer Information Systems, International Business Negotiations
If you would like to participate in upcoming ICODR 2004 arbitration, mediation, and eNegoitation competitions for law schools, please visit the ICODR portal for sign up forms and information.
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Mon Nov 17, 2003
Call for Papers
*** Call for Papers ***
EMERGING INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY ISSUES
Annual Conference
March 19, 2004
This conference is sponsored by the Computer Law Review and Technology Journal and the SMU Dedman School of Law.
Article abstracts should be submitted by December 1, 2003. Complete articles should be submitted by February 2, 2004.
Featured presentations will be published in the Symposium Issue of the Computer Law Review and Technology Journal, due out summer 2004.
Topic Areas include, but are not limited to:
Domain name, property and conversion
Digital copyrights
Copyright and communications
Fair use
Patent protection for Internet technology
Patent scope
Web browser patents and Microsoft
DMCA subpoena power
Spamming
First Amendment rights and trade secrets
Software and licensing
Taxing domain names
European Union digital VAT directive
Intellectual property licensing and bankruptcy law
In rem jurisdiction and domain names
Truth in Domain Name Act
Global linking and liability
FTC and Internet regulations
Proposed IP legislation
IP valuations
Online ADR
International IP and trade
IP and globalization
IP damages
Antitrust IP issues
Submissions may be e-mailed or sent by postal service.
If e-mailed, please submit to either:
Jenni Morse, Editor-in-Chief
clrtj@mail.smu.edu
or
Professor Xuan-Thao Nguyen, Conference Chair
xnguyen@mail.smu.edu
If mailed, please address to:
CLTRJ Symposium Submissions
Computer Law Review & Technology Journal
Southern Methodist University Dedman School of Law
P.O. Box 750116
Dallas, Texas 75275-0116
CALL FOR PAPERS
UNIVERSITY OF OTTAWA LAW & TECHNOLOGY JOURNAL
http://www.commonlaw.uottawa.ca/tech/html/lawjournal.html
The University of Ottawa Law and Technology Journal (UOLTJ) is a new
bilingual (French and English) peer-reviewed academic journal devoted to
scholarly articles on all aspects of law and technology. The Journal is
interested in work on all aspects of this field, regardless of the type of
technology, substantive area of law at issue, or theoretical or
philosophical focus. The Journal will be published semi-annually in print
and electronic formats.
The Journal is currently accepting submissions of original scholarly
articles for its Spring 2004 issue.
The Journal accepts submissions in English or in French. All submissions
should be accompanied by a 250-word abstract and a statement by the author
that the article is not under consideration for publication in other
journals and has not been previously published.
All citations should conform to the Canadian Guide to Uniform Legal Citation
(5th ed. 2002). Articles conforming to the Bluebook: A Uniform System of
Citation (17th ed. 2000) will also be considered for publication.
The deadline for submissions for the Spring 2004 issue is January 15, 2004.
Inquiries may be addressed to:
Professor Elizabeth F. Judge and Professor Jennifer A. Chandler
Editors-in-Chief and Faculty Advisors
University of Ottawa Law & Technology Journal
uoltj@uottawa.ca
Electronic copies of submissions should be sent to: uoltj@uottawa.ca
University of Ottawa Law & Technology Journal
University of Ottawa
Faculty of Law, Common Law Section
57 Louis Pasteur St.
Ottawa, Ontario
CANADA K1N 6N5
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More Consumers Reach Out to Touch the Screen
By AMY HARMON
New York Times (free registration required)
Published: November 17, 2003
INDIANAPOLIS — Striding into the airport here one recent afternoon, Kimberly Ward did not so much as glance at the two ticket agents waiting at the counter. Like most of her fellow travelers, she instead claimed an automated check-in terminal, touched its screen a few times, and took the proferred boarding pass with a quick smile of thanks.
Ms. Ward, 37, pays for gas only at the pump. She shops at Marsh, a supermarket in her neighborhood that has machines that let customers scan, bag and pay for groceries themselves. Her favorite bank teller is her A.T.M.
Dealing with humans in such situations "just slows you down," she says. "This is a lot more convenient."
A new generation of self-service machines is slipping into the daily lives of many Americans. Rejected for decades as too complicated, the machines are being embraced by a public whose faith in technology has grown as its satisfaction with more traditional forms of customer service has diminished. Faced with the alternative — live people — it seems that many consumers now prefer the machines.
more:
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/17/technology/17MACH.html?th
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Thu Nov 13, 2003
UN Expert Working Group
Thank you to the Center for Information Technology and Dispute Resolution for providing this forum for discussion.
I'd like to invite comments on the role of the UN Expert Working Group on Online Dispute Resolution.
At the Second UN Forum on ODR in July 2003, a number of potential activities for the Group were brainstormed. The aim of the Group is to contribute to the development of ODR between UN sessions.
We'd be grateful for your feedback on which of the following tasks should be priorities for the Group:
* preparing for the ODR Forum each year, eg by reviewing draft papers and assisting with the program
* producing a yearly publication on developments in ODR
* organising a conference specifically on ODR in developing/emerging countries
* developing an open source platform for use in developing/emerging countries
* working on ODR XML (cf comments that this already being done)
* assisting with the international ODR competitions (ICODR)
* preparing or designing something for Cyberweek 2004
* preparing a standard for conflicts of interest in ODR, eg a publication on independence in ODR
* preparing educational or training materials, eg accredited for regions.
Please indicate which of these areas you think the Expert Working Group should be focusing on by posting a comment to this site.
We'll collate comments received by 26 November 2003 to create draft "terms of reference" to guide the Expert Working Group.
Melissa Conley Tyler
International Conflict Resolution Centre, University of Melbourne
m.conleytyler@unimelb.edu.au
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Wed Nov 12, 2003
John Helie
I am honored to be invited to be a contributor to the new ODR News/Blog.
Being somewhat new to the BLOG culture I am not sure of the etiquette of the format. As usual, I am mostly interested in how BLOG's will impact our communications. We have watched email become a significant part of our communications system. We watched the Web become a significant part of our information system and now I am wondering if the Blog phenonema is a hybrid of web and email.
I have just recently gotten lost in a series of Blogs which led ever deeper, it started with a Blog by John Palfrey
at the Berkman Center at Harvard Law School http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/palfrey/ from there I wandered into a real mind blowing series of articles. Enter at your own risk. http://www.cio.com/archive/092203/index.html Here I could add comments to
"The War Over Innovation" by Howard Rheingold or The Dalai Lama's article on "Computers and The Buddha Nature." The list of authors on an array of topics with an opportunity to interact is mindbloging. While these CIO.com articles are open to interaction, I am not sure if they are Blogs.
The power of Blogs is not lost on Presidential hopefuls, John Dean is making very effective use of the medium. http://www.blogforamerica.com/
My interests in dispute resolution has moved into the area of large group interactions around consensus building issues and I am wondering how the BLOG will be used in such scenarios. My recent article
Communication Assessment: Promising Practice For Large Multi Party Convening
http://www.mediate.com/articles/helie4.cfm already needs to be modified to consider how BLOGS might be used.
I sense that BLOGS are not a dialogue medium, but I would like to hear your views on the emergence of the Blog and their role in community dialogue.
John Helie
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Video Conferencing as Hearsay Evidence
This is a very recent case from the UK Court of Appeal- it concerns one aspect of ODR in the courts-the admissibility of witness evidence through video-conferencing.
The case is Roman Polanski v The Conde Nast Publication Ltd 2003 of 11. November 2003
Roman Polanski has brought a defamation case and the question was whether he could do so in absentia from France, as he fears he will be extradited to the US if he enters the UK. He is a fugitive from the US criminal justice system. The English Civil procedure rules state that the court may allow evidence by video-conferencing. In this case, however the Court of Appeal held that the VCF evidence was less ideal as in a defamation case the claimant's character, credibility and reputation was crucial and the evidence was to be assessed by a jury. The Court held that it was in indulgence to allow the claimant to give his evidence by VCF and that this should not be granted. The Court found that the claimant could bring his action elsewhere (e.g. in France where he was resident). I think this case is interesting as it illustrates the CA's reluctance to allow VCF for very pragmatic reasons.
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Virtual games and ODR
An interesting conference this weekend at New York Law School focuses on law and multi-player games. Many thousands of people participate in Ultima Online, Everquest, Sims Online and others. Inevitably, disputes occur. There are interesting papers that have been prepared for the conference at http://www.nyls.edu/pages/777.asp My own thoughts on "Can Avatars Lead us to a New Model of Dispute Resolution?" can be found at http://www.nyls.edu/docs/katsh(2).pdf If you want to see an example of a particularly intriguing dispute, check out http://www.juliandibbell.com/playmoney/index.html and scroll down to the Friday, October 17, 2003 entry.
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Tue Nov 11, 2003
ODR and Amazon's amazing new search capability
A few weeks ago Amazon introduced a rather remarkable capability into its search form. It is now possible not only to search for books but to do a search inside the book. So far, one can search 150,000 books. There are many more books than this but even with this many, one can find much that one was not aware of. Do a search for online dispute resolution, for example, and find a few pages about ODR in Chris Moore's book The Mediation Process.
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Wed Nov 05, 2003
New ODR Conference -- Feb. '04
The Thirteenth Annual
SYMPOSIUM ON CONFLICT RESOLUTION
Friday, February 6, 2004 8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
RA Center, Ottawa, Ontario
SYMPOSIUM THEME: Impact of Technology on Conflict and Its Resolution
If you are interested in submitting an abstract, please contact Allison Demers at allison_demers@sympatico.ca or follow the link for more information.
more >>
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Sun Nov 02, 2003
Online Agencies as Ombudsmen
By BOB TEDESCHI
New York Times
Published: November 2, 2003
Online travel agencies are no slouches when it comes to customer service. According to the American Customer Satisfaction Index, Web sites like Expedia, Travelocity, Orbitz and others rated 77 out of 100 for the last quarter of 2002, the most recent date this group was rated. That score is higher than many other industries, including banking and retail, and is considerably higher than two industries the e-travel agents serve - hotels and airlines.
Such data suggest that online agents do fairly well at handling disputes regarding either poor service from the travel suppliers or substandard service on the e-travel sites themselves, be it from lost reservations or inaccurate information. But things go wrong, even in these companies' customer service departments.
One question for consumers is, how far should these companies go in acting as advocates for customers? Further, when the sites fail to resolve a dispute to your satisfaction, where can you go for help?
more:
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/02/travel/02cyber.html
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