Web Trends - What is the Commercial Answer?
Two conflicting trends exercise my mind this week, prompted in part by the two House of Lords decisions in the case of Miller and McFarlane and in part by my discovery via Delia Venables of a long established criminal site.
The House of Lords has given decisions in the two conjoined appeals relating to ancillary relief in which the wives won hands down (or so it seems at first glance.) Good for them, say I, but that is not the point of this article. The decision was well publicised in advance and the HL judgments were on the website for all to see on the morning of the judgment day. That is as it should be - open law, easily available to all, even in family cases. But look on the web for less important but still influential if not actually binding precedents about family law, especially where children are concerned, and you will find 90% of cases only on commercial sites where you have to pay a large subscription to get access. Family Court Reporter seems to be the main beneficiary of this arrangement and it is nothing short of diabolical. Why should we have to pay a large amount equivalent to the cost of the printed material to see these reports on the web? Some have cited difficulties with anonymising the cases but that should never be a problem in the days of word-processors. Perhaps the move by the government towards public hearings of family cases (see later in the wire) will help to open up this market.
Compare this with the criminal law scene. As featured later in this wire there are two excellent free web based resources for criminal law - http://www.crimeline.info from Andrew Keogh of Tuckers and http://www.criminalsolicitor.net. Andrew is a well respected advocate and author and his website content (not perhaps its style) reflects his considerable abilities. I don't know much about the authors of the criminalsolicitor.net site but there seem to be three of them and they obviously know their stuff. Both sites have links to web-based source material and both have summaries of important cases and weblinks to their judgments when available.
Despite trawling the web for the last 5 years or so both these sites have only recently come to my notice even though both are well established with many registered users. But they are almost identical. What a waste of time having two separate sites which are both excellent but duplicate each other and earn very little money. Andrew has recently started incorporating his material into his Crime Wiki which is a brilliant idea and means that more people are likely to see it and use it. But why doesn't http://www.criminalsolicitor.net incorporate its material into the Wiki too? The two sites could then avoid duplication and the Wiki site would become more economically viable.
Then this week comes http://www.footballbanningorders.net/ the brainchild of CJH Solicitors of Derby and obviously there to take advantage of the current world cup football mania and be a source of publicity and possible work for the firm. But that material could be in the Wiki too, without the firm losing out.
These three firms are all doing excellent work but all three are re-inventing the wheel. All of us who contribute properly to the legal information mine on the web need to be less parochial and think "big picture open law source" whenever possible. Perhaps firms could sponsor and be responsible for particular parts of theCrime Wiki and get kudos as a result. There must be a way to make all this material easier to find for everyone.
Hang on! How will all these fully-trained and experienced lawyers ever get paid for all the work they put into making this open law source and how will quality be maintained? I didn't say it had to be free, only easily and cheaply available without having to pay the same as the cost of the printed equivalent. Isn't the easy answer that a standard small pay-per-view charge should be levied? This is one way to see another useful criminal law resource, the National Police Legal Database, which you can look at for £10 per day. Public material (eg statutes) should always be free but isn't there an argument for a central source of legal informationwhich is available to all at a very low price?
The House of Lords has given decisions in the two conjoined appeals relating to ancillary relief in which the wives won hands down (or so it seems at first glance.) Good for them, say I, but that is not the point of this article. The decision was well publicised in advance and the HL judgments were on the website for all to see on the morning of the judgment day. That is as it should be - open law, easily available to all, even in family cases. But look on the web for less important but still influential if not actually binding precedents about family law, especially where children are concerned, and you will find 90% of cases only on commercial sites where you have to pay a large subscription to get access. Family Court Reporter seems to be the main beneficiary of this arrangement and it is nothing short of diabolical. Why should we have to pay a large amount equivalent to the cost of the printed material to see these reports on the web? Some have cited difficulties with anonymising the cases but that should never be a problem in the days of word-processors. Perhaps the move by the government towards public hearings of family cases (see later in the wire) will help to open up this market.
Compare this with the criminal law scene. As featured later in this wire there are two excellent free web based resources for criminal law - http://www.crimeline.info from Andrew Keogh of Tuckers and http://www.criminalsolicitor.net. Andrew is a well respected advocate and author and his website content (not perhaps its style) reflects his considerable abilities. I don't know much about the authors of the criminalsolicitor.net site but there seem to be three of them and they obviously know their stuff. Both sites have links to web-based source material and both have summaries of important cases and weblinks to their judgments when available.
Despite trawling the web for the last 5 years or so both these sites have only recently come to my notice even though both are well established with many registered users. But they are almost identical. What a waste of time having two separate sites which are both excellent but duplicate each other and earn very little money. Andrew has recently started incorporating his material into his Crime Wiki which is a brilliant idea and means that more people are likely to see it and use it. But why doesn't http://www.criminalsolicitor.net incorporate its material into the Wiki too? The two sites could then avoid duplication and the Wiki site would become more economically viable.
Then this week comes http://www.footballbanningorders.net/ the brainchild of CJH Solicitors of Derby and obviously there to take advantage of the current world cup football mania and be a source of publicity and possible work for the firm. But that material could be in the Wiki too, without the firm losing out.
These three firms are all doing excellent work but all three are re-inventing the wheel. All of us who contribute properly to the legal information mine on the web need to be less parochial and think "big picture open law source" whenever possible. Perhaps firms could sponsor and be responsible for particular parts of theCrime Wiki and get kudos as a result. There must be a way to make all this material easier to find for everyone.
Hang on! How will all these fully-trained and experienced lawyers ever get paid for all the work they put into making this open law source and how will quality be maintained? I didn't say it had to be free, only easily and cheaply available without having to pay the same as the cost of the printed equivalent. Isn't the easy answer that a standard small pay-per-view charge should be levied? This is one way to see another useful criminal law resource, the National Police Legal Database, which you can look at for £10 per day. Public material (eg statutes) should always be free but isn't there an argument for a central source of legal informationwhich is available to all at a very low price?
posted by Steve Butler, UKlawyers | 10:03 pm
5 Comments:
Hello,
I am Gavin from the Criminal Solicitor Dot Net web site. Thank you for your comments regarding the site. I am always glad to hear that the site is of use to others.
You pose the question in your post about why not integrate the content from both WikiCrimeLine and Criminal Solicitor Dot Net? The answer is simple both sites serve different purposes. WikiCrimeLine is about being an extensive knowledge base on the criminal justice system. Criminal Solicitor Dot Net is about providing news and a discussion forum for users to talk about the criminal justice system. The CrimeLine updater is also an excellent resource for criminal justice news. As a consequence of both sites aiming to provide information to users we do sometimes cover the same ground.
If you look at the content of both sites you will see that the common ground is the coverage of case law and legislation. WikiCrimeLine then covers legal subjects in a text book resource like manner. Criminal Solicitor Dot Net covers subjects raised/posted in the forums that are perhaps issues of the day such as legal aid news, or practitioners seeking views of other practitioners.
My personal view is that both sites serve the legal community well and that both sites have their own distinct purpose.
You end the piece with "the Wiki site would become more economically viable."
It was Oscar Wilde who said that "a fool knows the price of everything and the value of nothing."
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The economics of legal information are difficult. Oscar Wilde's actual
quotation was as follows from Lady Windermere’s Fan, act 3 (1893): "Cecil
Graham: What is a cynic? Lord Darlington: A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing."
There are two sides to it. The first is the supply
of expert labour to provide material - that is where sharing the task is
important. The second is an income stream to cover the costs. Andrew Keogh
is already seeking sponsorship but the original Wikipedia relies on donations. Andrew started his Wiki in response to the challenge
from Susskind. Our separate sites can still have individual uses and personalities but we should try to work together as well.
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