Comment Why should they cater to the public for free? (Score 1) 595
Being a part of the institution that actually produces all of these documents (i.e. the US courts), I fail to see why EVERYONE feels entitled to free access to the systems mentioned.
Nothing is being withheld from the public by charging for access to these databases. Anyone can walk down to my office and use the library and the photocopy machine to access all the case law they can stand.
What you're paying for is the convenience of having a computer searchable database of court documents. I actually design a lot of this type of stuff here at work, and I can say first hand that it isn't cheap to build a system to do this. The only difference on my end is that the taxpayers end up funding my project.
Between the cost of an imaging system, an archive (remember we're talking about terabytes of information here, even if you limit yourself to a regional level), a database to index the archive, a web server to interface the system, etc, etc, etc.... you're looking at a very high cost project.
I can only see two reasons that anyone would ever want to build such a system: Save money on operating costs (like we do, in my court), or make a profit selling access to the system (like these companies do). Don't fault the companies for seeing a market opportunity and taking it.
Nothing is being withheld from the public by charging for access to these databases. Anyone can walk down to my office and use the library and the photocopy machine to access all the case law they can stand.
What you're paying for is the convenience of having a computer searchable database of court documents. I actually design a lot of this type of stuff here at work, and I can say first hand that it isn't cheap to build a system to do this. The only difference on my end is that the taxpayers end up funding my project.
Between the cost of an imaging system, an archive (remember we're talking about terabytes of information here, even if you limit yourself to a regional level), a database to index the archive, a web server to interface the system, etc, etc, etc.... you're looking at a very high cost project.
I can only see two reasons that anyone would ever want to build such a system: Save money on operating costs (like we do, in my court), or make a profit selling access to the system (like these companies do). Don't fault the companies for seeing a market opportunity and taking it.
