Comments on: Berring, CanLII and Kobe Beef http://www.slaw.ca/2009/11/01/berring-canlii-and-kobe-beef/ A Canadian cooperative weblog on all things legal. Sun, 21 Mar 2010 16:48:56 -0400 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: Richard Leiter http://www.slaw.ca/2009/11/01/berring-canlii-and-kobe-beef/comment-page-1/#comment-708082 Richard Leiter Wed, 04 Nov 2009 20:28:04 +0000 http://www.slaw.ca/?p=13754#comment-708082 Very interesting piece. However, I think that there is communication problem going on between what Bob has said, and to what you are responding. Bob is referring to more than "editorial enhancements" to legal materials. West and Lexis (and BNA and CCH, etc) bring much, much more than fancy and clean databases of primary legal materials: the real value is the secondary material that helps research understand all the vastness and obtuseness that the primary materials offer the unwary. I won't pretend to speak for Bob, but I doubt that he thinks of West or Lexis as simply the Kobe Beef primary legal materials. The treatises, encyclopedias and digests aren't just sake massages on bulls, it is a whole different animal. Even though they, and you apparently, think that selling primary law is their bread and butter, that may be the case in financial terms, but in practical terms, it's utterly untrue. Without the great secondary materials, the primary law is incomprehensible. What gets me is that we have to <em>pay</em> to read primary legal materials, which as public record, we own, AND, we have to pay them to read their precious secondary materials that are necessary for us to understand what the primary materials mean. That's the ultimate irony. In the end, I think that Bob agrees with you, he just isn't stating his case clearly. Even if LII, Law.Gov, CanLII, et al, get everything right. It still won't have the secondary materials; the keys to the kingdom, so to speak. Very interesting piece. However, I think that there is communication problem going on between what Bob has said, and to what you are responding. Bob is referring to more than “editorial enhancements” to legal materials. West and Lexis (and BNA and CCH, etc) bring much, much more than fancy and clean databases of primary legal materials: the real value is the secondary material that helps research understand all the vastness and obtuseness that the primary materials offer the unwary.

I won’t pretend to speak for Bob, but I doubt that he thinks of West or Lexis as simply the Kobe Beef primary legal materials. The treatises, encyclopedias and digests aren’t just sake massages on bulls, it is a whole different animal.

Even though they, and you apparently, think that selling primary law is their bread and butter, that may be the case in financial terms, but in practical terms, it’s utterly untrue. Without the great secondary materials, the primary law is incomprehensible.

What gets me is that we have to pay to read primary legal materials, which as public record, we own, AND, we have to pay them to read their precious secondary materials that are necessary for us to understand what the primary materials mean. That’s the ultimate irony.

In the end, I think that Bob agrees with you, he just isn’t stating his case clearly. Even if LII, Law.Gov, CanLII, et al, get everything right. It still won’t have the secondary materials; the keys to the kingdom, so to speak.

]]> By: Al Podboy http://www.slaw.ca/2009/11/01/berring-canlii-and-kobe-beef/comment-page-1/#comment-708066 Al Podboy Tue, 03 Nov 2009 14:23:23 +0000 http://www.slaw.ca/?p=13754#comment-708066 Interesting piece - thank you. I really like your producer/consumer perspective. Whether government or corporations are the "best" gatekeepers of legal information is, I submit, an open question and usually based on political leaning. Nonetheless the "free access to law" movement is obviously great for both legal information consumers and the competitive marketplace. I love your Kobe beef analogy. Kudos... Interesting piece – thank you. I really like your producer/consumer perspective. Whether government or corporations are the “best” gatekeepers of legal information is, I submit, an open question and usually based on political leaning. Nonetheless the “free access to law” movement is obviously great for both legal information consumers and the competitive marketplace. I love your Kobe beef analogy. Kudos…

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