He’s boldly calling for an authenticated registry and repository of all primary legal materials in the United States available to the public at no cost. What does that include? Statutes, legal opinions, regulations and other rules that govern the daily lives of citizens, right down to permits issued by the local water district. Malamud has a name for his giant database, Law.gov.

“We are a nation of laws, but the laws are not publicly available,” Malamud said recently on a visit to Chicago. “That’s a problem of democracy and justice.”

via Time for free and easy access to legal information – chicagotribune.com.

The idea, according to the Public.Resource.Org description, is to “provide bulk data and feeds … to use the raw materials of our democracy.” What are these raw materials? Basically, all materials that have the force of law, including:

• briefs and opinions from the judiciary;
• reports, hearings, and laws from the legislative branch;
• and regulations, audits, grants, and other materials from the executive branch.

As an academic legal researcher currently disconnected from a law school, any access to a broader swath of legal information and materials is a win for me personally. I think access by everyone to such resources is also a good thing (even if those unfamiliar with reading and interpreting legal materials can often misinterpret what they are reading…).

I would love to see such a thing extend beyond federal materials (which are reasonably accessible online now). Getting 50 states (and various territories) to cooperate with a central repository would be challenging  —  but brilliant. Hopefully Malamud and the various co-conveners can pull it off!

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Meanwhile, the “big two”  —  LexisNexis and Westlaw  —  are not standing still. Both are intending to release new interfaces to their signature products in the next year, and both will focus on eliminating complex search query requirements in favor of Google-like natural language searching and “artificial intelligence” based sorting of results: “Both companies claim to be creating a legal research experience that will mimic the ease of use their customers have come to expect from the leading Internet search engine, Google,” wrote the Jill Schachner Chanen in the ABA Journal on Jan. 24th.

This shift in search strategies can’t come soon enough for me. Even when I was routinely using Lexis and Westlaw, I frequently found an initial Google search  —  even without the new Google Scholar features  —  would do a far better job and getting me oriented on a case topic than anything Lexis or Westlaw could provide. Once I had some specific search terms, the big two would let me drill down, pull up case histories and related cases, and seek legal background information in treatises. But that initial searching was much easier and productive  —  not to mention cheaper!  —  using Google.

Improving this aspect might help keep customers. Not doing it will certainly lose business, at least.

I don’t think I could, in good conscience, charge a client for legal research done entirely in Lexis or Westlaw at this point, without first starting out with free (or lower cost, at least) options like Google Scholar or Fastcase. The cost difference is staggering, and I would feel unethical to charge a client for the cost of exploratory research using the big two (but not for using them to Shephardize, for example, for which a paid service is simply required).

Personally, I am far more excited by Google Scholar than by these potential changes by the big two, but any innovation in this space would be welcome.

For more, see:

• Exclusive: Inside the new Westlaw, Lexis & Bloomberg Platform (ABA Journal)
• On the Lexis and Westlaw of the (Very) Near Future (Wall Street Journal Law Blog)

Though I don’t believe that it’s necessarily prudent or always cost-effective to run a law firm on freebies alone, free services, when used appropriately can give lawyers a wide range of capabilities that once would have been cost prohibitive.  And of course, don’t forget that yet another free tool for starting a law firm is MyShingle!

via Some Free Tools for Starting A Law Firm : My Shingle.

Before proceeding, let me remind anyone with confidential client information to be particularly careful, as you do not want to let an accidental slip-up reveal such details to the entire Web. (And there’s an open debate on whether it’s a good idea for attorneys to keep confidential information on 3rd-party servers, so think about that before doing it. I think it’s fine, personally, but you should think about the issues first.)

First, before we move on to tools to manage your business, you might want to consider alternatives to the very expensive Lexis and Westlaw. One new choice is Google Scholar, which has added case law to its index. I’ve written about some other choices before, along with more inexpensive alternatives,  including:

• Your local law library, where research is generally free
• FindLaw, a free case law database
• Fastcase, a reasonably priced legal research service (not free)

Once you can do research, you’ll need clients. In addition to the usual (paid) approaches, consider establishing your presence on Twitter, connecting to others on LinkedIn, and networking with your old classmates on Facebook.

Of course, once you have clients, you will need to keep track of them, along with your projects. You’ll also need to bill them. For this, I recommend either Cashboard (“time tracking, expenses, invoicing, estimates, and online payments done your way”) or FreshBooks (“Send, track and collect payments quickly. Great for teams, freelancers and service providers”). Both interface with Basecamp (below) to provide effective invoicing and billing. I have used both Cashboard and FreshBooks, and both are excellent choices.

Although you may be small, or may not even have more than token office space, you may want or need to work with a team  —  whether that’s collaborating with a virtual paralegal or a law student intern, or with a more specialized attorney. For this, take a hint from professional Web developers, and consider 37signals’ Basecamp. It lets you share files, meet deadlines, assign tasks, and centralize feedback.

Microsoft Exchange may cost much more than you can afford  —  and it certainly is more complex than you need. But you still need what it provides, especially email and calendaring. Throw in Web-based document editing and collaboration tools which are quite capable of replacing Microsoft Word for most document preparation tasks, and you have a winning combination in Google Apps. Basic services are free, but you may wish to upgrade to a paid business account for guaranteed service-level agreements and support.

You’re going to need to manage your telephone presence. Google Voice can help give you a central number for all your clients, and even transcribes your voicemails to text  —  all for free. (Consider VoIP services and Internet fax services to save money, too. One nice tip: Box.net, mentioned below, allows you to send faxes via efax.com for free.)

You’ll need a Web presence, too. While you can certainly use free blogging services like WordPress.com or Blogger (both recommended), you’ll probably want to buy a custom domain so you look more professional.

I highly recommend backing up your documents off site. Mozy is one nice choice  —  there’s a free intro plan, and paid plans if you need more space or service. Box.net is a good storage space if you need to collaborate or share files. Additionally, Dropbox provides simple cross-platform synching, so your laptop (which you’ve encrypted, right?) and your desktop files stay up to date.

All of the above provide fine services when you are starting out, and can grow as you grow. Just remember not to be cheap when it really counts  —  once you have some income coming in, I recommend an upgrade to the paid versions of these services to get full and professional support.

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The cloud consists of data and services that live on someone else’s servers. Although the term itself is new(ish), the basic idea is embodied by traditional legal research services like LexisNexis and Westlaw  —  data lives on someone else’s servers, not your own. Thus, someone else controls the data, not you. And someone else can delete or modify the data, and you’d never know…

It’s one thing to have to contend with Supreme Courts, like California, that have the power to “depublish” an opinion that helps your case and making it worthless as far as precedent is concerned. But to my knowledge, those cases are still on the books, and binding on the parties to the litigation that created the opinion. It’s an entirely different problem when a court can ask a publisher to take down an opinion previously published, and the publisher does it. In fact, the publisher has apparently been doing it for years. Maybe you knew about it, but I didn’t.

via Dear Publisher, Please Stop Deleting Case Law | Jason Wilson | Law Publishers.

This is the sort of thing that has always given librarians heart attacks  —  to the extent that one librarian I knew years ago attempted to print out every Web site she ever accessed and stored them in file cabinets. A bit extreme? Yes, but the point was that she could control it once it was in print: the data couldn’t disappear, change, etc.

I don’t have the solution to this conundrum  —  cloud services make too much sense to fight  —  but the downsides are expensive, too. What to do, what to do?

Legal Research Plus brought this to my attention, originally from the Daily Journal:

. . . Several months ago, . . .  Irvine attorney [Ed Connor] learned the California Supreme Court had given his 143-page brief to the legal information service LexisNexis, which was making it available online for a fee. . . .

via LexisNexis and Westlaw violating copyright? « Legal Research Plus.

This idea  —  that the courts are turning over attorney work product to for-fee services, which then resell them (or merely make them available?) to customers  —  is an intriguing one. Do briefs filed with the court become public domain? Or do the original author-attorneys retain copyright? Even if the writer (or their employer in some cases, since briefs are likely works-for-hire) retains copyright, does fair use apply to Lexis/Westlaw’s actions? As I said, an interesting idea.

Personally, from a public-policy perspective, I would be inclined to favor allowing LexisNexis, Westlaw, and anyone else to provide access to court-filed attorney briefs. I am bothered a bit about the resale factor  —  but only because there does not seem to be a free (as in without cost) option for accessing the briefs. I do not believe the public benefits from applying a copyright approach that denies access to the briefs. We are all better off if we can read them.

But like other situations in which I advocate “open access,” there should be more public access than simply LexisNexis and Westlaw’s extremely expensive service.

I’ll be interested to see if this issue goes anywhere in California, or if it just disappears.

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Greg Lambert at 3 Geeks and a Law Blog writes:

Generally, the discussion has tended to lean toward the idea that online research will trump print research due to the convenience of the format and how the upcoming generation will prefer online over print media.

via 3 Geeks and a Law Blog: Legal Research Metrics & Ethics: $499 a Year Or $825 an Hour?.

But Lambert points out that many researchers have discovered that in certain situations and with certain kinds of material, even young lawyers are discovering that online access – at least, as delivered by the current providers – just doesn’t work as well.

Cost is a major element of this: online access to a treatise (a compendium of legal research, opinion, etc. that’s an extremely useful resource for understanding an area of the law before diving into more specifics) can run to around $825 an hour, while the print version of the same treatise costs $499 per year (or less, if you don’t mind out-of-date treatises). But it’s more than simply the straight-up cost of access – print research can be more effective and time-efficient for many tasks:

Then along comes a recession and all of a sudden it becomes apparent that online research is “expensive” and for some forms of research – specifically treatise research – online research doesn’t work very well. Take a poll at one of the practice group meetings you attend and ask the attorneys point blank: “When researching in treatises, do you find you are more efficient using the print version of a treatise, or the online version of a treatise?” I’d almost give you 2 to 1 odds that the print version will be the preferred method.

via 3 Geeks and a Law Blog: Legal Research Metrics & Ethics: $499 a Year Or $825 an Hour?

Myself, I find that online case-law research so much more effective than the print alternative that I strongly support eliminating the print versions of decisions completely. There is simply no point in filling libraries with dead trees holding out-of-date case law that’s difficult and time-consuming to cross-reference.

However, treatises are a different story. The longer, more in-depth format, combined the the benefits of browsing vs. searching when it comes to broad areas of the law, make the print versions far more attractive than their current online counterparts.

This is essentially the same reason why I do not read books on my computer screen: it is uncomfortable and limiting.

The Kindle and other e-readers substantially reduce this argument, however, and that is exactly what I see for the future of treatises. The benefits of “online” access (especially linking) simply do not outweigh the per-hour charges or the inefficiency of search vs. browse. Electronic readers, with one-time charges like print, add effective electronic searching while preserving much (but not all – flipping back and forth between sections, or having multiple volumes open at once are still not possible) help bridge this gap.

My prediction: treatises will move to electronic media, and “online” access via LexisNexis or Westlaw will be reduced to quick scans and database searches, with researchers then taking it “offline” to their Kindle. (Of course, the “online” vs. “offline” distinction is inaccurate, since the Kindle has built-in wireless networking – so we need to find a better term to capture the distinction.)