4 ms·

Not so simple. Different judges define "opinions" differently. Not every material opinion is published on a court's site. There are all kinds of research task

Not so simple. Different judges define "opinions" differently. Not every material opinion is published on a court's site. There are all kinds of research tasks that require searching full-text briefs and viewing dockets. PACER is a filing system used by reporters, the general public, litigants, and opposing counsel. The fact that public domain materials are locked up behind a paywall illegally is borderline criminal.

jsmthrowaway 12y ago
> The fact that public domain materials are locked up behind a paywall illegally is borderline criminal. (a) Court dockets are not public domain, they're often public record, which is an important difference and (b) pretty much every jurisdiction on the books has set it up so that agencies can recoup their costs when records are accessed. As an example, to get full parcel data for Alameda County, a CD-ROM is $20,000. Considering most of those records involve measurements in furlongs and chains and date from the Gold Rush era, I can understand that digitizing was expensive, but right next to it is a ZIP containing almost the same thing in Shapefile form for free. Nobody said governmental fees to access public records are logical, but calling efforts to recoup costs "illegal" and "borderline criminal" is a bit much. Rein it in. Those are serious (and false) things to say, specifically because of the legislation allowing the practice in almost every venue. Call it anything else like "misguided," and I'm with you. Illegal? Come prepared.
- thinkcomp 12y ago
  "In general, all government records are in the public domain and may be freely used." --http://www.archives.gov/faqs/ http://www.archives.gov/faqs/ NARA houses archived court records. I don't know of any exception for live court records. These are public domain materials we're talking about, so long as they're not under seal. Read the E-Government Act of 2002 and the associated Congressional reports telling the judiciary to stop charging for PACER materials (summarized at http://freelawproject.org/2015/03/23/why-should-congress-care-about-pacer/ http://freelawproject.org/2015/03/23/why-should-congress-car...). It is both illegal and theft from the public on a massive scale. I stand by "criminal."
  - jsmthrowaway 12y ago
    > Read the E-Government Act of 2002 You piqued my curiosity, citing a public law in your defense of a position that a federal agency is operating illegally, so I did. You missed §205(e) of that Act, which modifies Public Law 102-140 §303(a) to read: SEC. 303. (a) The Judicial Conference may, only to the extent necessary, prescribe reasonable fees, pursuant to sections 1913, 1914, 1926, and 1930 of title 28, United States Code, for collection by the courts under those sections for access to information available through automatic data processing equipment. So, your citation actually disagrees with you. I didn't bother to study further to see if this has been amended (it almost certainly has), because I was mainly interested in your defensive citation. As I said, these are based on costs. The method of determining those costs is probably flawed and we can debate that all day long, but the fees are legally permitted. Throwing terms around like "illegal" and "criminal" undermines the point you have.
    - thinkcomp 12y ago
      I didn't miss anything. I've researched this extensively--see the lawsuit against the AO referenced in my other comment on this thread. The Act specifies "only to the extent necessary" and "reasonable" fees. $0.10 per page is not supported as being "necessary" or "reasonable" by any legal scholar, economist, or other source. It's an arbitrary round number that is in no way based on the cost of bandwidth, which is zero at the margin. Therefore the present fees are not legally permitted. The only fees permitted are so small they don't even register; in other words, the fees are not permitted. Nor am I "throwing around terms." There is a law; the judiciary is violating it willfully. They are taking money from citizens with no legal basis; that is typically referred to as conversion or theft, which is criminal. If you want to get into semantics, check your definition of "federal agency." The courts don't qualify according to some precedent, which is part of why we have this mess. Otherwise the Administrative Procedure Act would apply and force some accountability.
      - jsmthrowaway 12y ago
        > I've researched this extensively--see the lawsuit against the AO referenced in my other comment on this thread. I read your lawsuit before replying and am aware. It's like you think people don't know who you are. Honestly, I almost didn't reply out of fear you'd sue. How many are you up to now, mid-20s? 30?

jsmthrowaway 12y ago

> The fact that public domain materials are locked up behind a paywall illegally is borderline criminal. (a) Court dockets are not public domain, they're often public record, which is an important difference and (b) pretty much every jurisdiction on the books has set it up so that agencies can recoup their costs when records are accessed. As an example, to get full parcel data for Alameda County, a CD-ROM is $20,000. Considering most of those records involve measurements in furlongs and chains and date from the Gold Rush era, I can understand that digitizing was expensive, but right next to it is a ZIP containing almost the same thing in Shapefile form for free. Nobody said governmental fees to access public records are logical, but calling efforts to recoup costs "illegal" and "borderline criminal" is a bit much. Rein it in. Those are serious (and false) things to say, specifically because of the legislation allowing the practice in almost every venue. Call it anything else like "misguided," and I'm with you. Illegal? Come prepared.

thinkcomp 12y ago
"In general, all government records are in the public domain and may be freely used." --http://www.archives.gov/faqs/ http://www.archives.gov/faqs/ NARA houses archived court records. I don't know of any exception for live court records. These are public domain materials we're talking about, so long as they're not under seal. Read the E-Government Act of 2002 and the associated Congressional reports telling the judiciary to stop charging for PACER materials (summarized at http://freelawproject.org/2015/03/23/why-should-congress-care-about-pacer/ http://freelawproject.org/2015/03/23/why-should-congress-car...). It is both illegal and theft from the public on a massive scale. I stand by "criminal."
- jsmthrowaway 12y ago
  > Read the E-Government Act of 2002 You piqued my curiosity, citing a public law in your defense of a position that a federal agency is operating illegally, so I did. You missed §205(e) of that Act, which modifies Public Law 102-140 §303(a) to read: SEC. 303. (a) The Judicial Conference may, only to the extent necessary, prescribe reasonable fees, pursuant to sections 1913, 1914, 1926, and 1930 of title 28, United States Code, for collection by the courts under those sections for access to information available through automatic data processing equipment. So, your citation actually disagrees with you. I didn't bother to study further to see if this has been amended (it almost certainly has), because I was mainly interested in your defensive citation. As I said, these are based on costs. The method of determining those costs is probably flawed and we can debate that all day long, but the fees are legally permitted. Throwing terms around like "illegal" and "criminal" undermines the point you have.
  - thinkcomp 12y ago
    I didn't miss anything. I've researched this extensively--see the lawsuit against the AO referenced in my other comment on this thread. The Act specifies "only to the extent necessary" and "reasonable" fees. $0.10 per page is not supported as being "necessary" or "reasonable" by any legal scholar, economist, or other source. It's an arbitrary round number that is in no way based on the cost of bandwidth, which is zero at the margin. Therefore the present fees are not legally permitted. The only fees permitted are so small they don't even register; in other words, the fees are not permitted. Nor am I "throwing around terms." There is a law; the judiciary is violating it willfully. They are taking money from citizens with no legal basis; that is typically referred to as conversion or theft, which is criminal. If you want to get into semantics, check your definition of "federal agency." The courts don't qualify according to some precedent, which is part of why we have this mess. Otherwise the Administrative Procedure Act would apply and force some accountability.
    - jsmthrowaway 12y ago
      > I've researched this extensively--see the lawsuit against the AO referenced in my other comment on this thread. I read your lawsuit before replying and am aware. It's like you think people don't know who you are. Honestly, I almost didn't reply out of fear you'd sue. How many are you up to now, mid-20s? 30?