Archive for February 2011
Help us move this forward
I’m disappointed that we have had so little feedback on the FreeLegalWeb pilot service to date as we had real enthusiasm for the initial concept and a good number of subscribers to the original blog, attendees at the BarCamp and signups to the Google group.
Please take just a few minutes to think about the project and how you can engage with it and help promote it and move it forward.
Firstly, please do use the site in earnest for a bit and let us know whether you think it’s a useful service with potential (for lawyer or lay users) and broadly what’s lacking or what you’d like to see from the site. Bear in mind that at this point it’s a pilot site and the principles of the project are more important than the detail of the execution.
Please give us your feedback and thoughts on the project by writing or commenting on the FreeLegalWeb blog and/or your own blog and/or on Twitter. All publicity is good publicity; if we can revive the public discussion about what we want from a free legal web, then that would be a great start. If you need help posting to the site, see the Author Guide.
We put considerable effort into trying to raise funds during 2009 but the tide of austerity turned against us and for the moment we must carry on for the love of it.
I’m more than happy to carry on developing and curating content for the site; it will be easy enough to expand it beyond the initial Housing Law focus, but it’s only worth doing that if I get your feedback and can see where we’re headed.
Robert Casalis at UniRom will continue to maintain the legislation and case law data and make some progress with developing the Citator functions which will join it all up.
Harry Metcalfe and team at the Dextrous Web developed the custom WordPress interface but we’ll need funds to develop the functionality of the site further.
As to the organisation, I’m happy to keep the ship afloat but what we really need is help with networking/marketing/fundraising. Everyone can play their part by engaging in the blogosphere/Twittersphere, but if you’re game to help seriously move this forward or know of anyone who might be interested, let me know.
UKSC blog case comments now on FreeLegalWeb
A big thanks to UKSC blog for contributing their case comments to FreeLegalWeb.
UKSC blog brings together barristers at Matrix Chambers, solicitors at Olswang LLP and wider contributions from academics and other interested parties to report the work of the UK Supreme Court in a suitably 21st century style. The editors, Hugh Tomlinson QC, Matthew Ryder QC and Anthony Fairclough of Matrix, and Dan Tench, Oliver Gayner and Laura Coogan of Olswang, invite any interested parties to contribute to debates on the blog.
Their case comments are considered analyses of recent UKSC judgments from this expert panel and so represent some of the best possible legal commentary available on the free legal web.
Accessible law
Just published on VoxPopuLII is my article on Accessible Law. This is largely a composite of posts that I have previously published on FreeLegalWeb and Binary Law, deftly woven together.
Thanks to Rob Richards for the invitation to publish and to Elizabeth Pratt for the editing.
VoxPopuLII is a guest-blogging project sponsored by the Legal Information Institute at the Cornell Law School. It presents the insights of a the very diverse group of people working on legal informatics issues and government information, all around the world. It emphasises new voices and big ideas.
Cornel LII is a not-for-profit group that believes everyone should be able to read and understand the laws that govern them, without cost by:
- Publishing law online, for free.
- Creating materials that help people understand law.
- Exploring new technologies that make it easier for people to find the law.
It is a small research, engineering and editorial group with collaborators including publishers, legal scholars, computer scientists, government agencies, and other groups and individuals that promote open access to law, worldwide.
For detailed commentary on legal informatics follow Rob Richards via his Legal Informatics blog or on Twitter.
4 comments