[... Fastcase] uses computer algorithms to perform all the case indexing now done by the thousands of human editors at Westlaw and Lexis. Operating out of a slightly seedy Washington office building, Fastcase brings in less than $10 million a year in revenue, hardly a threat to the Wexis duopoly, which last year roughly split a combined $1.6 billion in pretax profit on sales of $6.5 billion.
Disruption is in the air, however. Fastcase sells bulk memberships to state bar associations for as little as $2 per member per year, a compelling reason for law firms to at least try it out. Just as cheap personal computers undermined the mainframe business in the 1980s and open-source programs like Linux and Mysql are challenging Microsoft and Oracle today, outfits like Fastcase are attacking Wexis' stranglehold on legal research from the bottom up.
A mix of for-profit and not-for-profit firms have missions similar to Fastcase's, including PreCydent, Public.Resource.org and Collexis Holdings' Casemaker division. They are assembling a digital version of the collections that fill miles of shelves at law libraries across the country. ...
Posted by
Gavin Baker at 6/15/2008 05:59:00 PM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
I recommend the OA tracking project (OATP) as the best way to stay on top of new OA developments. You can read the OATP feed on a blog-like web page or subscribe to it by RSS, email, or Twitter. You can also help build the feed by tagging new developments you encounter.
