Hacker News Reader

Comment by hect0r | Hacker News Reader

We are talking about divorce cases (amongst other things). These should be private matters and there is no public benefit in this being made available for free via Google. To take your argument to its natural conclusion, all your interactions with publicly funded entities should be freely available as well. For example, maybe your medical records, your school transcripts, transcripts of complaints made to police about you, etc.

I think most people who are lionising Aaron's efforts in "freeing" the PACER data really do so because they are in love with an idea rather than because of any considered assessment of the value (and harm) that this content could bring if made freely available.

View on HN

Again, who's to say what's useful? They're not private matters by rule, it's all public record. I could think of a bunch of uses for the data.

I don't have any problem with public record actually being public (and I do have a problem with public records that aren't actually public). Medical records and school transcripts are not public records. 911 calls are public, but you have to know how to request them and that usually means they aren't released unless it's a newsworthy story and a local media outlet jumps through the hoop. Visitor logs should be public (like they are for the White House). You can request anyone's FBI file after they die, but that system could be quite a bit more efficient.

The fundamental question is who decides what is a public record and what is not? Why are your medical records private but your ex-wife's court-room accusations that you were sexually promiscuous, impotent, or secretly homosexual to be considered public records that must be "freed"?

Are you really asking this? The answer is obvious--the law. If you are offended that court records are public, start lobbying to get a bill passed that protects them. Healthcare has HIPAA which is why medical records are private.

This seems pretty analogous to Facebook's Timeline and Graph Search features: once released, everyone is outraged over privacy implications, though the information was always there if you wanted to find it.

It's the difference between 'free to all' and 'free to anyone willing to spend $0.10/page'. It may make it harder for someone to exploit, but it is a false sense of security.

I agree.

It would be better of this content was anonymised so that it cannot be associated with the participants since the names of the people involved are, for the most part, irrelevant to lawyers who need to read this content.

As for the costs, then charging for it does provide a barrier to entry that would hopefully dissuade people from using it for nefarious purposes. A better model would be to recognise that the 'owners' of this content are the people involved in the case and perhaps allow them to license the content of their case and derive income from when it is used. This would address a large number of issues that exist with this system, including privacy.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com