They say you’ll only miss something when it’s gone.

I hope people will not be saying this of BAILII – if it happens that due to market forces it goes into extinction. Market forces have already seen an uninspiring impact on the legal profession, though making certain CABx go into liquidation in a ‘survival of the fittest’ Darwinian legal-economic climate. Even the new model legal curriculum promises to see the unprofitable ends of law get elbowed out, whether this be immigration, housing, disability benefits or asylum, as the ‘wealth creators’ get shoehorned in, such as share acquisitions and private equity.

As a website, BAILLI may not look snazzy. It may not achieve millions on the London Stock Exchange in the near future. It does, however, offer an incredible resource for law and is entirely free-of-charge and public, meaning any member of the public can look up judgments. Try it – here.

You probably don’t want to go there to see lots of targeted ads anyway based on your demographic profile. You may wish to be able to read any judgment from recent years, if you believe in access-to-law for all. Yet, this amazing website is facing financial difficulty. I have spoken to Joseph Ury of BAILLI who is one of the most genuinely nice people you will ever meet. He continues to explain the situation with modesty and politeness, but never with an ounce of anger.

The thing about BAILII is that it typifies innovation, as a popular, easy-to-use, effective resource where the user feels utterly involved. BAILLI is not a simply static invention, a repository of useful and redundant information; it fosters a culture of discovery, research, knowledge transfer and knowledge sharing. It allows things like the ‘Medici Effect’ and the ‘next adjacent’ in innovation to happen for real – in other words, as a legal academic or legal practitioner, you can make groundbreaking connections between diverse subject areas which you never knew had existed.

If you think this is something worth supporting, I strongly urge you to go to the new Facebook page here.

And make sure you follow @BAILII on Twitter here! 

Make yourself known, and contribute to something worth protecting in this ideologically-driven age of austerity.

Finally, I strongly recommend you to look at the work of my peers/colleagues in this regard:

Saving Private Bailii and the Legal Communication Revolution (by @ilegal)

http://ilegality.tumblr.com/post/24123840258/saving-private-bailii-and-the-legal-communication

Justice’s hidden backbone – a tribute to BAILII (by @adamwagner1)

http://ukhumanrightsblog.com/2010/11/18/justices-hidden-backbone-a-tribute-to-bailii/

BAILII – by @familoo

http://pinktape.co.uk/uncategorized/bailii/

BAILII needs your cash regularly (by @nearlylegal)

http://nearlylegal.co.uk/blog/2011/06/bailii-needs-your-cash-regularly/