Content Matters

Earlier this week, Business Week reported that the U.S. division of Reed Elsevier has hired lobbyist Barbour Griffith & Rogers to lobby the federal government.  The high-powered lobby shop was founded by Republican stalwart Haley Barbour, now Governor of Mississippi.  When Barbour was elected Governor, the firm was sold to the Interpublic Group of Companies, and counts among its clients former Iraqi prime minister Ayad Allawi.

According to the registration form filed with the Senate last week, the firm has been hired  "for strategic counsel and to provide advice on policy issues important to the publishing and information industries".

While there are many policy issues facing content companies these days, I'm wondering if Reed Elsevier is specifically looking to challenge efforts by Carl Malamud to break down the protective gates that prevent access to case law.  That market today is in effect a duopoly, with Lexis and Thomson West the primary sources.  Malamud's efforts to challenge those barriers was profiled in a John Markoff New York Times article a few weeks ago.

For those who might dismiss Malamud's efforts, it's helpful to recall that he, almost singlehandedly, forced the SEC to make corporate filings available online (EDGAR); prior to the 1993 decision, SEC filings were provided through exclusive contracts to then LexisNexis parent Mead Data Central.

As Malamud states in the Times article:

"I don’t mind people making billions, but I hate barriers to entry."

There are many compelling arguments to treat case law as public works; just as with SEC and Patent & Trademark filings, there is a cost to society to only allowing access to those with resources.  And while it's clear that Lexis and West would fight such an effort, in the long run, their businesses will succeed or fail based upon the tools they provide to enhance the underlying content, not simply access to the base documents.

The hiring of Barbour Griffith follows the launch of the pseudo-grass roots organization PRISM, of which Elsevier is suspected to be a backer.  It seems that whenever change is on the horizon, the old line content companies turn to their double L approach to Lobby and Litigate.