RECAP hasn't been nearly as active as its initiators had hoped. The data there is pretty good however, and for a handful of key cases, I would say it's very good. The biggest issue with the data is that it's spotty. Since it relies on individuals to pull info on each case, some cases may only have partial information (not all the parties, attorneys, etc. represented), or not have the full docket available (and rarely, if ever, all of the documents associated with a case).

RECAP recently found a new home with the Free Law Project, so hopefully things will improve. http://freelawproject.org/2014/05/19/our-recap-partnership-w...

Recap only helps here if everyone accesses/pays for all of the files that are about to be deleted, and doing so would surely cost millions or billions.

I don't get the bit about "privatization." PACER is run by the judiciary.

I assume they're confused by the part where it's run essentially for-profit by the government.

The judiciary sees it as a profit center. Folks have offered to essentially buy the data and make it entirely public. But they see too much profit from it

Of course nobody is "profiting." There are no shareholders getting dividends or execs getting bonuses. They use it fund the operations of the judiciary in the face of a shortage of funding from Congress.

Except, of course, that PACER has various requirements that conflict with this, and they make as hard as possible to keep this profit (which was 150 million in 2008) up.

For example written opinions that "set forth a reasoned explanation for a court's decision" must be free of charge.

They make it is as difficult as possible to access this, and do not allow any sort of bulk download, because doing so would make PACER/courtweb less useful as a pay service.