ABA Journal Article: Are digitization and budget cuts compromising history?

There's an interesting piece on efforts to digitize and authenticate legal materials - including the Uniform Electronic Legal Materials Act - in this month's issue of the ABA Journal: 

While librarians see an enormous upside in increasing public access to material that once was buried in less romantic storage facilities, they are concerned about the accuracy and preservation of legal information that is “born digital,” according to Michelle Wu, director of the Georgetown Law Library.

Wu says the concerns facing modern law libraries are incredibly complex, noting that it’s difficult to keep up with the sheer volume of legal information being generated. She worries about legal information being kept behind subscription walls, and wants to feel confident that libraries have the capacity to capture new information and ensure access to it in perpetuity.

“So much is now represented by what’s online,” Wu says. “The concern is that materials that are not online will disappear from history and won’t be part of our societal knowledge.”