Online consumer legal resource partners with a leading law library.

by Christian McIntosh, special to PC World
January 14, 1999, 4:02 p.m. PT

In a deal designed to give consumers greater access to legal information online, Phoenix-based Law.com partnered with online legal publisher Law Office Information Systems (LOIS) to offer the public ten days of free legal research.

Under the partnership, anyone can sign up for a free trial subscription to all the databases in the LOIS Law Library. LOIS provides its 50,000 members pay-for-play access to case law, statutes, legal updates, and regulations. Law.com is the Web's leading legal portal.

"We want to provide people with as much free information as possible and we want to make that information consumer friendly," said R. Bruce Whiting, Law.com chair and CEO. "The goal is to get the public more informed and more prepared. We want people to know that there are different avenues to the law."

Whiting fashions his Web site, which launched this week, as the Internet portal to law on the Web. Law.com offers interactive legal guides for consumers, attorneys, and business owners, as well as free @law e-mail, daily news briefs, and a national attorney directory from Martindale-Hubbell.

The LOIS partnership is the latest in a series of strategic alliances for Law.com. Whiting has also inked content deals with Court TV Online, LegalSpan.net, Amber Sun Productions, Gilbert Legal Guide publisher Hardcourt Brace, Nolo Press, CommTouch Software, and Corporate Legal Times.

The LOIS deal indicates Whiting's egalitarian approach to the law.

"If we don't have what you're looking for," he said, "we'll do our best to send you to the right source."

LOIS president and CEO Kyle Parker shares Whiting's views that "the law is for everyone and access to law should also be made available to everyone. The Internet allows us to improve access to legal source material."

Parker says he hopes to empower the public by "helping them conduct legal research from the privacy of their home. We want to help people make informed decisions by demystifying the legal system and debunking widely held legal myths."

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