For announcements of opinions from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit lawyers can sign up for a listserv from Willamette Law School in Salem, Oregon. Through a service called Willamette Law Online, a group of students and faculty compile headnotes on opinions of the for distribution through a listserv. This list provides for a back and forth discussion among lawyers of Ninth Circuit cases and issues. In Illinois, a private publisher provides a listserv service for state supreme court opinions. His motive with the service is to make opinions known as quickly as possible after their release.
Some law firms offer listservers for their areas of practice.
The best known is Greg Suskind's immigration listserv. The listserv distribution of court opinions illustrates the difference between the domains of the Internet. The Web is the most powerful medium for publication of text but the drawback is that lawyers tend not to check a Web site regularly. Email is a good way to notify lawyers of recent events. A message received in email is also easier for a new user of the Internet to forward to others.