I am delighted to have been asked to participate in the Yale Law Journal’s online symposium on The Future of Legal Scholarship.  My essay is The Long Tail of Legal Scholarship, 116 Yale L.J. Pocket Part 38 (2006).  Here is my Introduction:

Chris Anderson’s book, The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More, has attracted enormous attention since its publication in July 2006. His insight is that technology and the Internet have transformed the focus of America’s culture and economy. Whereas pre-Internet firms turned out a small number of “hits” or blockbuster products (the “head” of the demand curve), today’s Internet-era firms offer a broader range of niche products (the “tail”). This Essay argues that the long tail theory can help both explain the current state of legal scholarship and chart its future. 

The other papers in the symposium are:

• Eugene Volokh, Law Reviews, the Internet, and Preventing and Correcting Errors, 116 Yale L.J. Pocket Part 4 (2006)
• Ann Althouse, Let the Law Journal Be the Law Journal and the Blog Be the Blog, 116 Yale L.J. Pocket Part 8 (2006)
• Christopher Bracey, A Blog Supreme?,116 Yale L.J. Pocket Part 13 (2006)
• Jack Balkin, Online Legal Scholarship: The Medium and the Message, 116 Yale L.J. Pocket Part 20 (2006)
• Stephen I. Vladeck, That’s So Six Months Ago: Challenges to Student Scholarship in the Age of Blogging, 116 Yale L.J. Pocket Part 31 (2006)

Brian Leiter and Rosa Brooks will be publishing their contributions shortly.