[topshelfdata]

Thanks for the questions. My apologies for the slow response, HN is throttling my comments. Here we go:

1. I'm no lawyer, but we did confirm with the state public records office that we can charge for this -- so yes, selling this data is legal. I think this is true for other public data sets as well, considering the numerous businesses that pull public records data, munge, and resell (e.g., background checks).

2. The rationale for charging for it was simple: the data in its raw form requires processing that our customers can't afford to do. If you're a retail store, hiring a programmer or even Excel-savvy analyst is too expensive. These businesses are happy to pay a fee to access this data.

3. Pricing: we spoke with numerous potential customers when developing the idea and product. Pricing is a part of the product, and was something we tested by asking for their tolerance.