As long as history remembers, the powerful have feared those below them will learn what they know. Hence trade guilds' secrecy, fear of slaves' literacy, women's education… knowledge being power, the powerful aren't crazy about sharing it.

Of course, there are incontrovertibly valid needs for confidentiality and secrecy. Loose lips do sink ships. The forces of secrecy and openness are in a perpetual scrum. One such contest arises when an "open" murder case has long grown cold. At what point should it become less the exclusive property of the police?