Wisconsin Vital Records Inexplicably not Allowed Online?!

I recently spent some time researching at the Wisconsin Historical Society Library where they have microfilm of pre-1907 birth, marriage, and death records. Indexes of this information are available at http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/Content.aspx?dsNav=N:1161 but I had never seen copies of records online. I have seen similar records from other states but never from Wisconsin - sitting on top of the microfilm cabinet was the reason why. A sign read,

All that history in a few skinny little drawers

DO NOT ELECTRONICALLY SAVE RECORDS FROM THE PRE-1907 WISCONSIN BIRTH, MARRIAGE, AND DEATH RECORDS. IT IS AGAINST WISCONSIN STATUTE 69.21. "It is illegal to make this document available to the public in electronic format."

Yikes!! This is a travesty for 21st century genealogists whose bread and butter is dealing with electronic records online. According to other researchers there, the Historical Society has brought this to the state legislature in the past to get it changed and have been shot down.

In the absence of a campaign to change the law, I have a few questions about interpretation of this statute. As it happens, I found some interesting data in the records and want to collaborate with some fellow researchers. I wonder, if I save any of the images to my personal USB drive, am I actually violating this statute? What constitutes "the public"? Saving to my own device is not making the records "available to the public" - it is now in my private electronic collection. In fact, if even if I further share that image with a few other researchers, I would argue that they have still not been made available to "the public" - they are now simply in a number of other private collections. If I published them here on my genealogy blog, I would have a hard time defending myself in court. So how do I find the safe line to use this great genealogical data?

For convenience, here is a link to the full text of the statute. https://docs.legis.wisconsin.gov/statutes/statutes/69/I/21

I have asked this question of Judy G. Russell, the Legal Genealogist. We'll see if she's able to offer some insights for us Wisconsin researchers.

UPDATE: Since posting this I have found a few other forums online where there has been some discussion on the topic.

• https://statelinegenealogyclub.wordpress.com/2014/10/15/wisconsin-vital-records-law/
• http://www.wikitree.com/g2g/104044/illegal-digital-copies-wisconsin-marriage-records-online