A posting in Slashdot has information about the new UN data access system called UNdata that contains information from all major UN databases and those of several other international organizations. UNdata will improve the dissemination of statistics by UN's Statistics Division (UNSD) to the widest possible audience. It is an easy to use data access system that was developed to meet UNSD’s vision of providing an integrated information resource with current, relevant and reliable statistics free of charge to the global community. The design allows a user to access a large number of UN databases either by browsing the data series or through a keyword search.

Yes, it's Leap Year day, or whatever it's called.  Those folks who were born on Feb. 29th get to have a real birthday party this year. 
You can read about leap year and other "timely" matters on the rather wonderful website of  the National Institute of Standards and Technology Time and Frequency Division, an operating unit of the Physics Laboratory of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), an agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce that is  located in Boulder, Colorado at the NIST Boulder Laboratories.  While you're there you can check out their online exhibits about timekeeping and calendars through the ages, and you can also set your watch and be sure it's the right time!   

C-SPAN has recently released a great new online resource with lots of potential:  the  C-SPAN Congressional Chronicle (currently in beta) is an index to the C-SPAN video recordings of the House and Senate floor proceedings. According to C-SPAN the video recordings are matched with the text of the Congressional Record as soon as it is available.  Each appearance has a video link where users can watch and listen to the actual remarks.  C-SPAN  hopes that this site will provide a useful tool for viewers and followers of Congress to research, watch, and review the actions of the Congress. They welcome  bloggers and websites to create links to various videorecordings and also welcome comments and suggestions for improving the service. 

Slate has an interesting article titled "Digg, Wikipedia and the Myth of Web 2.0 Democracy" in which the author, Chris Wilson, talks about how a few people are responsible for most of the entries in Digg and Wikipedia and various permutations of having an open-access site.  He makes that point that  "Despite the fairy tales about the participatory culture of Web 2.0, direct democracy isn't feasible at the scale on which these sites operate. Still, it's curious to note that these sites seem to have the hierarchical structure of the old-guard institutions they've sought to supplant."

The Committee on Oversight and Government Reform is the main investigative committee in the U.S. House of Representatives. It has authority to investigate the subjects within the Committee’s legislative jurisdiction as well as “any matter” within the jurisdiction of the other standing House Committees.
Tues. Feb. 26 at 10 am the full Committee will hold a hearing entitled “Electronic Records Preservation at the White House.”  According to the Committee website,  the witnesses expected to testify include:

You and some friends or colleagues decide to start a blog together. This is pretty common, but might there be some legal issues you haven't considered? Over at InformIT, Eric Goldman has written a 2 part series that examines this possiblity.  Part I discusses the legal ramifications of blogging collaboratively,  and in part 2 the author points out some possible solutions and recommendations for mitigating unwanted consequences of co-blogging.

SCOTUSblog has announced the release of a new statpack (9 page pdf) that shows the breakdown of how each Supreme Court Justice has ruled at the quartermark of the term.  One new statistic includes how often each Justice votes with the majority, both overall and in divided cases.  The idea is that these figures reflect a general, if imperfect, measurement of how often each Justice is presumably pleased with the outcome of the Court’s decisions. Justice Antonin Scalia is the only member of the Court to vote with the majority in every merits decision issued so far this Term.

Thanks to my fellow blogger for the link to Fister's article.  I recently came across an article (linked through that splendid online publication brought to us by the Chronicle of Higher Education, Arts and Letters Daily) that offers more food for thought.  Titled Better than Free,this thoughtful piece by Kevin Kelly of Wired discusses how we might be able to add value to the vast amount of free information now available - value that people will be willing to pay for. He says that "The internet is a copy machine....When copies are super abundant, they become worthless. When copies are super abundant, stuff which can't be copied becomes scarce and valuable. When copies are free, you need to sell things which can not be copied. Well, what can't be copied?" He discusses eight "generative values" that are better than free: 
immediacy,  personalization, interpretation, authenticity, accessibility, embodiment, patronage and findability.  All of these are relevant to librarians as we adjust our skill sets to provide information available on the internet. 

The Congressional Research Service has issued a report entitled (45 page pdf) Instances of Use of United States Armed Forces Abroad, 1798-2007, updated January 14, 2008 .  It reviews hundreds of instances in which the United States has sent military forces abroad in situations of military conflict or potential conflict to protect U.S. citizens or promote U.S. interests. The listed deployments vary in size and length, legal authorization and significance. In eleven separate cases listed in bold-face type the U.S. formally declared war against foreign nations; but for most the status of the action under domestic or international law hasn't been addressed.  A sample entry:

"1798-1800      Undeclared  Naval  War  with  France.    This  contest  included  land actions, such as that in the Dominican Republic, city of Puerto Plata, where marines captured a French privateer under the guns of the forts. Congress authorized military action through a series of statutes.
1801-05          Tripoli.   The   First   Barbary   War   included   the U.S.S. George Washington and Philadelphia affairs and the Eaton expedition, during which a few marines landed with United States Agent William Eaton to raise a force against Tripoli in an effort to free the crew of the Philadelphia.    Tripoli  declared  war  but  not  the  United  States, although Congress authorized U.S. military action by statute."

The H. Douglas Barclay Law Library at the Syracuse University College of Law has created a Race and Law Research Wiki that it hopes will be a valuable inter-disciplinary resource for researchers.  The topical organization is based on a Race and Law course syllabus and textbook.  For each topic, researchers will currently find bibliographies and research guides; web resources and databases; and legislative and administrative material.  The wiki also includes sections on statistics, how to find books and articles, and suggestions for relevant news sources and blogs.  Emphasis in all categories is on electronic resources; however, some references to print sources have also been included.  Anyone interested in contributing to the wiki can contact the librarian in charge here.

The Washington Affairs Office of the American Association of Law Libraries has just announced the launch of its new blog. The blog, named AALL’s Washington Blawg, will highlight bills that the AALL is tracking in Congress, Action Alerts, news, resources, events and more. The blog will will cover legislative, judicial and regulatory activities on the state, national, and international levels and address important topics such as access to government information, digital authentication, copyright, and open government issues. The WAO is located at the Georgetown University Law Library in Washington, D.C., a location that allows them to work closely with the three branches of government. They are involved in several active coalitions, including the Library Copyright Alliance, OpenTheGovernment.org, and the Alliance for Taxpayer Access. You can keep receive regular updates by subscribing to the RSS feed, signing up for email updates, or by visiting the blog for the latest news.

Michael Sauers, who has the wonderful title of "Technology Innovation Librarian" and blogs for the Nebraska Library Commission, has started cataloging and offering Creative Commons-licensed works at his library.  What he did was to take electronic versions of CC titles, post them on his library's Web server, catalog them in the OPAC, and make them available to the public. Additionally, for titles whose license allows for physical printing of the works, they turned the electronic books into spiral-bound books to be added to the physical collection.  The result, so far, is that his library now has a collection of 9 CC-licensed electronic titles available through the OPAC along with 7 print versions available to circulate.   Also, seven of the nine titles resulted in brand new records in OCLC.  Corey Doctorow, one of the authors, has blogged about the project over at BoingBoing.