NARA releases Digital Preservation Framework for public comment
The Archivist of the US (AOTUS) released NARA’s plan for a Digital Preservation Framework consisting of a “Risk and Prioritization Matrix” and 15 File Format Preservation Action Plans. NARA is asking that the public submit comments on NARA’s GitHub site through November 1, 2019.
In particular, we are hoping to get feedback on the following topics:
- What revisions can you suggest to the proposed processing and preservation actions for the formats?
- Are the Essential Characteristics for each record type comprehensive enough for digital preservation?
- Are the proposed preservation actions for the formats technically appropriate?
- Are there appropriate tools for processing and preservation of specific formats that we do not have listed?
- What can you suggest in terms of appropriate public access versions of the formats?
- Are there other formats we haven’t identified that need plans?
You can use the issues feature in Github to leave a comment or question or start a discussion. Read more about how to contribute here. So, go ahead, start digging in to your favorite file format and tell NARA your thoughts.
Today NARA is releasing the entirety of our digital preservation framework for public comment. This digital preservation framework consists of our approach to determining risks faced by electronic files, and our plans for preserving different types of file formats. The public is encouraged to join the discussion, September 16 through November 1, 2019, on GitHub.
via Digital Preservation Framework Released for Public Comment – AOTUS.
EPA argues its blog isn’t public information, won’t change post
Possibly lost in the jaw-dropping WTF! statement where the EPA argued its blog isn’t public information is the fact that the EPA, in a PUBLIC BLOG POST ON THE INTERNET WITHIN THE EPA.GOV DOMAIN(!), had the gall to celebrate National Pollinators Week after it expanded the use of the pesticide sulfoxaflor that is considered “highly toxic” to bees. The Doublespeak severely pains this former beekeeper.
“The EPA Blog is an example of information that would not be considered disseminated by the EPA to the public,” Kevin Kirby of the EPA wrote in response to Burd.
Document(s) of the day: FDA judgements 1908 – 1966. Thanks Natl Library of Medicine!
Today’s document(s) of the day is via the always interesting Scout Report. It’s a digitized collection of Food and Drug Administration (FDA) judgments from NIH/NLM (National Institutes of Health/National Library of Medicine) from 1980 – 1966. A finding aid to the collection is available. “The evidence files are controlled by the various Sample, S., or IS evidence file numbers found in the Notices’s Numbers metadata field and are organized roughly by date.
This is a goldmine of historic FDA documents. The only gripe I have is that when I went to put the url into the wayback machine to preserve all the documents, I got an error message saying that the page was not available to be archived because access had been forbidden. Here’s a treasure trove of fugitive government documents not able to be collected or preserved by the FDLP. So, if you’re listening/reading NLM, please allow your digitized collections to be crawled by the Internet Archive and by libraries collecting digital government documents. Thanks!
We’ve all heard by word of mouth about products that may contain suspect ingredients, but this collection of U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) judgments from NIH/NLM (National Institutes of Health/National Library of Medicine) has the full story. The collection contains summaries of the outcomes of federal court cases against manufacturers and their products that were prosecuted under the 1906 Pure Food and Drug Act for adulteration, misbranding, or faulty labeling. The notices are arranged into four categories with various date ranges: Foods and Drugs, 1908-1943; Drugs and Devices, 1940-1963; Cosmetics, 1940-1964; Foods, 1940-1966. When first approaching the collection, users may want to browse by the many provided categories such as: Defendants, Product Keywords, and Issue Dates. Each entry includes the record’s case number, collection, date issued, product keywords, and more. A detailed finding aid for the collection is also available. [DS]
via Internet Scout.
FEC vice chair resigns. FEC effectively shut down
Federal Election Commission (FEC) Vice Chairman Matthew Petersen announced his resignation today. Chalk up another federal agency unable to do its work. This is happening across the federal government. Many agency political appointments simply haven’t been nominated, while some, like Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP)’s science division simply shut down because no staff have been hired; while others like USDA have sought to erode the agency’s work by forceably relocating its staff to places like Kansas City (and then cutting staff buyouts to boot!). This is disturbing to say the least.
Federal Election Commission Vice Chairman Matthew Petersen announced his resignation today.
This means the agency that enforces and regulates the nation’s campaign finance laws will effectively shut down — something that hasn’t happened since 2008 — because it won’t have the legal minimum of four commissioners to make high-level decisions.
Petersen’s resignation, first reported by the Washington Examiner, will throw the FEC into turmoil for weeks — and perhaps months — as the nation enters the teeth of 2020 presidential and congressional elections.
- For now, the FEC can’t conduct meetings.
- It can’t slap political scofflaws with fines.
- It can’t make rules.
- It can’t conduct audits and approve them.
- It can’t vote on the outcome of investigations.
And while staff will continue to post campaign finance reports and attend to day-to-day functions, the commission itself can’t offer official advice to politicians and political committees who seek it.
via Federal Election Commission to effectively shut down. Now what? – Center for Public Integrity.
Senate introduces legislation to clarify presumption of disclosure in FOIA
This just in from our friends at MuckRock: Senate introduces legislation to clarify presumption of disclosure in FOIA. This new bill will will protect public access to information from private entities that do business with the government following the *terrible* Supreme Court decision in Food Marketing Institute v. Argus Leader, which overturned more than 40 years of FOIA precedent by letting corporations decide whether the public was entitled to access government spending information. Also, according to OpenTheGovernment’s analysis, the bill addresses “…the EPA’s move to undermine FOIA by issuing regulations, without the legally required public notice and comment period, that appear to allow officials to withhold portions of documents as “not responsive” to a FOIA request, despite a federal court ruling forbidding the practice.”
The “Open and Responsive Government Act of 2019” would address limits to FOIA being imposed by regulatory agencies, in addition to those recently created by the Supreme Court’s decision in Food Marketing Institute v. Argus Leader Media. That decision allowed for a broad interpretation of confidentiality under the FOIA’s b(4) trade secret exemption, and transparency advocates are confident the ruling, if allowed to stand, would severely limit access to government dealings with private companies.
“Last month’s Supreme Court overturned more than 40 years of FOIA precedent, and will force government agencies to withhold large swaths of information about private contractors and other companies who do business with government,” said Emily Manna, policy analyst at Open The Government. This bill would return us to the status quo, and restore the public’s right to access this critical information.”
The proposed amendments would expand the language of the “trade secrets” exemption to explicitly require a standard of substantial harm for the nondisclosure of commercial information. That standard seemed to have been set by the case National Parks & Conservation Ass’n v. Morton, but the Supreme Court’s recent ruling did not acknowledge it.
via Senate introduces legislation to clarify presumption of disclosure in FOIA • MuckRock.
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