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Iraq survival guide online, but not public. Print may be coming?
Iraq survival guide now online, by Gina Cavallaro, Army Times (Jan 30, 2007) According to this story:
[A]n electronic version of a new handbook for soldiers on how to survive their first 100 days in Iraq can be seen online. Deploying soldiers are encouraged to log in with their Army Knowledge Online passwords to the Center for Army Lessons Learned at http://call.army.mil and review the guidelines gleaned from more than 1,700 soldiers who responded to a survey six months ago. A paper version for basic trainees was supposed to be issued by January, but has been held up at the Government Printing Office until sometime in February.Continue reading
First International Workshop on Database Preservation
The announcement for First International Workshop on Database Preservation (PresDB'07) has been posted to the relevant mailing lists, so you may have already seen it, but it is worth taking a moment to reflect on the need for this workshop and the relevance to government information and depository libraries.
While considerable thought has been given in the past to the preservation of fixed "digital objects", the preservation of databases, which have an internal structure and which may change over time, poses new challenges. Typically databases are centrally managed, and their survival depends on the viability of commercial organisations or the continued public funding of data centres. Libraries, the traditional curators of scientific and scholarly reference material, have largely abrogated their archival responsibility to databases.Continue reading
Microsoft Vista takes control
As Vista, the new version of Microsoft Windows, gets closer to release date, there is more commentary about it. Michael Geist echoes some of the comments that Peter Gutmann made in his widely discussed paper (See: How Windows Vista Will Affect Government Information for more on this topic and links to Guttman's paper.)
- Vista's Fine Print Raises Red Flags, by Michael Geist, Toronto Star January 29, 2007. (another copy)
Here are excerpts:
In the name of shielding consumers from computer viruses and protecting copyright owners from potential infringement, Vista seemingly wrestles control of the "user experience" from the user. Vista's legal fine print includes extensive provisions granting Microsoft the right to regularly check the legitimacy of the software and holds the prospect of deleting certain programs without the user's knowledge. Vista also incorporates Windows Defender, an anti-virus program that actively scans computers for "spyware, adware, and other potentially unwanted software." The agreement does not define any of these terms, leaving it to Microsoft to determine what constitutes unwanted software. Once operational, the agreement warns that Windows Defender will, by default, automatically remove software rated "high" or "severe," even though that may result in other software ceasing to work or mistakenly result in the removal of software that is not unwanted. For greater certainty, the terms and conditions remove any doubt about who is in control by providing that "this agreement only gives you some rights to use the software. Microsoft reserves all other rights." For those users frustrated by the software's limitations, Microsoft cautions that "you may not work around any technical limitations in the software."Continue reading
Hack the Government
Carl Malamud gave a talk at the 2006 OSCON (O'Reilly Open Source Convention) on "10 Government Hacks." He has posted his presentation materials as a series of 10 movies with textual commentary on the Internet Archive. He says he...
...whirled through 10 hacks in 15 minutes. I left myself 23 seconds to sum it up. The hacks all have a point, and that point is that government should be less about private interests and more about the public interest. The skills we use in the open source world are tools of civic engagement, tools of citizenship. And, if we apply those skills of engagement to our government, it is possible, at least sometimes, to drag the political system (kicking and screaming perhaps) towards the common good.
Here are links to each of the 10 with short annotations on a couple of my favorites:
- Hack 1: Be Media
- Hack 2: Get Standing (Somebody Sold the Attic)
- Hack 3: Be Government
- Hack 4: Adopt the FCC
- Hack 5: Enforce ODF By Proxy
In my world of vaporware hacks to government I'd love to see, I imagine a Firefox extension that detects any proprietary format in a .gov URL and talks to a backend proxy running tools like docvert to convert-on-the-fly and store the doc for the next user. Government rarely provides even minimal security (https URLs, MD5 signatures on documents, signed email, etc.., etc...), so one could add value to lots of government data by signing on their behalf. - Hack 6: Audit the Feds
- Hack 7: Link Check the Feds (Link Check the Mayor)
...periodically run a link checker against all the departments, then send the head of the agency a list with the number of broken links, ranked by department. Oh, and send a copy of the list to the chairman of the congressional oversight committee. And to each department head in the agency so the ones on the top can have something to chat about with the ones on the bottom while they're on the golf course. This hack works at any level of government. For example, link check your city government and send the results to your local newspaper. Pick a slow news day and your ranking will probably even make the evening news. - Hack 8: Annotate Hearings
...take the time to watch a hearing and blog the good parts, it definitely gets the word out. For this hack, adopt a committee or an issue, and make a habit of watching what they do and systematically annotating them. If nothing else, you help set the terms of the conversation. - Hack 9: Hold Hearings
- Hack 10: Map Spectrum (Summation)
Review of prewar Iraq intelligence: Senate Requests, White House does not reply
NCH Washington Update (Vol. 13, #3; January 27, 2007) "Public Interest Declassification Board (PIDB) Meets" by Lee White, National Coalition for History.
Chairman Snider stated that the PIDB had received a request from the Senate Intelligence Committee last fall to review the classification of prewar Iraq intelligence. Snider stated that the PIDB was prohibited from taking action without prior approval of the White House. However, despite requests to the Bush administration to move forward, the board had received no response from the White House. Snider announced that the board was going to proceed unless told not to do so by the administration.Continue reading
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