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Scroogle shuts down, citing DDoS attacks and Google throttling
Scroogle, since 2003 my go-to search engine -- it queries Google search, but anonymizes search results, does not store cookies on users' computers, and strips out all the google ads on the search results page -- may have finally gone to the big search engine in the sky. Created by "privacy militant and self-appointed Wikipedia watchdog" Daniel Brandt, Scroogle had recently been enduring round-the-clock [w:distributed denial of service] (DDoS) attacks on its servers as well as throttling of its service by Google. For those that are interested, there are other options for privacy-protecting search engines. There IS a connection to and a concern for libraries here. Anyone building digital archives needs to be concerned about this type of action. The best way to thwart DDoS attacks is to host digital content on many servers and have built-in redundancy of content and infrastructure. Collaboration is key! [HT to /.] Continue reading
Video for Legislative Data and Transparency Conference now online!
On February 2, 2012 the House of Representatives Committee on House Administration, chaired by Dan Lungren, convened a full-day conference entitled Legislative Data and Transparency Conference. Check it out. looks like a great list of experts. It's great that the House is talking about public data, XML standards and easy public access to the legislative process. I haven't watched all the video, but I hope they also talk about *preservation* of the legislative process as well.
The Committee on House Administration held a Legislative Data and Transparency Conference on February 2, 2012, from 9AM to 6PM in Cannon Caucus Room, 345 Cannon HOB. Conference Agenda Remarks from Representative Daniel E. Lungren [Video] Chairman, Committee on House Administration Panel 1: Legislative Branch Initiatives [Video] Legislative Branch Agencies that create information Kirsten Gullickson, The Office of the Clerk Panelists: Bob Reeves, Office of the Clerk Sandra Strokoff, House Office of Legislative Counsel Hugh Halpern, House Rules Committee Panel 2: Legislative Branch Initiatives [Video] Legislative Branch Agencies that disseminate information Panelists: Ralph Seep, Law Revision Counsel Robert Gee, Library of Congress Ric Davis, Government Printing Office Panel 3: What is data and what is available? [Video] The impact and understandability of current data use Moderator: Jeff Griffith, Global Centre for ICT in Parliament Panelists: Josh Tauberer, GovTrack Eric Mill, Sunlight Foundation Derek Willis, New York Times Panel 4: Extending XML and Metadata Standards [Video] Moderator: Anne Washington, George Mason University Panelists: Sandra Strokoff, House Office of Legislative Counsel Ralph Seep, Law Revision Counsel Tom Bruce, Cornell Legal Institute Cindy Leach, Office of the Clerk Panel 5: Integrating Video and Metadata [Video] Moderator: Robert Reeves, Deputy Clerk Panelists: Tab Butler, Major League Baseball Network Javier Muniz, Granicus Daniel Bennett, e-Citizen Foundation Panel 6: Defining Transparency Success Measures [Video] Knowing how far we’ve come... Moderators: Matt Lira, Office of the Majority Leader Steve Dwyer, Office of the Minority Whip Panelists: Daniel Schuman, Sunlight Foundation Maurice McTigue, Mercatus Center Jim Harper, The Cato InstituteContinue reading
AOTUS responds to petition to create federal scanning commission
Earlier this month, we posted about the "Open letter and petition to President Obama to create a federal scanning commission and digitize all .gov publications". The petition closed on 1/20 and now David Ferriero, the Archivist of the US at the National Archives, has given the official NARA response. I'd say this is a positive first step, but much discussion is still needed. Please join the conversation over at the NARA Blog. I think documents librarians will be invaluable to this effort going forward!
Digitizing Federal Public Records By David Ferriero Thank you for signing a petition asking the Obama Administration to digitize all public records. The Obama Administration believes increasing access to our collections by digitizing our records is a great idea. Our most recent efforts to do this ourselves as part of our OpenGov initiative, include the Citizen Archivist project, a Wikipedian in Residence, Tag it Tuesdays, and Scanathons. We are also moving forward on implementing the President’s recent Memorandum on Managing Government Records, which focuses on the need to update policies and practices for the digital age. But all those things aren’t enough. Your petition, and the Yes We Scan effort broadly, calls for a national strategy, and even a Federal Scanning Commission, to figure out what it would take to digitize the holdings of many federal entities, from the Library of Congress to the Government Printing Office to the Smithsonian Institution. These ideas bring up a host of questions that still need to be answered: What should the National Archives’ priorities be? Do we focus on preserving deteriorating paper records, still bound with red ribbons from two centuries ago? Do we make digital copies of Vietnam Era film footage? Should we focus on preserving those older paper records while citizens volunteer to digitize more recent, and better preserved, records? The National Archives – which houses the Nation’s permanent records – is looking for your input to help answer these important questions on how we move forward. What are your thoughts on how the National Archives and other agencies should proceed? What questions should we be asking ourselves? You can add your thoughts over on the National Archives blog, and I’m looking forward to having a longer discussion with the creators and signers of this petition on this important issue in the coming weeks– more details on that will follow. Thank you again for your interest in this important issue. I’m looking forward to your ideas on how we can proceed with digitizing federal public records. David Ferriero is the Archivist of the United StatesContinue reading
NBII goes dark. Libraries do what they do: harvest and preserve it for future access #opendata
Many of us in the government documents world woke up to 2012 with the following message posted on the Web site of the [w:National Biological Information Infrastructure] (NBII) and distributed around to various library listservs:
In the 2012 President's Budget Request, the National Biological Information Infrastructure (NBII) is terminated. As a result, all resources, databases, tools, and applications within this web site will be removed on January 15, 2012.NBII has been a critical program since 1994 (See Bill Clinton's Executive Order 12906 which created the "National Spatial Data Infrastructure" ("NSDI")). NBII was set up to coordinate a broad array of information at the federal level about biodiversity and ecosystems. Todd Carpenter, director of National Information Standards Organization NISO, put it nicely and succinctly when he tweeted:
What is particularly sad about NBII shutting down is it's precisely the thing we need MORE of not less=>trusted data repositories #opendataWell have no fear, the Library of Congress, Internet Archive and Stanford Libraries have all harvested (separately) the NBII Website -- Stanford harvested twice between January 5 and January 13, 2012for its Fugitive US Agencies collection. Continue reading
The oxymoron of digital preservation
February 21, 2012 / 1 Comment on The oxymoron of digital preservation
This story is making it around the interwebs/twitterverse today. Brainpicker, a wonderful blog, posted a story today about digital preservation in the film industry -- "The future for digital storage is constant migration.". While focusing on independent filmmakers and nonprofit archives, it's worthwhile to do a find-and-replace "film" with "government documents" and "filmmakers" with "government information (nee documents) librarians." Digital preservation takes collaboration and long-term vision. period!
[HT to Brainpicker!] Continue reading →Continue Reading →