Home » Articles posted by James R. Jacobs (Page 53)
Author Archives: James R. Jacobs
Troubling freeze on science by Trump administration
The news out of Washington DC is not good if you’re a government information librarian or an open government advocate. In the last 24 hours, the Trump administration has put a freeze on EPA grants and contracts and ordered USDA science researchers to “cease publication of ‘outward facing’ documents and news releases.” Not only does […]
CIA’s CREST declassified database is now online. Thanks MuckRock and others!
The CIA’s CREST database of declassified records is gradually being made publicly available online, thanks to the efforts of MuckRock, Michael Best and others. Prior to MuckRock’s lawsuit, CREST was *technically* available, but only Monday through Friday from 9 Am to 4:30 PM at the National Archives facility at the University of Maryland. Some CREST […]
How a complex network of bills becomes a law: GovTrack introduces new data analysis of text incorporation
Here’s a fascinating new way to look at US Congressional legislation from our friends at GovTrack.us. As Josh Tauberer explains, GovTrack’s new service “Enacted Via Other Measures,” their new data analysis of text incorporation, will now provide connections between bills — when a bill has at least about 33% of its provisions incorporated into one […]
House Republicans’ plan to permanently cripple government
The first thing the new Republican-led Congress did was attempt to kill the Office of Congressional Ethics — thankfully the public uproar forced them to withdraw the plan *for now*. Now Congress is set to put into place a terrible new law called Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny Act (REINS Act). This […]
Panel on End-of-term crawl and the collection of vulnerable government information
January 23, 2017 / 4 Comments on Panel on End-of-term crawl and the collection of vulnerable government information
I was honored last week to be part of a panel hosted by OpenTheGovernment and the Bauman Foundation to talk about the End of Term project. Other presenters included Jess Kutch at Coworker.org and Micah Altman, Director of Research at MIT Libraries. I talked about what EOT is doing, as well as some of the […]
Continue Reading →