Re-launching data.gov with interactive data
Launched just two years ago as a site for users to find and download "bulk" data sets from federal government agencies, Data.Gov is re-launching a "next generation" version with datasets that are "interactive" meaning you can search, filter, and explore data on the fly with your web browser. "You can also create charts and maps, and APIs are available for developers."
- http://explore.data.gov/
- Next Generation Datasets
- Introducing the New Data.Gov Platform. Socrata [a Seattle-based startup that has quietly been helping cities and states around the country to get their data online.] "Discover The New Cloud-Based Data.Gov Platform In This 10-Minute Video Tour."
- Data.gov relaunches as a cloud-based open data platform, by Alex Howard, Gov20.govfresh (May 16, 2011)
Privacy: “I have nothing to hide”
We often hear the argument that it is okay for the government to gather or analyze personal information because only those who have something to hide need worry. As the British government slogan says, "If you've got nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear."
Libraries take a different approach to privacy. As the American Library Association says, "Privacy is essential to the exercise of free speech, free thought, and free association."
Yet we continue to hear the "nothing to hide" argument. Daniel J. Solove, a professor of law at George Washington University, examines the argument in detail and exposes its flaws in an excerpt from his new book, Nothing to Hide: The False Tradeoff Between Privacy and Security:
- Why Privacy Matters Even if You Have 'Nothing to Hide', by Daniel J. Solove, Chronicle of Higher Education, "The Chronicle Review" (May 15, 2011) [subscription required] Commentators often attempt to refute the nothing-to-hide argument by pointing to things people want to hide. But the problem with the nothing-to-hide argument is the underlying assumption that privacy is about hiding bad things. By accepting this assumption, we concede far too much ground and invite an unproductive discussion about information that people would very likely want to hide. As the computer-security specialist [Bruce] Schneier aptly notes, the nothing-to-hide argument stems from a faulty "premise that privacy is about hiding a wrong." Surveillance, for example, can inhibit such lawful activities as free speech, free association, and other First Amendment rights essential for democracy.
Chapter 1 of the book is also freely available:
- Nothing To Hide: The False Tradeoff Between Privacy And Security, Chapter 1, by Solove, Daniel J., Yale University Press, 2011. SSRN.
Solove argues that, in many cases, privacy issues never get balanced against conflicting interests. Bruce Schneier, the security expert Solove quotes above and the author of the excellent monthly newsletter, Crypto-Gram, makes a similar argument in a recent presentation on security issues:
- The security mirage, Bruce Schneier. TEDxPSU. (Oct 2010), video, 21 min.
As we have mentioned here before, (see, for example, Will GPO guarantee user privacy? Can it? and PRIVACY: Key Challenges Facing Federal Agencies and "Policy neutral" does not mean "neutral policies"), privacy has important policy implications for individual FDLP libraries and their approaches to access to government information. What is your library policy? Will your library choose to retain its role as a protector of privacy, or will it abandon that role to government agencies?
Continue readingLunchtime listen: Eli Pariser on filter bubbles
Eli Pariser, founder of MoveOn.org and author of The Filter Bubble: What the Internet Is Hiding from You, gave a very interesting and smart -- and somewhat disconcerting -- talk at TED in Long Beach, CA in February, 2011. Pariser points out the unintended consequences embedded in search personalization where users get trapped in a "filter bubble" and don't get exposed to information that could challenge or broaden their worldview.
Public Printer at House Oversight Comm: “GPO – Issues and Challenges: How Will GPO Transition to the Future?”
On Weds May 11, 2011, Public Printer Bill Boarman and others submitted written testimony to a hearing of the Committee on House Administration Subcommittee on Oversight (PDF). the hearing was titled "GPO – Issues and Challenges: How Will GPO Transition to the Future?" Here's the GPO press release about the Public Printer's comments (anyone else wish GPO put out their press releases in xhtml rather than pdf?! It's hard to find them after the fact! but I digress). (Unembeddable) Video of the hearing is also available. Witnesses:
- William J. Boarman, Public Printer of the United States, Government Printing Office
- James Hamilton Group Director, InfoTrends
- Eric D. Belcher, President and Chief Executive Officer, InnerWorkings, Inc.
- Eric Petersen, Specialist in American National Government, Congressional Research Service
- "GPO must not go" argues for reasons why GPO is important to the govt info ecosystem.
- Public Printer's Letter to President Obama Regarding Open Government argues for a continued need in a distributed model to assure long term access and preservation.
- iConference presentation on the future of govt information
- Critical GPO systems and the FDLP cloud
- Several link rot articles
- Government Information in the Digital Age: The Once and Future Federal Depository Library Program. James A. Jacobs, James R. Jacobs and Shinjoung Yeo. Journal of Academic Librarianship, Volume 31, Issue 3, May 2005, Pages 198-208. lays out roles for GPO, fed agencies, libraries and others in assuring long term access to and preservation of govt information.
Building the Digital Smithsonian Libraries
Building the Digital Smithsonian Libraries, by Erin Thomas, Smithsonian Libraries (May 13, 2011).
As you may already know, the Libraries has been busy digitizing scientific legacy literature as part of the global partnership that makes up the Biodiversity Heritage Library for some time now — the BHL recently published its 90,500th volume! But as you may not have yet noticed, the Libraries has also begun scanning select titles from our History, Art, and Culture collections as well. The Libraries scans roughly 150 History, Art, and Culture titles each month, and those scans are freely available from the Smithsonian Collection at the Internet Archive. At press time, the collection holds 3,838 items!Continue reading