Reminder: let EPA know your thoughts on access to environmental information
Rebecca posted about this in April, but I'd just like to remind everyone that the EPA blog is open for comments THIS WEEK (June 9-13, 2008). This is a great opportunity to provide your comments to EPA. As always, we recommend that you couch your comments in terms of access, authenticity, preservation and privacy!!
EPA is holding an on-line discussion among state, tribe, and other federal partners of EPA, as well as the public to foster collaboration on information access. For this discussion, we are using a blog which is a more interactive and personal form of technology. Everyone is invited to use this site to identify and share their best resources, tools, and ideas for improving access to EPA’s environmental information. This is a key part of the National Dialogue on Access to Environmental Information – working with you to enhance information access. This blog will be open for comment for one week (June 9-13, 2008). The blog will then be closed and a summary report will be posted on the “What We’ve Learned” section of the National Dialogue website by June 20th.Continue reading
“The Nation on Lessig”
This was a really interesting post that I found on the Sunlight Foundation's Sun Spots blog:
Continue reading"Earlier today, Lawrence Lessig spoke about Change Congress at the Free Press' fourth annual National Conference for Media Reform, being held this year in Minneapolis. As always, Larry gave a killer speech. You can watch an earlier speech he gave at the National Press Club in March when he launched Change Congress here."
"Not to be missed: In the current edition of The Nation, Christopher Hayes, the magazine's Washington editor, profiles Larry and Change Congress. It's an extensive profile and a good read. ...Cory Doctorow called the profile "fantastic." Hayes writes "playing David to various Goliaths (armed with a laptop as slingshot) is the defining narrative of Lessig's career." If you're a Lessig fan, it's a must read. If you're unfamiliar with this bona fide and burgeoning cult hero, check it out...And join the revolution!"
Google VP for search quality talks about searching
An interesting interview with Udi Manber, vice president in charge of search quality at Google:
- At Google, a search guru's dream comes true, by Stephen Shankland, CNet, June 5, 2008.
The other difference is it depends on location. If you do the same search from a different country, you get different results, even if it's the same language. We will tune the results by the country in which you're searching. It's by language and location.Continue reading
How do you collect digital documents?
I spend a good deal of time scouring newspapers and Web sites like Docuticker (RSS Feed) and UN Pulse (RSS Feed) in order to add digital government documents to my library's collections. Sometimes I have the url cataloged; or if I think the document is particularly in danger of disappearing, I'll upload them to the Internet Archive's govt documents collection. Below are a few that I've come across in my digitravels recently. At the upcoming International Documents Taskforce (IDTF) meeting at ALA Annual Conference (GODORT conference schedule here), I'm giving a short presentation about digital collections. I'd really like to hear how/if others are doing digital collection development either randomly or as a matter of course. Please leave a comment and let me know your thoughts, ideas, and hopes. Please include any information you care to share -- what you do, how you do it, if you have favorite haunts/Websites etc.
- Addressing the global food crisis: Key trade, investment and commodity policies in ensuring sustainable food security and alleviating poverty. United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD)
- The Contribution of Early Childhood Education to a Sustainable Society. UNESCO
- Carpet bombing in cyberspace. Armed Forces Journal
- The Employment Situation: May 2008. Bureau of Labor Statistics
- Senate Intelligence Committee Unveils Final Phase II Reports on Prewar Iraq Intelligence. U.S. Senate, Select Committee on Intelligence.
- Phase II Report on Public Statements (PDF; 2.5 MB)
- Phase II Report on DoD Policy Office (PDF; 819 KB)
- Eighth Annual Trafficking in Persons Report. U.S. Department of State. Download in sections or as full report (PDF).
The Federal Government Must Reimagine Its Role As An Information Provider
Here is a pre-print (not-final version) of a paper with fascinating ideas about distribution of government information:
- Robinson, David, Yu, Harlan, Zeller, William P and Felten, Edward W, "Government Data and the Invisible Hand" (2008). Yale Journal of Law & Technology, Vol. 11, 2008.
...reduce the federal role in presenting important government information to citizens. Today, government bodies consider their own websites to be a higher priority than technical infrastructures that open up their data for others to use. We argue that this understanding is a mistake. It would be preferable for government to understand providing reusable data, rather than providing websites, as the core of its online publishing responsibility.While the paper does not address preservation and long term access explicitly, it does suggest that the government should provide a "permanent location" with a permanent URL for "each piece of government data." It also implies (I think) that something like LOCKSS will ensure authenticity and permanent access ("As long as there is vigorous competition between third party sites, we expect most citizens will be able to ?nd a site provider they trust.") I believe that oversimplifies the problem and relies too much on hope and not enough on a social commitment to preservation through public funding of memory organizations. Thanks and a tip of the hat to Joshua Taubere (GovTrack.us) for pointing to this article. He describes and comments on the paper in a post on the Open House Project blog: (Government Data and the Invisible Hand June 6th, 2008 by Joshua Tauberer). Continue reading