We Salute MnCOGI
Our media monitoring for mentions of FGI recently pulled up the Minnesota Coalition on Government Information at http://www.mncogi.org. According to the organization's About page, it's mission is "promote public access to government activity and information." The page also carries their guiding principles which we at FGI agree with almost entirely:
MnCOGI carries out its mission through uniting, informing and enhancing the impact of organizations and individuals committed to open access to public records.
It is the active responsibility of government to promote public participation supported by open access to accurate public information by and about the government.
Documents/records produced with public funds, regardless of physical format, are part of the public record.
Compliance with open meeting and public records laws must be monitored and enforced by responsibility authorities and institutions that are held accountable.
Because collection, maintenance and preservation of information are the responsibility of each government office each must be held accountable.
Research and education are essential to preserve and improve access to public information.
Education and support for all Minnesotans about their rights and responsibilities is best accomplished through a broad-based coalition of informed advocates for open access.
Preservation of public records is a critical part of achieving accountability to be encouraged by MnCOGI.
MnCOGI will link with and support parallel efforts at the federal level while maintaining a specific focus on the free flow of information on public policy matters at the state and local levels in Minnesota.
About the only quibble we have with MnCOGI is that we believe that collection, maintenance and preservation of information are responsibilities too important to be left to each government office. They must be assisted in those tasks by third parties with fewer axes to grind, like libraries. But this is a minor quibble given the level of involvement by libraries in MnCOGI.
One last thing we appreciate about MnCOGI is that they have signed up nonlibrarian organizations like the MN Newspapers Association to their efforts. Congratulations on that. Keep up your important work!
Continue readingDaily maps from National Geographic
A map a day keeps the doctor away right? Well now you can browse through history with National Geographic's daily maps site of historical news events and milestones. And they've even got an RSS feed.
Your feed reader getting too full? Thunderbird slowing down because of too many feeds? Then do what I do: tag it to your del.icio.us account with a tag like "daily." Because each tag has an RSS feed, you can simply add the feed to your Firefox toolbar as a live bookmark. Just click on the orange icon (
in your location bar (upper right). That's how I read GOVDOC-L too! Continue reading
And in other news…
Blake over at LIS News has published his "10 Non-librarian Blogs to read in 2008" which were nominated by his blog readers. On the list are many of our own favorites, including BoingBoing, Slashdot, Lifehacker, and Open Access News.
A belated shout out to Prof. Kip Currier and the terrific students in his Government Information Resources and Services class at the University of Pittsburgh School of Information Science. I spoke to the class this week about finding federal legislative information and they admitted to being followers of FGI blog - and they knew I'm a guest blogger this month! Keep reading, y'all, and please add your comments, we love to hear from you! Especially since you are learning how to be govdocs librarians in the 21st Century, you have a unique point of view that is valuable to all of us who work with government information.
Continue readingCitizen Media Law Project legal guide
The Citizen Media Law Project states that "knowing your legal rights and responsibilities is important for anyone who publishes online" in the its announcement about its Legal Guide project. The CMLP's legal guide addresses the legal issues you may encounter as you gather information and publish your work. The guide is intended for use by citizen media creators with or without formal legal training, as well as others with an interest in these issues. While a work-in-progress, the Legal Guide already provides useful information in its fairly detailed articles. You can browse the Legal Guide section-by-section or search it.
The same group has an online Legal Threats Database: which contains lawsuits, cease & desist letters, subpoenas, and other legal threats directed at those who engage in online speech. You can view, search, create, and comment on entries in the database.