Librarian of Congress testifies on the 21st century library
James H. Billington, The Librarian of Congress, testified before the House Subcommittee on the Legislative Branch on March 20, 2007. read Billington's full testimony here. Billington pointed out that digital information is particularly fragile, but as the number of "digital transactions" that the LOC handles on a yearly basis, is extremely useful and of interest to students, historians, researchers and the general public. Billington said, "No single institution can collect, save and provide access to digital content in the future. Almost all of the Library's digital initiatives involve learning to work in new ways, in a networked environment, where we are working with others to amass critical content and deliver new and improved services." Check out "LC21: A Digital Strategy for the Library of Congress" to see the LOC's analysis of the library's digital future. We're not saying that every library has to manage 295 terabytes of digital content, but ALL libraries should be thinking about, planning for and working toward being digital repositories for their communities. That includes digital deposit, harvesting and other avenues for building digital collections.
It took two centuries for the Library of Congress to acquire today's analog collection—32 million printed volumes, 12.5 million photographs, 59.5 million manuscripts and other materials – a total of more than 134 million physical items. By contrast, with the explosion of digital information, it now takes only about 15 minutes for the world to produce an equivalent amount of information. Researchers at Cal-Berkeley produced estimates of the amount of information produced and circulated on the Internet in 2003 – it was equivalent to 37,000 times the content of one Library of Congress. Most of this information exists only in digital form: so-called born-digital items, many of which are already irretrievably lost. There is a widely-held but false assumption that digital materials accessible today on one's PC or Blackberry will necessarily be available in the future. That is not the case. The average life of a Web site has been estimated to be 44 to 75 days (bold added), and information not actively preserved today could literally be gone tomorrow. Other essential digital information—most notably e-journals and data bases—are merely licensed for use in the short term– the information does not belong to the licensee. By contrast, traditional print books and journals collected by the Library for more than two centuries are, and will remain, in the possession of the Library and accessible to researchers. But it is current information that is often most needed by Congress, and current, up-to-date information is increasingly available only in digital form.Continue reading
Microsoft vs. Open Formats
Open file formats are essential for government information because they provide a better opportunity for open exchange, reuse, and preservation of public information. As was reported a couple of weeks ago (see Open Formats Legislation Killed in Florida), Microsoft opposed a piece of Florida legislation that would have required the state to develop "a plan and a business case" for using open file formats in documents the state creates. This story has not been widely covered (I still have not found anything in LexisNexis), but the Wall Street Journal now confirms the story.
- State Open-Source Bills Get Microsoft's Attention, by John Letzing, Wall Street Journal, May 2, 2007; Page B2F
...within an hour of the proposed bill's reading in late March, Dr. Homan said, he was greeted in his office by three lobbyists representing Microsoft Corp. "They were here lickety-split," he said. "I had no idea it was going to get that kind of reaction."
The WSJ reports that the Florida instance was not unique, saying that Microsoft has mounted a lobbying effort against ODF, the OpenDocument Format, which was ratified by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). Texas faced a similar lobbying effort from Microsoft:
Soon after introducing an open-document format bill in the Texas state legislature in February, Rep. Marc Veasey said it was clear Microsoft was going to commit considerable time and effort to influencing the outcome. "Immediately we heard from Microsoft and their lobbyist here in Austin, and we knew we'd be up against a tough battle."
ODF is important to government information because, as the WSJ says, "Document formats serve as an underlying digital container, controlling access to files like spreadsheets and the ability to share them." [emphasis added] And:
The impetus for the Texas bill was similar to that in other states -- a desire to ensure access to archived and current documents regardless of which company's application is used to open them, and lower costs. [emphasis added]
It is not just about saving money or lowering costs or short-term financial savings. It is about long-term preservation of knowledge and access to public information.
InfoWord also covers the story:
- Microsoft's state-by-state fight to maintain its Office monopoly (WSJ), by Matt Asay, InfoWorld, May 02, 2007.
It would be one thing if Microsoft were fighting efforts to put open source/open standards on a superior footing. But it's trying to keep ODF from even receiving equal treatment. Dr. Horman (the Florida legislator) is right when he suggests:Microsoft sees what's coming. Things like Word and Excel are sort of like a drug now getting ready to go generic.With 97% market share in the office productivity suite market, it's understandable that Microsoft would feel threatened. Understandable, but not laudable.
That drug analogy is particularly appropriate, not hyperbole, when one sees this tactic that Microsoft is using as reported in the WSJ article:
Earlier this month, the company said it will offer a $3 software suite to students in developing countries, which will help position Microsoft against cheaper open-source products available there. [emphasis added]
Three Dollars! The analogy doesn't go far enough. This is less like prescription pharmaceuticals under patent and more like street drugs with the pusher giving the first dose for free.
Continue readingCriticisms of Google Book Search
Recently, there have been a couple of criticisms of Google Book Search that go beyond the knee-jerk arguments we hear from time to time.
In a post on the ACRL blog (Siva Vaidhyanathan Questions Google Book Search, by Marc Meola, ACRLog, April 23rd, 2007), Meola describes a presentation by Siva Vaidhyanathan at the Drexel University Libraries' Scholarly Communication Symposium. Siva asks some pointed questions of Google and its library partners. I was particularly struck by this thought:
At one point, Vaidhyanathan compared Google Book Search to the Human Genome Project. Here, he claimed, a for-profit company named Celera demonstrated it could do the work better and faster, but governments declined, recognizing that this information should not be privatized. Now Vaidhyanathan became animated, stating that it should be the same for knowledge and asking, "since when is expediency one of the core values of librarianship?"
In a post at the AHA blog (Google Books: What's Not to Like?. by Robert Townsend, American Historical Association Blog, April 30, 2007), Townsend notes the problems he found with Google Book search included poor scan quality, faulty metadata, and "truncated public domain."
Over the past three months I spent a fair amount of time on the site as part of a research project on the early history of the profession, and from a researcher's point of view I have to say the results were deeply disconcerting.
For specifics about Google Book Search and government documents, see: Need Full Access to Gov Docs in Google Book Search.
Continue readingNeed Full Access to Gov Docs in Google Book Search
An Open Letter to Google, William Patry, and Google's Library Partners
All I'm asking for is full access for the public to government documents on Google BookSearch. These documents are in the public domain and therefore should not be limited by claims of copyright, by Google or by the Library Partners.Also see: Google Book Search treats government documents as copyrighted material
It looks as if Google is definitely considering all post-1923 works under copyright.Continue reading
State-by-State Report on Authentication of Online Legal Resources
While there is an abundance of state legal resources (laws, regulations, court opinions, etc), in most cases they can't be used in courts of law or for other legal purposes because its the print version that is considered "legally official." The American Association of Law Libraries has just released this new 50 state report outlining the status of online legal materials: State-by-State Report on Authentication of Online Legal Resources This report was released in conjunction with the National Summit on Authentication of Digital Information, which AALL held April 20-21 in Chicago. According to AALL, The 50 delegates who participated in this event were a distinguished group of individuals: judges, state government officials, attorneys, and leaders of AALL and of other organizations, such as the American Bar Association. They were invited because of their interest and expertise in some aspect of legal/government information. Proceedings from the summit will shortly be posted to the AALL web site. Continue reading