How many justices does it take…?
So, Guy Walks Up to the Bar, and Scalia Says... By Adam Liptak, NY Times, December 31, 2005. This one's on the light-hearted side. A new study shows that Justice Scalia is the funniest justice. Starting in October, 2004, Supreme Court transcripts started identifying laughs by name. Jay D. Wexler, a law professor at Boston University, used the new data to analyze the relative funniness of the justices. Happy new year from the folks here at FGI! Continue reading
White House says its web-tracking is OK
Here is a followup to the story earlier today that the White House web site uses web bugs. White House Says Web Site Counts Visitors, By ANICK JESDANUN, The Associated Press, December 30, 2005.
The White House said Friday its Web tracking technology is consistent with federal rules because it only counts the number of visitors anonymously and doesn't record personal information.Note that wikipedia says that web bugs "are used when monitoring has to be done by a server that is different than the one holding the Web pages; this is necessary for example when the Web pages are served by different servers, or when the monitoring has to be done by a third party." See also EFF's web bug FAQ. Continue reading
More about persistent cookies and privacy
Chris Dorobek of Federal Computer Week has done a bit of investigation into the status of government web sites' compliance with privacy policies and reports his findings and links to other stories here: Hand in the cookie jar by Chris Dorobek, December 30, 2005, The FCW Insider. He quotes a story (White House to investigate contractor's Web tracking By Anick Jesdanun, Associated Press, December 30, 2005) in the Boston Globe about use of "web bugs" on the White House web site. See also: NSA used persistent web-cookies. Continue reading
News about Massachusetts Open Document Format Controversy
Open document man resigns from Mass CTO post "Tired of being a lightning rod" By Ashlee Vance, Reg Developer, December 29, 2005.
The main cheerleader behind Massachusetts' embrace of the OpenDocument format (ODF) has resigned, saying his role as the state's IT chief has been undermined by controversy surrounding the document battle.Continue reading
Access to Government Information, pre and post 9/11
December 31, 2005 / Leave a comment
Access to Government Information, pre and post 9/11. By James A. Jacobs An examination and discussion of the impact the events of Sept. 11 have had on Government Publications and libraries. A presentation at the event Intellectual freedom in libraries post 9/11 April 9, 2002 Sponsored by Librarians Association of the University of California Riverside […]
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