Part-Time Policy Wonk

From Library Journal Academic Newswire:

Librarians today are set to ring in the New Year with the nation's first ever public access mandate. Both the House of Representatives and Senate this week approved the revised Labor Health and Human Services (LHHS) appropriations bill which leaves intact a directive for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) requiring investigators to deposit their final papers in PubMed Central. Papers will then be available within a year after publication. All that's left is the president's signature, which is expected, and could come this week. The approval caps a several years-long fight spearheaded by SPARC, to make public access a requirement for NIH grantees.

Posted by Anne at 08:49 PM | Permalink

From Radar Magazine:

Behold, the Bush Administration in chart form: Federal spending on paper shredding has increased more than 600 percent since George W. Bush took office. This chart, generated by usaspending.gov, the U.S. government's brand spanking new database of federal expenditures, shows spending on "contracts for paper shredding services" going back to 2000. Click here for the full, heartbreaking breakdown. In 2000, the feds spent $452,807 to make unpleasant truths go away; by 2006, the "Cheney Effect" had bumped that number up to $2.9 million. And by halfway through 2007, the feds almost matched that number, with $2.7 million and counting. Pretty much says it all.

Posted by Anne at 08:10 PM | Permalink

From Free Government Information:

The 50-State Agency Databases Registry, which I coordinate, has launched a new set of subject-focused database collections under the heading of history:

* Biographical Databases - Databases that provide biographical sketches of authors, state officials, famous state residents, etc.

* Historical Media Databases - Databases that provide online access to photographs, video, or audio.

* Historical Newspaper and Magazine Indexes - Databases that index articles in older newspapers, journals and magazine that contain historical information. These databases will usually lead one to microfilmed items that may be obtainable through Interlibrary Loan.

* Museum Collection Databases - Catalogs of state museum holdings which often have historical notes. Museums listed here are either run by a state or by one of the state's political subdivisions

* Official Records Databases - vital records, (birth, death, etc), war pensions, etc.

These pages just launched, so they are a little light on content. The Registry volunteers will be adding to these pages in the next few weeks.

If you are registered with the ALA GODORT wiki and would like to help the effort along, please browse the state pages or search for words from the historical categories and copy and paste databases from the state pages to the appropriate subject page.

Posted by Anne at 08:05 PM | Permalink

From the Sunlight Foundation:

Boing Boing highlights CommitteeCaller.com, a new app that allows people to easily call an entire congressional committee to express their views. Consider it speed dial for congressional committee members. The site was built by Fred Benenson, a master's degree student at NYU's Tisch School of the Arts, as a final project for a class he was taking this fall. . .

. . . This is how it works: Go to CommitteeCaller.com and select a committee. Then enter your phone number and click "Put me in touch with democracy!" The site's software will call you and patch the call through to the front office of each member of that committee. Easy as that! And there's no fee. The site also allows users to rate the responsiveness of each office. CommitteeCaller.com will compile this information and grade the responsiveness of each member to the public.

Posted by Anne at 08:02 PM | Permalink

From Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility:

Buried within the omnibus appropriations bill Congress sent this week to President Bush is a Christmas present for the beleaguered library network of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Congress ordered EPA to restore library services across the country and earmarked $3 million for that purpose, according to Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).

Beginning in early 2006, without public announcement or congressional approval, EPA began dismantling its network of technical and research libraries. Altogether EPA has closed regional libraries serving 23 states and its headquarters library in Washington, D.C. It has also reduced services and hours in libraries covering another 14 states. In addition, EPA has shuttered several of its specialized, technical libraries, such as its unique library dedicated to the effects of pesticides and new chemicals.

The report language attached to the omnibus appropriations bill for the remainder of the 2008 fiscal year directs EPA to use $3 million to “restore the network of EPA libraries recently closed or consolidated by the Administration…” and to report within 90 days on its plans to “restore publicly available libraries to provide environmental information and data to each EPA region…”

Posted by Anne at 07:58 PM | Permalink

From Sunshine Week:

New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, Democratic candidate for president, says he supports open government and as president "would ensure that the obsessive secrecy of the Bush administration will be rolled back."

Richardson, responding to the Sunshine Week 2008: Sunshine Campaign Questionnaire, noted, "The public must and will have access to information about what its government is doing, and in the absence of a compelling reason, it will have that access."

Posted by Anne at 07:57 PM | Permalink

From Secrecy News:

Speaking of classification reform, Rep. Jane Harman and 13 Democratic colleagues this week introduced "The Reducing Over-Classification Act of 2007."

The legislation focuses on the Department of Homeland Security and aims to make the Department a model of judicious information policy by curtailing classification and other restrictions on disclosure.

Posted by Anne at 07:56 PM | Permalink

From Secrecy News:

This week marks one full year since publication of the latest print volume of the Foreign Relations of the United States (FRUS) series, the official documentary record of U.S. foreign policy which dates back to the Abraham Lincoln Administration.

Publication of FRUS is required by law (Public Law 102-138) and is supposed to occur "not more than 30 years after the events recorded."

But while FRUS has long lagged behind its 30 year deadline, the failure to publish even a single print volume all year is extraordinary and unprecedented in living memory.

Posted by Anne at 07:55 PM | Permalink

Somehow I don't think this is what the ALA had in mind for the use of its lists. . .

From The News & Observer:

After banning a popular coming-of-age tale, Johnston County school officials are scouring library shelves for other potentially offensive books to remove.

The district review was prompted by a parent challenge to "How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents," which was removed from school libraries and classrooms this fall. The novel by Julia Alvarez has faced challenges in at least four districts nationwide for its sexual content and profane language, though national observers knew of no other district where parents succeeded in having it banned. . .

. . . In the wake of the Johnston challenge, the school board asked administrators to check all of the books in high school libraries and classrooms against lists of commonly challenged books to weed out other offensive material. Several organizations compile these lists, including the American Library Association. The review is likely to last months.

Posted by Anne at 07:54 PM | Permalink

From Secrecy News:

The National Archives says it is exploring new methods to accelerate the disclosure of records at Presidential libraries.

Archivists "decided to undertake an in-house study in the spring of 2007 to review ways to achieve faster processing of Presidential records," stated Emily Robison, acting director of the Clinton Presidential Library, in an October 2 declaration (pdf) that was filed in a lawsuit brought against NARA by Judicial Watch.

Posted by Anne at 08:24 PM | Permalink

From Standard Newswire:

Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, announced that the National Archives told U.S. District Court Judge James Robertson during a December 17, 2007 court hearing that a portion of Hillary Clinton's White House office records will be ready for release by the end of January 2008; after which it will notify President Clinton. Under the Presidential Records Act, President Clinton has upon notice thirty days to review the documents. The National Archives will also provide a status report of President Clinton's review by March 1, 2008. The records include Hillary Clinton's White House daily schedule.

Posted by Anne at 08:22 PM | Permalink

From the News-Democrat & Leader:

Kentucky public libraries are the most highly regarded local government service, according to a recent independent survey of Kentuckians.

In addition, more than 95 percent of Kentuckians surveyed agree that public libraries are a good investment of tax dollars.

A survey of 600 Kentuckians by the University of Kentucky Survey Research Center sponsored by the Kentucky Public Library Association indicates that Kentuckians place a high value on local public libraries.

Posted by Anne at 08:21 PM | Permalink

From Secrecy News:

Several defense intelligence agencies will withhold unclassified information about their contracts from a new public database of government spending.

The new database at USAspending.gov is intended to provide increased transparency regarding most government contracts.

But when it comes to intelligence spending, there will actually be a net loss of public information because categories of intelligence contracting data that were previously disclosed will now be withheld.

Posted by Anne at 08:21 PM | Permalink

From the National Security Archive:

The House of Representatives at 5:18 pm today unanimously passed the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) reform bill (S. 2488) that passed the Senate by unanimous consent on December 14. The bill aims to fix some of the most persistent problems in the FOIA system, including excessive delay, lack of responsiveness, and litigation gamesmanship by federal agencies. Following today’s approval by the House, the OPEN Government Act will be sent to the President's desk for approval.

Posted by Anne at 08:19 PM | Permalink

From the Korean Times:

The copyright period for royalty payments will be extended to 70 years from the current 50 years after the original copyright holder dies, as a step to meet the requirements of the ``provisional'' free trade agreement (FTA) between South Korea and the United States.

At a Cabinet meeting President Roh Moo-hyun chaired Tuesday, the government passed this and other revisions on copyright protection.

Under the revision book publishers and entertainment-related businesses will be required to pay royalties 20 years longer than is currently required.

Posted by Anne at 08:18 PM | Permalink

From News.com:

Iranian police have closed down 24 Internet cafes and other coffee shops in as many hours, as part of a broad crackdown on "immoral" behavior in the Islamic state, official media said Sunday.

The action in Tehran province was the latest move in a campaign against practices deemed incompatible with Islamic values, including women not adhering to strict dress codes and barber shops offering men Western hair styles.

Posted by Anne at 08:17 PM | Permalink

From News.com:

Congress won't decide until next year whether to pass a complex law that would let telephone and Internet companies off the hook from lawsuits alleging illicit cooperation with federal government spies.

After a day of back-and-forth on the Senate floor, U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid emerged on Monday evening and announced he would postpone debate on the so-called FISA Amendments Act. That bill, which has already been approved in a closed-door meeting of the Senate Intelligence Committee, would grant such corporate immunity and make it easier for the feds to snoop on phone calls and e-mails involving foreigners and Americans without a warrant, drawing rampant criticism from civil liberties groups.

Posted by Anne at 08:16 PM | Permalink

From ABC News:

In the weeks after the U.S.-led invasion toppled Saddam Hussein in 2003, the charred, partly gutted Iraqi National Library and Archive became a symbol of the chaos and lawlessness that swept through the capital. . .

. . . Now, on the brink of the first anniversary of Saddam Hussein's death, and some four years since it was looted, the library's recovery is exceeding even the most optimistic predictions.

Posted by Anne at 08:33 PM | Permalink

From the Austin American-Statesman:

The Senate unanimously approved legislation tonight that would strengthen the much beleaguered Freedom of Information Act.

The passage of legislation, sponsored by Sens. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and John Cornyn, R-Texas, was seen as a “break through” by the open government community.

An earlier attempt to overhaul the 41-year-old law has been stalled since August over disagreements between the House and Senate versions of the bill.

The Senate’s latest bill is an attempt to iron out those differences.

Posted by Anne at 08:31 PM | Permalink

From Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington:

From its first days, this administration has tried to keep the American public in the dark about what goes on behind closed White House doors. Through a secret agreement and a letter from Vice President Cheney’s counsel, the administration had attempted to permanently hide from view records related to those who visit the White House and the vice president’s residence. Today, a federal judge has cracked open those doors by holding that these are Secret Service records subject to public disclosure. As a result of CREW’s lawsuit, District of Columbia District Court Judge Royce C. Lamberth has ordered the Secret Service to produce records of certain conservative leaders’ visits to the White House within 20 days.

Although in a separate case, Judge Lamberth held today he did not have the authority to order the Secret Service to stop destroying White House visitor records, his ruling here means that such records cannot be destroyed without prior approval of the Archivist.

Posted by Anne at 08:30 PM | Permalink

NARA Press Release:

The development of the Electronic Records Archives (ERA) system has passed a significant milestone, with the successful completion of government testing of the first delivery of software from the developer, Lockheed Martin Corporation. ERA is the National Archives and Records Administration’s strategic initiative to preserve and provide long-term access to uniquely valuable electronic records of the U.S. Government, and to transition government-wide management of the lifecycle of all records into the realm of e-government.

Posted by Anne at 08:29 PM | Permalink

From The Guardian:

A California free speech group whose board of directors includes Google and Yahoo said on Monday it had asked U.S. trade officials to challenge China's Internet restrictions as a violation of global trade rules.

The issue threatens to further strain U.S.-China trade relations if the U.S. Trade Representative's office decides to take on the case. With China already the world's second-largest Internet market with over 162 million Web users, the commercial stakes are huge.

"China's censorship of the Internet, while fundamentally an issue of free speech and individual liberty, is also a significant barrier to U.S.-China commerce, and therefore, very much a trade issue," Peter Scheer, executive director of the California First Amendment Coalition, said in a statement that came as top U.S. officials were in Beijing for economic talks.

Posted by Anne at 08:28 PM | Permalink

From the Albuquerque Journal: (Subscription required)

The books have been given a reprieve.

In response to outrage from scientists, books may once again be checked out from the Sandia National Laboratories library. . .

. . . Restoring access to the library books will cost Sandia about $500,000 per year, Williams said. Given rising costs and budgets that are flat or declining, Williams acknowledged that the long-term fate of the library book access remains uncertain.

"We still have to look at an alternative there, quite frankly," Williams said Monday.

Posted by Anne at 08:48 PM | Permalink

From the Dallas Morning News:

Millions of records, photos and artifacts tracing the presidency of George W. Bush will move from the White House to a white North Texas warehouse by early 2009 under a recently awarded government contract.

The six-year, $12.7 million contract, overseen by the National Archives and Records Administration, will turn Lewisville's 1725 Lakepointe Drive into the hub of work to organize and catalogue a massive cache of presidential materials before they move into a permanent library.

"It is expected that the collection will be greater than the Clinton holdings, which consist of over 30,000 cubic feet of textual and non-textual holdings," National Archives spokeswoman Susan Cooper said by e-mail Wednesday. "The electronic component will also be greater than the Clinton administration holdings."

Posted by Anne at 08:42 PM | Permalink

From the Billings Gazette:

The Montana State Library is going to slow down its transition to a digital library, but it still aims to phase out the type of walk-in access it now has, the library commission was told Wednesday.

The library says its mission can best be met with a digital library, and only a few ancillary walk-in services used by very few people - such as access to print newspapers - will be lost. Detractors say the library is moving too fast and isn't ready for the switch.

Posted by Anne at 08:39 PM | Permalink

From the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation:

A controversial bill that seeks to reform Canadian copyright laws will not be introduced this week, federal officials confirmed on Thursday.

A spokesperson for Minister of Industry Jim Prentice said he would not be introducing the bill either Thursday or Friday. The House of Commons goes into recess for the holidays at the end of this week, meaning the bill could not be introduced until late January at the earliest.

Posted by Anne at 08:35 PM | Permalink

From Government Technology:

A new white paper designed to help public officials develop policies for removing Social Security numbers and other sensitive information from public documents is now available online. The National Association of Secretaries of State (NASS), in collaboration with the National Electronic Commerce Coordinating Council (eC3), today released a joint white paper on redaction entitled Privacy, Public Access & Policymaking in State Redaction Practices. Developed with input from leading experts in government, academia and the private sector, the paper is the first national report specifically written for state and local leaders coping with data security issues in public records.

Posted by Anne at 08:27 PM | Permalink

From The Globe and Mail:

Hundreds of items of historical significance, including a valuable Group of Seven painting, have gone missing over the years from the province's archives, the Auditor-General noted in his annual report yesterday.

The report found a number of weaknesses in the Archives of Ontario's inventory control that may have resulted in the losses.

"While progress has been made in the last few years, the Archives of Ontario does not yet have adequate information to ensure that all government records of historical significance are being identified, securely archived and made readily available to the public," Auditor-General Jim McCarter said.

The archives's mandate is to oversee and manage recorded information created by ministries and government agencies, and to preserve historically relevant material and make it publicly accessible.

Posted by Anne at 08:24 PM | Permalink

From the Washington Post:

Robert Shea is a Republican insider with a head for business and a yen for federal program performance standards. Gary Bass is a government watchdog with a mean bite who wants openness and knows how to get it.

Official antagonists, political opposites, brought together by a wild, crazy idea: federal budget transparency. Online and searchable. Free for the asking.

Today, the White House budget office officially launches USASpending.gov, a Web site that shows taxpayers where their dollars go and which legislators, contractors and regions get the most.

The site was created by Shea, associate director of the Office of Management and Budget. It was modeled on a site pioneered by Bass, director of OMB Watch, one of the budget office's harshest nonprofit critics.

Posted by Anne at 08:22 PM | Permalink

From Inside Higher Ed:

The various and competing efforts to digitize university libraries’ vast holdings have no lack of ambition, but access to documents and copyright issues have been two factors slowing the development of online scholarly repositories. Now, an effort at George Mason University seeks to bypass libraries entirely and delve into scholars’ file cabinets instead.

Or at least, their hard drives. If many researchers have had to scan rare documents or books for their own perusal, there’s a potential treasure trove of material that exists among their combined efforts. Rather than let all that scholarship rot, or waste away in data files, the university’s Center for History and New Media sees an opportunity to create an open archive of scholarly resources in the public domain.

Posted by Anne at 08:30 PM | Permalink

From Secrecy News:

A bipartisan resolution to provide online public access to Congressional Research Service reports was introduced in the Senate yesterday.

"The Sergeant-at-Arms of the Senate, in consultation with the Director of the Congressional Research Service, shall make available through a centralized electronic system, for purposes of access and retrieval by the public ... all information described in paragraph (2) that is available through the Congressional Research Service website," the Resolution states.

Exemptions from disclosure are included for copyrighted and personal information, and for reports that are prepared confidentially for an individual member or committee.

The resolution, S. Res. 401, was jointly introduced by Senators Joe Lieberman, John McCain, Susan Collins, Patrick Leahy, John Cornyn and Tom Harkin.

Posted by Anne at 08:29 PM | Permalink

From the Sunlight Foundation:

Beginning in 2006, the Sunlight Foundation launched the Punch Clock Campaign, asking all candidates for congressional office - challengers and incumbents - to promise, if elected, to post their daily schedules on the Internet. Lawmakers who agree to share their schedules, including who they’ve met with and why, show that they are responsive, open, transparent and above all accountable, leading to greater public trust.

Inspired by the 60 percent of Americans who 'punch a clock' to account for their time at work, Sunlight asked why members of Congress should not also account for their time to their employers: the citizens they represent. With the aid of ordinary people across the country, Sunlight asked candidates to sign a pledge to post their schedules on the Internet once elected. One member who took the pledge was elected; to date, seven other members of Congress have agreed to post the daily schedules of their meetings and activities on and off Capitol Hill.

The Punch Clock Map is an extension of the Punch Clock Campaign. It provides a visual representation of the meetings detailed in each member's schedule, to make it easy for everyone to see whom lawmakers have met with and how they serve their district's needs. Each point on this map represents the home-base location of the person or organization with whom a member of Congress has met, not where the meeting took place. The site also provides a weekly updated RSS feeds of the schedules for each member.

Posted by Anne at 08:28 PM | Permalink

From OpenCongress:

Now you can share the bills that matter to you in Congress with your friends on Facebook. Today we are launching our new Facebook app that lets you post bills to you profile, announce your support or opposition and comment on why you care about them. And, of course, the bills you post will have links back to their OpenCongress pages, so your friends can get all the information they need in order to learn more and get involved with the issues themselves.

Posted by Anne at 08:26 PM | Permalink

Hearing, U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. E-Government 2.0: Improving Innovation, Collaboration, and Access 12/11/07 10:00 AM (EST).

The hearing was broadcast live and will be available for viewing later here.

Witnesses Testimony is already available online as PDF documents:
• Karen S. Evans, Administrator, Office of Electronic Government and Information Technology , Office of Management and Budget
• John Lewis Needham, Manager, Public Sector Content Partnerships , Google, Inc.
• Ari Schwartz, Deputy Director , Center for Democracy and Technology
• Jimmy Wales, Founder , Wikipedia

Posted by Anne at 08:24 PM | Permalink

From the Washington Post:

These days you can Google just about anything, from your favorite celebrity's pet to your boss's middle name. But using the biggest search engine to get information about the government often falls short.

That's what leaders from Google and Wikipedia plan to tell the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs today, urging Congress to require federal agencies to make their Web sites, records and databases more searchable.

Posted by Anne at 08:23 PM | Permalink

From the Center for Democracy & Technology:

CDT and OMB Watch today jointly released "Hiding in Plain Sight," a report highlighting a critical gap in online access to vital government information. The report, presented to a Senate panel today, exposes a simple technological roadblock as the culprit and notes the problem has an equally simple technological fix. The problem comes to light as the E-Government Act of 2002, which promotes access to government information and services, is up for reauthorization.

Full Report

Posted by Anne at 08:21 PM | Permalink

From the New York Times:

Will privacy sell?

Ask.com is betting it will. The fourth-largest search engine company will begin a service today called AskEraser, which allows users to make their searches more private.

Ask.com and other major search engines like Google, Yahoo and Microsoft typically keep track of search terms typed by users and link them to a computer’s Internet address, and sometimes to the user. However, when AskEraser is turned on, Ask.com discards all that information, the company said.

Posted by Anne at 08:19 PM | Permalink

ALA Press Release:

Today, in a statement to the U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, the American Library Association (ALA) addressed the critical yet unacknowledged role public libraries play in delivering E-government services to the American people. Increasingly, government agencies refer individuals to their local public libraries for assistance and access to the Internet for citizen-government interactions. Yet public libraries are not considered members of the E-government team. ALA's statement (PDF), for the Committee's hearing on E-government, highlighted the stress these E-government services are placing on public libraries' infrastructure and suggested taking steps toward creating a partnership between public libraries and the government in order to improve E-government delivery to citizens.

Posted by Anne at 08:18 PM | Permalink

From the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee:

For the past 16 months, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee has been investigating allegations of political interference with government climate change science under the Bush Administration. During the course of this investigation, the Committee obtained over 27,000 pages of documents from the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) and the Commerce Department, held two investigative hearings, and deposed or interviewed key officials. Much of the information made available to the Committee has never been publicly disclosed.

This report presents the findings of the Committee’s investigation. The evidence before the Committee leads to one inescapable conclusion: the Bush Administration has engaged in a systematic effort to manipulate climate change science and mislead policymakers and the public about the dangers of global warming.

Proposed Report

Posted by Anne at 08:49 PM | Permalink

From Stateline.org:

The 2001 terrorist attacks led every state but South Dakota to restrict access to information deemed critical to homeland security — from architectural blueprints to emergency evacuation routes, according to a comprehensive, state-by-state study of post-9/11 changes to open-government laws.

Wary of terrorists, state lawmakers closed government meetings previously open to the public, denied residents access to disaster-response plans and concealed documents on mass-transit systems, energy companies and research laboratories, according to the findings.

Posted by Anne at 08:45 PM | Permalink

From News.com:

The U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday overwhelmingly approved a bill saying that anyone offering an open Wi-Fi connection to the public must report illegal images including "obscene" cartoons and drawings--or face fines of up to $300,000.

That broad definition would cover individuals, coffee shops, libraries, hotels, and even some government agencies that provide Wi-Fi. It also sweeps in social-networking sites, domain name registrars, Internet service providers, and e-mail service providers such as Hotmail and Gmail, and it may require that the complete contents of the user's account be retained for subsequent police inspection. . .

. . . Wednesday's vote caught Internet companies by surprise: the Democratic leadership rushed the SAFE Act to the floor under a procedure that's supposed to be reserved for noncontroversial legislation. It was introduced October 10, but has never received even one hearing or committee vote. In addition, the legislation approved this week has changed substantially since the earlier version and was not available for public review.

Securing Adolescents From Exploitation-Online Act, or SAFE Act (H.R.3791)

Posted by Anne at 08:26 PM | Permalink

Press Release:

Governor Crist today announced two new open government initiatives that will improve Floridians’ ability to access public documents and meetings. The first initiative involves a Bill of Rights for all Floridians trying to access public records. The list of rights was compiled by the Commission on Open Government, established by the Governor on June 19, 2007, by Executive Order 07-107. The second initiative involves improving Internet access to state agency contact information.

Posted by Anne at 08:24 PM | Permalink

From the Sunlight Foundation:

New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo today unveiled "Project Sunlight," a powerful and easy-to-use website giving the public unprecedented access to the workings of state government and the information it keeps. . .

. . . New York's Project Sunlight allows tracking, in as real time as the reports are available, seven different state databases -- campaign financing, lobbying, agency contracts, member items, legislation and both for-profit and not-for-profit corporations -- and the links between them.

Posted by Anne at 08:22 PM | Permalink

From The Huffington Post:

Bloggers and other citizen journalists have a new and exciting opportunity to find and shed light on stories the mainstream media are missing -- by combing through transcripts of recent Congressional oversight hearings. Without any fanfare, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee has started posting preliminary transcripts of many of its hearings on its Web site, giving everyone a chance to pore through testimony and find news the MSM may have overlooked.

Posted by Anne at 08:25 PM | Permalink

From the Associated Press:

Lawmakers are scrambling to align House and Senate versions of a bill to tighten freedom of information laws in time to pass it this year.

But with less than three weeks left before Congress recesses for the holidays, Democratic leaders say the chances of that happening are uncertain.

After talks to reconcile the bills went nowhere, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, presented a new version of their bill Tuesday that would bring its financial issues in line with the House version.

Posted by Anne at 08:23 PM | Permalink

From The Globe & Mail:

As sales of CDs continue to plummet and music downloading continues to increase, record companies and artists alike are trying to think of ways to change the traditional business models of the music industry. Radiohead and other bands are giving their music away, Universal is bundling songs with Nokia cellphones, and Prince is suing everyone he can get his hands on. In the U.S., litigation by the record industry is the dominant response to downloading, while Canada has the "private copying levy," which adds a fee to the cost of blank CDs, and uses the money to compensate artists.

A group of Canadian artists want to take that latter idea and extend it even further: In an open letter to the federal government, the artists behind the Songwriters Association of Canada say that instead of just a fee on blank CDs, they would like the government to impose a $5-per-month levy on all Internet access in the country, with that revenue going to musicians whose music is being illegally downloaded. The letter appears on the SAC website.

Posted by Anne at 08:18 PM | Permalink