Tuesday March 27th retired British Columbia Legislative Librarian Joan A. Barton spoke movingly to forty members of the Victoria Librarians Association of the long history of the Legislative Library, now threatened with closure. The library was established in 1863, with Dr. Helmkin’s private collection at its core, as Thomas Jefferson’s was for the Library [...]
Archive of entries posted on March 2007
Independent musicians fearful their music will go unheard if the Internet is prioritized
From the Mercury News:
Sensing a revolution in the way Internet traffic is managed, rock and roll musicians find themselves in the unusual position of defending the status quo.
Independent, lesser-known musicians and smaller record labels have launched a nationwide campaign Tuesday to support the idea that all Internet traffic should be treated equally, which they said [...]
FBI chief blames computers for privacy flap
From News.com:
FBI Director Robert Mueller on Tuesday said secret “national security letters” are invaluable in unearthing telephone and e-mail logs and blamed computer snafus for deceiving Congress about how often the technique is used. . .
. . . The FBI once used 3×5 index cards to track use of the letters but then switched to [...]
CLASSIFIED: Ensuring Congressional Access to National Security Information
Oh, to live in DC. . .
Public Forum co-sponsored by Center for American Progress and OpenTheGovernment.org: CLASSIFIED: Ensuring Congressional Access to National Security Information
March 30, 2007, 12:30pm – 2:00pm
The Constitution gives Congress broad authority to oversee and investigate the activities of the executive branch. If Congress is to carry out that authority, it must have [...]
Virginia Passes State Version of CIPA
From Library Journal:
Virginia has become the second state to pass a state version of the Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA), joining Utah in requiring libraries to use filters to block child pornography and obscenity, and, for minors, “harmful to minors” material. Unlike the 2000 federal law, which ties filters to receipt of E-rate telecomm discounts, [...]
Suggestions For FOIA Amendments
New LLRX Column:
Basically, all of my suggestions come down to agency accountability. If agencies are held accountable for their failures in FOIA operations then they will improve FOIA operations.
Data for the Future: the German Project “Co-operative Development of a Long-term Digital Information Archive” (kopal)
Altenhöner, Reinhard (2006) Data for the Future: the German Project “Co-operative Development of a Long-term Digital Information Archive” (kopal). Library Hi Tech 24(4):pp. 574-582.
One of the open problems of the global information society is to ensure the long-term accessibility of digital documents. kopal tackles this problem head-on: In a three-year project, financially supported by the [...]
Make Way for Copyright Chaos
From the New York Times:
Last week, Viacom asked a federal court to order the video-sharing service YouTube to pay it more than $1 billion in damages for some 150,000 videos that Viacom claims it owns and YouTube users have shared. “YouTube,” the complaint alleges, “has harnessed technology to willfully infringe copyrights on a huge scale,” [...]
Wiki site offers new avenue for advocacy
From The Hill:
Jim Harper’s twin interests in government transparency and the Internet may give lobbyists another way to influence the political process.
Harper, a former counsel to the Senate Governmental Reform Committee, developed a website in his spare time designed to make it easier for the public to track legislation.
Now his site, WashingtonWatch.com, has added a [...]
My National Security Letter Gag Order
From the Washington Post:
It is the policy of The Washington Post not to publish anonymous pieces. In this case, an exception has been made because the author — who would have preferred to be named — is legally prohibited from disclosing his or her identity in connection with receipt of a national security letter. The [...]