Expect Resistance & Library Autonomous Zone

Information as Public Domain: Access through Libraries

This is a declaration from an international conference in Russia held last month. The link only has the declaration in English with the program listed in Russian. Be that as it may, it’s a good reminder that the entire world is interested in information access and that the public domain extends beyond American borders! Check out the World Summit on the Information Society

On 27-29 October 2004 St. Petersburg hosted the International Conference On 27-29 October 2004 St. Petersburg hosted the International Conference “Information as Public Domain: Access through Libraries”, which was attended by over 120 representatives of public authorities, academic research organizations, libraries and other institutions from Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Great Britain, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzia, Moldova, Russia, USA, Tajikistan and the Ukraine.

Having examined an extensive range of agenda items, the participants of the Conference hereby confirm their view that enabling access to public domain information produced by public authorities should become fundamental to the national information policies of all nations striving for democracy and freedom of human development. Public authorities, as well as libraries, archives and various information services providers should assume a primary responsibility for the expansion of openness and management of information as public domain. The mainstream principle of information management should be as follows: information produced by public authorities should be deemed publicly available, and any exceptions to this rule officially banning the said access should be justified, minimized and supported by the power of law. The national information policy and its legislative and regulatory support should be based on the presumption of openness of government information.

The participants of the Conference take note that any national information policy should reside on the determination to develop a knowledge society and a civil society. Libraries of today constitute an indispensable institution of civil society and an effective tool for building it. Support of the development of library services should be elaborated in national information policies.

The participants of the Conference take note of the need for meaningful efforts to implement the key documents passed at the World Summit on Information Society, i.e. the Declaration of Principles and Plan of Action (2003), as well as the Policy guidelines for the development and promotion of government public domain information (UNESCO, 2004).

AP Wire | 11/24/2004 | Higher ed officials question request to access student records

Higher education officials in South Carolina are concerned about a proposal that would give the federal government more access to individual student records….

The U.S. Department of Education says it wants more information about students as a way to better track trends such as retention, graduation rates and net tuition. The agency wants to create a unit record system at the federal level that would collect data from individual student records

Shhh … someone might hear you.
By Alex Johnson, MSNBC
Updated: 6:19 p.m. ET Nov. 18, 2004.

On the occasion of Attorney General Ashcroft’s resignation, MSNBC reviews his contempt for freedom of information. One particularly notable case was the redaction of almost half of a report on workplace diversity
in Ashcroft’s Justice Department. The redacted portions were uncovered, however. MSNBC notes:

According to the Justice Department, these facts were too sensitive
for Americans to read about:

# "Attorneys across demographic groups believe that the Justice
Department is a good place to work."

# "The Department does face significant diversity issues."

# "The Department suffers from an inadequate human resources
management infrastructure."

# "Section Chiefs are an extremely critical element of the
Department's diversity climate. They have significant authority in
recruitment, hiring, promotion, performance appraisal, case assignment
and career development."

# "Minorities are significantly under-represented in management
ranks."

Announcement of Intent To Initiate the Process To Remove
Aeronautical Information From Public Sale and Distribution
AGENCY: National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), Department of
Defense.
FR Doc 04-25631.
Federal Register: November 18, 2004 (Volume 69, Number 222)]
[Notices]
[Page 67546-67547]

SUMMARY: The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) intends to
remove its Flight Information Publications (FLIP), Digital Aeronautical
Flight Information File (DAFIF), and related aeronautical safety of
navigation digital and hardcopy publications from public sale and
distribution.

This action is taken to accomplish the following objectives:
safeguarding the integrity of Department of Defense (DoD) aeronautical
navigation data currently available on the public Internet; preventing
unfettered access to air facility data by those intending harm to the
United States, its interests or allies; upholding terms of bi-lateral
geospatial data-sharing agreements; avoiding competition with
commercial interests; and avoiding intellectual property/copyright
disputes with foreign agencies that provide host-nation aeronautical
data.

Thanks to BeSpacific

Letter to WIPO on stolen EFF documents Cory Doctorow, Electronic Freedom Foundation,
November 18, 2004.

Cory is blogging the WIPO meetings in Geneva where negotiations over the Broadcasting Treaty, which has the power to lock up the public domain and break the web, are being held.

Let me try to convey to you the depth of the weirdness that arose when all the public-interest groups’ papers were stolen and trashed at WIPO. No one gets into the WIPO building without being accredited and checked over, so this was almost certainly someone who was working on the treaty — in other words, a political opponent (none of the documents promoting the Broadcast Treaty were touched).

More from Cory on WIPO:
here

The Effect of Electronic Voting Machines on Change in Support for Bush in the 2004 Florida Elections by Michael Hout, Laura Mangels, Jennifer Carlson, and Rachel Best.

This working paper just came out today (11/18/04). There are some pretty strange findings and the authors say they are “99.9% sure that these effects are not attributable to
chance.” Makes one wonder.

Electronic voting raised President BushÕs advantage from the tiny edge he held in 2000 to a clearer margin of victory in 2004. The impact of
e-voting was not uniform, however. Its impact was proportional to the Democratic support in the county, i.e., it was especially large in Broward, Palm Beach, and Miami-Dade.

The Arrival Of Secret Law
by Steven Aftergood, Secrecy News,
Volume 2004, Issue No. 100.
November 14, 2004.

Americans can now be obligated to comply with legally-binding regulations that are unknown to them, and that indeed they are forbidden to know.

This is not some dismal Eastern European allegory. It is part of a continuing transformation of American government that is leaving it less open, less accountable and less susceptible to rational deliberation as a vehicle for change.

Harold C. Relyea once wrote an article entitled “The Coming of Secret Law” (Government Information Quarterly, vol. 5, no. 2, 1988) that electrified readers (or at least one reader) with its warning about increased executive branch reliance on secret presidential directives and related instruments.

Back in the 1980s when that article was written, secret law was still on the way. Now it is here.

Wired News: Senate May Ram Copyright Bill

This is one of those times when several threads in my brain coalesce. I got a chance to hear Pamela Samuelson, dean of the Berkeley Center for Law and Technology speak at UCSD two days ago on the subject of P2P. Fascinating talk on an issue of great importance to libraries (anyone know LOCKSS?). She talked a little about the Piracy Deterrence and Education Act of 2004 (HR4077) currently winding its way through Congress. She also referenced an article that I haven’t had a chance to read yet called “Darknet and the future of content contribution” by Peter Biddle et al (an ACM DRM workshop, Nov, 2002). Anyway, she’s working with several others — including the EFF — to make sure that the public domain, intellectual property law and copyright don’t get overrun by corporate zealots like the RIAA and MPAA. Now here’s this story in Wired that says that several pieces of legislation have been lumped together are are being pushed through the Senate by our good buddy Orrin Hatch and surpisingly, Patrick Leahy (D-VT) — until you check out their contributors on open secrets dot org and see that they’re both heavily financed by the TV/Movies/Music industries! Do you find this all as disturbing as I do? Then start by sending a letter to your Congress people at Public knowledge dot org.

The Senate might vote on HR2391, the Intellectual Property Protection Act, a comprehensive bill that opponents charge could make many users of peer-to-peer networks, digital-music players and other products criminally liable for copyright infringement. The bill would also undo centuries of “fair use” — the principle that gives Americans the right to use small samples of the works of others without having to ask permission or pay.

The Faith-Based Encyclopedia
by Robert McHenry, TCS: Tech Central Station, 11/15/2004.

An interesting article. As McHenry, a former editor in chief of the Encyclop¾dia Britannica. notes:

Then comes the crucial and entirely faith-based step:

3. Some unspecified quasi-Darwinian process will assure that those writings and editings by contributors of greatest expertise will survive; articles will eventually reach a steady state that corresponds to the highest degree of accuracy.

Does someone actually believe this? Evidently so. Why? It’s very hard to say.

McHenry’s argument goes to the heart
of much of the problem our users face when using
the Internet for information. When it is good, it is very very, good and when it is bad it is, well, very, very bad, if not horid, misleading, inaccurate, etc.
How do you tell the difference? What is the role of the library?

Enjoy! A-and a tip of the hat to /. where the usual discussion (of what value…?) ensues…

The Quaint Mr. Gonzales

More public interest groups — such as the Center for Constitutional Rights, Human Rights Watch and the ACLU (although they officially take no position, they call for a full and thorough hearing) — are coming out and voicing their displeasure over President Bush’s choice for attorney general, Alberto Gonzales. There’s no question that the AG can have a profound affect on civil and human rights in the US. What’s not as clear is whether or not Gonzales will uphold those solemn responsibilities, or continue unchanged with the horrendous record of the outgoing AG.

ÒMr. Ashcroft’s legacy has been an open hostility to protecting civil liberties and an outright disdain for those who dare to question his policies. We need to do more than just replace John Ashcroft; we need a wholesale re-examination of Justice Department policies that trample on civil liberties and human rights.”
– Anthony Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union.