Category «Freedom of Information»

The Internet Archive won a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Webbys

Brewster Kahle: The Internet Archive won a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Webbys! One of the greatest honors came in the form of this terrific video, narrated by one of our heroes, Lawrence Lessig Lessig said, “Creativity and innovation build on the past. The Internet Archive is the foundation preserving that past, so that perhaps, …

Subjects: Education, Freedom of Information, Government Documents, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Libraries

Americans Divided on Whether Recent Science Protests Will Benefit Scientists’ Causes

“In the wake of last month’s marches for science and climate in Washington and around the country, Americans are divided in their support of the events’ goals and their sense of whether it will make a difference. In particular, a new Pew Research Center survey finds that most Democrats and younger adults are convinced that …

Subjects: Congress, Education, Free Speech, Freedom of Information, Government Documents, Knowledge Management

Freedom of the Press 2017 – Press Freedom’s Dark Horizon

Key Global Findings 2017 “Global press freedom declined to its lowest point in 13 years in 2016 amid unprecedented threats to journalists and media outlets in major democracies and new moves by authoritarian states to control the media, including beyond their borders. Only 13 percent of the world’s population enjoys a Free press—that is, a …

Subjects: Censorship, Civil Liberties, Free Speech, Freedom of Information, Government Documents, Legal Research

Global Open Data Index 2016/2017

The Global Open Data Index 2016/2017 – Advancing the State of Open Data Through Dialogue – “The Global Open Data Index (GODI) is the annual global benchmark for publication of open government data, run by the Open Knowledge Network. Our crowdsourced survey measures the openness of government data according to the Open Definition. By having …

Subjects: E-Government, Freedom of Information, Government Documents, Legal Research

Americans’ Attitudes About the News Media Deeply Divided Along Partisan Lines

“Democrats and Republicans, who already tend to place their trust in different news sources and rely on different outlets for political news, now disagree more than ever on a fundamental issue of the news media’s role in society: whether news organizations’ criticism of political leaders primarily keeps them from doing things they shouldn’t – or …

Subjects: Civil Liberties, Freedom of Information

All the President’s Guests – The unauthorized White House visitor logs

Politico Data: “Who has the president’s ear? Who’s hitting the links with the commander in chief? And who’s on the outside looking in? The official White House visitor logs keep a record of who sees the president and his staff — but they don’t tell the whole story. POLITICO’s Unauthorized White House Visitor Logs stand …

Subjects: Freedom of Information, Government Documents, Knowledge Management, Legal Research

TRAC Sues ICE on Withholding Data on Detainers

“The Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC) filed a suit today under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) charging Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) with unlawfully withholding records related to ICE’s immigration enforcement actions and its interaction with other law enforcement agencies. At issue are ICE’s use of detainers. These are requests from ICE to federal, …

Subjects: Civil Liberties, Freedom of Information, Government Documents, Legal Research

Creating more accessibility to legislative data focus of think tank Congressional testimony

“The Center for Data Innovation has submitted written testimony to the House Committee on Appropriations Subcommittee on Legislative Branch regarding ways to improve the accessibility of legislative data. The Center recommends that Congress begin publishing legislative data via application programming interface (API) in addition to publishing this data in bulk format. As the Library of Congress …

Subjects: Congress, Freedom of Information, Government Documents, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Legislation

FOIA Backlog Skyrockets at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services

Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC) – “The backlog of unprocessed FOIA requests to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) continues to climb. In just a two-year period, the backlog of unanswered FOIA requests has tripled, climbing from 17,998 at the end of December 2014 to 46,550 at the end of December 2016. This means …

Subjects: Civil Liberties, Freedom of Information, Government Documents, Legal Research

Chicago mayor Emanuel posts EPA’s deleted climate change page

Politico: Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s response to the Trump administration pulling down its website detailing information about climate change: putting up his own. “The new section of the City of Chicago’s website, launched this weekend, pulls data from the archived Environmental Protection Agency page, noting, “while this information may not be readily available on the …

Subjects: Climate Change, E-Government, Environmental Law, Freedom of Information, Government Documents, Legal Research

Bill in NY legislature seeks release of Trump tax returns

CNN Money: “Some Democratic state senators in New York are trying an end run to get Donald Trump’s taxes into the public view by introducing legislation that would reveal his state tax returns for the last five years. The legislation — dubbed the Tax Returns Uniformly Made Public Act (or TRUMP Act) — would require …

Subjects: Financial System, Freedom of Information, Government Documents, Legal Research, Legislation

Office of Government Ethics now handling voluminous info requests from public

Quartz – “Trump’s administration has been widely criticized for its lack of transparency, and demands for information from the public, press, and Congress have gone through the roof. The OGE has already received five times the amount of Freedom of Information (FOIA) requests that they usually get in a full fiscal year—with five months left …

Subjects: Freedom of Information, Government Documents, Knowledge Management, Legal Research