Free Government Information (FGI)

The Princeton Center for Information Technology Policy (CITP) will host a 2-day workshop Open Government: Defining, Designing, and Sustaining Transparency at Princeton U, Jan 21-22, 2010...

Ok gentle readers, we've got a new guest blogger for December. Welcome to the podium Sonnet Brown, head of the Federal Documents Department at the Earl K. Long Library at the University of New Orleans. She's a 2010 ALA Emerging Leader so watch out! Check out her bio for more. Take it away Sonnet!

Thank you, James, for the warm welcome! I thought I'd kick off my guest blogging with a fun countdown. No, we are not counting down to the New Year, though I'm sure we are all ready for a fabulous 2010! This countdown is much more important...

While poking around the Government Printing Office's (GPO)'s OPAL training site at http://www.opal-online.org/archivegpo.htm, I found a couple of online workshops that I think will be valuable to beginner and expert alike: Searching for Free Government Full Text Docs Online: Where to Begin...

[UPDATE: I spoke too soon. Seems that these are "early access" documents that "will be removed from this database, to be replaced by the fully edited version in the appropriate digital edition in the Rotunda American Founding Era collection."] Nice work U of Virginia! Y...ou can access the papers here...

In September 2009 we at Free Government Information (FGI) started the "lost docs blog" at lostdocs.freegovinfo.info to collect your receipts from GPO about the fugitive documents you reported through GPO's lost docs form at www.fdlp.gov/lostdocs or through GPO's Help system at gpo.custhelp.com...

Noah Shactman's cool Danger Room blog (from Wired) posted recently about the CIA's declassified Lost Magic Manual that has just resurfaced. In 1953, the CIA hired professional magician John Mulholland to adapt his techniques of stealth and misdirection to the craft of espionage...