Slashdot Mirror

I imagine that there are at least dozens of libraries that archive major newspapers to microfilm (err, microform, I guess) and store it in artificial, man made caves.

Apparently, some of the archives go back a ways:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newspaperarchive

And some are enormous:

http://www.loc.gov/about/facts.html

You are correct, but the amounts don't seem to change. This is apparently the correct information, from the Proceedings page of the Copyright and Royalty Board (CRB). The link titled "Notice of agreement 74 FR 9293 March 3, 2009" is a PDF file: PDF. See page 9303 of the U.S. Federal Registry:

4. Minimum Annual Fees

(a) In General. For each year from 2006-2015, an Eligible Small Webcaster shall pay annual minimum fees as follows:

(1) $500 for electing Microcasters, which shall constitute the only royalty payable hereunder by an electing Microcaster, except that an electing Microcaster also shall pay a $100 annual fee (the ''Proxy Fee'') to SoundExchange for the reporting waiver discussed in Section 6(a), and the provisions of Section 5(d) shall apply;

(2) $2,000, for Eligible Small Webcasters other than electing Microcasters that had Gross Revenues during the prior year of not more than $50,000 and reasonably expect Gross Revenues of not more than $50,000 during the applicable year; or

(3) $5,000, for Eligible Small Webcasters that had Gross Revenues during the prior year of more than $50,000 or reasonably expect Gross Revenues to exceed $50,000 during the applicable year. (b) The amounts specified in Section 4(a) shall be paid by January 31 of each year. (c) All minimum fees (but not the Proxy Fee for the reporting waiver for Microcasters) shall be fully creditable toward royalties due for the year for which such amounts are paid, but not any other year.

You are correct, but the amounts don't seem to change. This is apparently the correct information, from the Proceedings page of the Copyright and Royalty Board (CRB). The link titled "Notice of agreement 74 FR 9293 March 3, 2009" is a PDF file: PDF. See page 9303 of the U.S. Federal Registry:

4. Minimum Annual Fees

(a) In General. For each year from 2006-2015, an Eligible Small Webcaster shall pay annual minimum fees as follows:

(1) $500 for electing Microcasters, which shall constitute the only royalty payable hereunder by an electing Microcaster, except that an electing Microcaster also shall pay a $100 annual fee (the ''Proxy Fee'') to SoundExchange for the reporting waiver discussed in Section 6(a), and the provisions of Section 5(d) shall apply;

(2) $2,000, for Eligible Small Webcasters other than electing Microcasters that had Gross Revenues during the prior year of not more than $50,000 and reasonably expect Gross Revenues of not more than $50,000 during the applicable year; or

(3) $5,000, for Eligible Small Webcasters that had Gross Revenues during the prior year of more than $50,000 or reasonably expect Gross Revenues to exceed $50,000 during the applicable year. (b) The amounts specified in Section 4(a) shall be paid by January 31 of each year. (c) All minimum fees (but not the Proxy Fee for the reporting waiver for Microcasters) shall be fully creditable toward royalties due for the year for which such amounts are paid, but not any other year.

From Wikipedia:

The Digital Performance in Sound Recordings Act of 1995 and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 together granted a performance right for sound recordings. As a result, copyright law now requires that users of music pay the copyright owner of the sound recording for the public performance of that music via certain kinds of digital transmissions.

From the Library of Congress, Section 3f2: ( http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/F?c104:1:./temp/~c104dVWooD:e844: )

`(2) In the absence of license agreements negotiated under paragraph (1), during the 60-day period commencing 6 months after publication of the notice specified in paragraph (1), and upon the filing of a petition in accordance with section 803(a)(1), the Librarian of Congress shall, pursuant to chapter 8, convene a copyright arbitration royalty panel to determine and publish in the Federal Register a schedule of rates and terms which, subject to paragraph (3), shall be binding on all copyright owners of sound recordings and entities performing sound recordings . In addition to the objectives set forth in section 801(b)(1), in establishing such rates and terms, the copyright arbitration royalty panel may consider the rates and terms for comparable types of digital audio transmission services and comparable circumstances under voluntary license agreements negotiated as provided in paragraph (1). The Librarian of Congress shall also establish requirements by which copyright owners may receive reasonable notice of the use of their sound recordings under this section, and under which records of such use shall be kept and made available by entities performing sound recordings.

Emphasis mine.

Slashdot Error: The minimum is $500, not $25,000, as the Slashdot story says. In all these years, the company that owns Slashdot has not learned the basic elements of editing.

I assumed, in my grandparent comment, that the Slashdot story was correct, and was shocked at the amount.

This government PDF file seems to say $500, also: Final Determination Of Rates And Terms, Docket No. 2005-1 CRB DTRA (PDF) Quote: "(b) Minimum fee. Each Commercial Webcaster and Noncommercial Webcaster will pay an annual, nonrefundable minimum fee of $500 for each calendar year or part of a calendar year of the license period during which they are Licensees pursuant to licenses under 17 U.S.C. 114."

The cap and trade bill that just passed the house will simply drive all of the industry further to China and the third world where there are scant environmental regulations.

Actually, the bill calls for a system of what are effectively import tariffs on goods coming from countries that have less stringent greenhouse gas controls than the U.S:

`SEC. 768. INTERNATIONAL RESERVE ALLOWANCE PROGRAM.

`(a) Establishment-

`(1) IN GENERAL- The Administrator, with the concurrence of Commissioner responsible for U.S. Customs and Border Protection, shall issue regulations--

`(A) establishing an international reserve allowance program for the sale, exchange, purchase, transfer, and banking of international reserve allowances for covered goods with respect to the eligible industrial sector;

`(B) ensuring that the price for purchasing the international reserve allowances from the United States on a particular day is equivalent to the auction clearing price for emission allowances under section 722 for the most recent emission allowance auction;

`(C) establishing a general methodology for calculating the quantity of international reserve allowances that a United States importer of any covered good must submit;

`(D) requiring the submission of appropriate amounts of such allowances for covered goods with respect to the eligible industrial sector that enter the customs territory of the United States;

`(E) exempting from the requirements of subparagraph (D) such products that are the origin of--

`(i) any country determined to meet any of the standards provided in section 767(c);

`(ii) any foreign country that the United Nations has identified as among the least developed of developing countries; or

`(iii) any foreign country that the President has determined to be responsible for less than 0.5 percent of total global greenhouse gas emissions and less than 5 percent of United States imports of covered goods with respect to the eligible industrial sector;

`(F) specifying the procedures that U.S. Customs and Border Protection will apply for the declaration and entry of covered goods with respect to the eligible industrial sector into the customs territory of the United States; and

`(G) establishing procedures that prevent circumvention of the international reserve allowance requirement for covered goods with respect to the eligible industrial sector that

People who write legal documents usually leave much leeway to account for the unaccountable. If you look up the right articles of constitution or law, there's bound to be a section ascribing federal powers to "other areas not yet covered by current document"

And if you look at other early documents you'll see government was supported to be strictly limited in what powers it had. Repeatedly Thomas Jefferson wrote that the people have the power and that government is but a servant to the people, not their dictator. He "sought to establish a federal government of limited powers."

Falcon

ICANN is primarily responsible for governing this sort of stuff. Section (i) below states it pretty clearly.

The difference is between someone who used the website, and someone who bought it and immediately set up a for sale sign.

According to the US anti-cybersquatting act, if the registrant is outside the U.S., you may bring the lawsuit in rem against the domain itself, not against the registrant.

Anti-cybersquatting act:
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c106:S.1255.IS:=

Icann regulations:
http://www.icann.org/en/dndr/udrp/policy.htm

b. Evidence of Registration and Use in Bad Faith. For the purposes of Paragraph 4(a)(iii), the following circumstances, in particular but without limitation, if found by the Panel to be present, shall be evidence of the registration and use of a domain name in bad faith:

        (i) circumstances indicating that you have registered or you have acquired the domain name primarily for the purpose of selling, renting, or otherwise transferring the domain name registration to the complainant who is the owner of the trademark or service mark or to a competitor of that complainant, for valuable consideration in excess of your documented out-of-pocket costs directly related to the domain name; or

        (ii) you have registered the domain name in order to prevent the owner of the trademark or service mark from reflecting the mark in a corresponding domain name, provided that you have engaged in a pattern of such conduct; or

        (iii) you have registered the domain name primarily for the purpose of disrupting the business of a competitor; or

        (iv) by using the domain name, you have intentionally attempted to attract, for commercial gain, Internet users to your web site or other on-line location, by creating a likelihood of confusion with the complainant's mark as to the source, sponsorship, affiliation, or endorsement of your web site or location or of a product or service on your web site or location.

Oh, that's a shame, maybe next time we should hand this matter over to the USAF or at least the FBI. You know, someone capable of exterminating or prosecuting the 'rats'?

Federal Trade Commission [Home]

A Brief Overiview of the Federal Trade Commission's
Investigative and Law Enforcement Authority (1) [1995]

Statutes Enforced or Administered by the Commission [Home]

"AN ACT To enhance Federal Trade Commission enforcement against illegal spam, spyware, and cross-border fraud and deception, and for other purposes."
U.S. SAFE WEB Act of 2006 [Final - Full Text]

1. abolish legally binding precedent. The accepted interpretation of a law should be a consensus among the legal community, not a decision of one moron 150 years ago.

Precedent changes frequently, and is generally a consensus decision arrived at as judges look at how other judges ruled. And there are few, if any, precedents that were established 150 years ago, and any that are tend to be re-affirmed by a new look at the law periodically.

2. Hire someone competent to rewrite the laws, aiming for clarity and precision.

As an initial matter, clarity and precision are tradeoffs. The easier the law is to read, the less precise it is. And practically, rewriting laws would be a logistical nightmare. Rewriting laws means re-passing laws, and to do that to every law in the book would take countless years to make sure the new laws aren't introducing new loopholes. Do you have an example of a law that you feel is too vague? Because I've read a lot of statutes, and in general they tend to be fairly clear.

3. Law should be treated like software: any and all changes should be incorporated into the text, not distributed as amendments. The current legal system looks like Linux 0.01 with all the patches distributed separately up to 2.6.30, and you can win a case by confusing the judge and your opponent into forgetting a critical patch.

Alright, you are way off-base on this, changes to the law are always incorporated into the text. In fact, laws that amend statutes tend to even specify what section are modified and how they are. For example, look at Section 3this short bill.

3. Make the up to date text of every law easily accessible and searchable by anyone.

Pretty much already done. I don't know of any state that doesn't have a searchable index of its statutes.

4. If you find there is no law for something new, like, say, the internet, say so. Don't torture existing unrelated laws fo fit the new situation.

Well the problem with that is people shouldn't be allowed to violate the law simply because they're doing it on the internet. If someone is committing fraud, then they're committing fraud, just because they're doing it via e-mail doesn't mean they should escape liability.

5. Arguments should be based on merit, not qualifications and the overuse of jargon.

I'm not sure what you mean by this. Lawsuits are always supposed to be judged on merit. Unfortunately not all of them are, but this isn't because of some failure of the law, it's part of the human equation, and you're not going to fix that. As for qualifications I am also not sure what you mean; lawyers need to meet certain minimal qualifications, but after that their arguments are judged, not their background. An Ivy League law grad is in the same position as a fourth-tier law grad if they've both passed the bar.

1. abolish legally binding precedent. The accepted interpretation of a law should be a consensus among the legal community, not a decision of one moron 150 years ago.

Old decisions, while they may be technically binding, are usually unpersuasive unless it accords to the general legal consensus within and without the jurisdiction. Publications like the restatements of the law (which are essentially just lists of contemporary legal principles, and not actually binding law anywhere, nor adopted by legislatures) are often much more persuasive to judges and justices than ancient decisions. In other words, courts will overturn ancient precedent when they think it's appropriate; lower courts will interpret ancient precedent (that hasn't been relied on by a higher court in that jurisdiction recently) as not to apply to "modern" circumstances, and higher courts often affirm those kinds of decisions (thus overturning the precedent for that circumstance or overturning it entirely)

Also, I want to point out that you're advocating judicial activism.

2. Hire someone competent [faqs.org] to rewrite the laws, aiming for clarity and precision.

The advantages and disadvantages of clear laws have been discussed elsewhere in the comments. I'll just add that flexibility in the law gives judges an opportunity to weigh normative values of what's just for the case before them when interpreting the law and making their decisions. This is especially important for plaintiffs overcoming, and defendants succeeding at, summary judgment motions.

3. Law should be treated like software: any and all changes should be incorporated into the text, not distributed as amendments. The current legal system looks like Linux 0.01 with all the patches distributed separately up to 2.6.30, and you can win a case by confusing the judge and your opponent into forgetting a critical patch.

What you're describing is the difference (in the US federal system) between the Statutes at Large and the United States Code. Statutes at large are the bills passed by Congress (and approved by the president), in chronological order. The United States Code is the law of the United States organized by subject. Commercial annotated versions by Westlaw and LexisNexis are kept up-to-date with amendments, administrative rules, decisions, etc. The normal USC is updated every six years.

3. Make the up to date text of every law easily accessible and searchable by anyone.

http://thomas.loc.gov/
http://uscode.house.gov/
http://www.loc.gov/law/
http://www.loc.gov/law/help/guide/states.php

There's more if you're willing to look at free services not provided by the government. There's even more if you're willing to look at commercial services from Westlaw, LexisNexis, and many others.

Also, the law libraries at public law schools are (usually) open to the public. You can even discuss, at great length, your research goals with law librarians, who will lend your their expertise for free.

The fact that legal research is so hard (and so important) is why legal researchers and lawyers get paid so much. (As a side note, another key reason lawyers get paid so much, and lawsuits are so expensive, is that good legal research resources are freaking expensive. Check out the going rate for westlaw or lexisnexis. One search (of any given complexity) of all US federal cases in Westlaw is something like 140 dollars. Viewing and printing the resulting cases usually has an attached fee as well. You can pay for time instead of by action - but you're charged per minute.)

4. If you find there is no law for something new, like, say, the internet, say so. Don't torture existing unrelated laws fo fit the new situation.

Very very often judges WILL admit that, and then proceed to torture existing laws to fi

1. abolish legally binding precedent. The accepted interpretation of a law should be a consensus among the legal community, not a decision of one moron 150 years ago.

Old decisions, while they may be technically binding, are usually unpersuasive unless it accords to the general legal consensus within and without the jurisdiction. Publications like the restatements of the law (which are essentially just lists of contemporary legal principles, and not actually binding law anywhere, nor adopted by legislatures) are often much more persuasive to judges and justices than ancient decisions. In other words, courts will overturn ancient precedent when they think it's appropriate; lower courts will interpret ancient precedent (that hasn't been relied on by a higher court in that jurisdiction recently) as not to apply to "modern" circumstances, and higher courts often affirm those kinds of decisions (thus overturning the precedent for that circumstance or overturning it entirely)

Also, I want to point out that you're advocating judicial activism.

2. Hire someone competent [faqs.org] to rewrite the laws, aiming for clarity and precision.

The advantages and disadvantages of clear laws have been discussed elsewhere in the comments. I'll just add that flexibility in the law gives judges an opportunity to weigh normative values of what's just for the case before them when interpreting the law and making their decisions. This is especially important for plaintiffs overcoming, and defendants succeeding at, summary judgment motions.

3. Law should be treated like software: any and all changes should be incorporated into the text, not distributed as amendments. The current legal system looks like Linux 0.01 with all the patches distributed separately up to 2.6.30, and you can win a case by confusing the judge and your opponent into forgetting a critical patch.

What you're describing is the difference (in the US federal system) between the Statutes at Large and the United States Code. Statutes at large are the bills passed by Congress (and approved by the president), in chronological order. The United States Code is the law of the United States organized by subject. Commercial annotated versions by Westlaw and LexisNexis are kept up-to-date with amendments, administrative rules, decisions, etc. The normal USC is updated every six years.

3. Make the up to date text of every law easily accessible and searchable by anyone.

http://thomas.loc.gov/
http://uscode.house.gov/
http://www.loc.gov/law/
http://www.loc.gov/law/help/guide/states.php

There's more if you're willing to look at free services not provided by the government. There's even more if you're willing to look at commercial services from Westlaw, LexisNexis, and many others.

Also, the law libraries at public law schools are (usually) open to the public. You can even discuss, at great length, your research goals with law librarians, who will lend your their expertise for free.

The fact that legal research is so hard (and so important) is why legal researchers and lawyers get paid so much. (As a side note, another key reason lawyers get paid so much, and lawsuits are so expensive, is that good legal research resources are freaking expensive. Check out the going rate for westlaw or lexisnexis. One search (of any given complexity) of all US federal cases in Westlaw is something like 140 dollars. Viewing and printing the resulting cases usually has an attached fee as well. You can pay for time instead of by action - but you're charged per minute.)

4. If you find there is no law for something new, like, say, the internet, say so. Don't torture existing unrelated laws fo fit the new situation.

Very very often judges WILL admit that, and then proceed to torture existing laws to fi

1. abolish legally binding precedent. The accepted interpretation of a law should be a consensus among the legal community, not a decision of one moron 150 years ago.

Old decisions, while they may be technically binding, are usually unpersuasive unless it accords to the general legal consensus within and without the jurisdiction. Publications like the restatements of the law (which are essentially just lists of contemporary legal principles, and not actually binding law anywhere, nor adopted by legislatures) are often much more persuasive to judges and justices than ancient decisions. In other words, courts will overturn ancient precedent when they think it's appropriate; lower courts will interpret ancient precedent (that hasn't been relied on by a higher court in that jurisdiction recently) as not to apply to "modern" circumstances, and higher courts often affirm those kinds of decisions (thus overturning the precedent for that circumstance or overturning it entirely)

Also, I want to point out that you're advocating judicial activism.

2. Hire someone competent [faqs.org] to rewrite the laws, aiming for clarity and precision.

The advantages and disadvantages of clear laws have been discussed elsewhere in the comments. I'll just add that flexibility in the law gives judges an opportunity to weigh normative values of what's just for the case before them when interpreting the law and making their decisions. This is especially important for plaintiffs overcoming, and defendants succeeding at, summary judgment motions.

3. Law should be treated like software: any and all changes should be incorporated into the text, not distributed as amendments. The current legal system looks like Linux 0.01 with all the patches distributed separately up to 2.6.30, and you can win a case by confusing the judge and your opponent into forgetting a critical patch.

What you're describing is the difference (in the US federal system) between the Statutes at Large and the United States Code. Statutes at large are the bills passed by Congress (and approved by the president), in chronological order. The United States Code is the law of the United States organized by subject. Commercial annotated versions by Westlaw and LexisNexis are kept up-to-date with amendments, administrative rules, decisions, etc. The normal USC is updated every six years.

3. Make the up to date text of every law easily accessible and searchable by anyone.

http://thomas.loc.gov/
http://uscode.house.gov/
http://www.loc.gov/law/
http://www.loc.gov/law/help/guide/states.php

There's more if you're willing to look at free services not provided by the government. There's even more if you're willing to look at commercial services from Westlaw, LexisNexis, and many others.

Also, the law libraries at public law schools are (usually) open to the public. You can even discuss, at great length, your research goals with law librarians, who will lend your their expertise for free.

The fact that legal research is so hard (and so important) is why legal researchers and lawyers get paid so much. (As a side note, another key reason lawyers get paid so much, and lawsuits are so expensive, is that good legal research resources are freaking expensive. Check out the going rate for westlaw or lexisnexis. One search (of any given complexity) of all US federal cases in Westlaw is something like 140 dollars. Viewing and printing the resulting cases usually has an attached fee as well. You can pay for time instead of by action - but you're charged per minute.)

4. If you find there is no law for something new, like, say, the internet, say so. Don't torture existing unrelated laws fo fit the new situation.

Very very often judges WILL admit that, and then proceed to torture existing laws to fi

Put it on Wikileaks. Send it anonymously to the New York Times, the Washington Post, and a few key congressional offices. That's a good start.

When in doubt, ask what would Herblock say?

> The original author should be able to claim copyright over his/her material for as long as he/she wishes!

For as long as he/she wishes??? No!
The point of copyright is not to provide a steady salary for the life of the author!
The intent is to protect the initial investment of artists so their creation is not stolen before they have a chance to make some money from it.

From Article I, Section 8 of the constitution:

"To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;"

I couldn't agree with you more. Why is it that congresspeople think they can circumvent or undermine the constitution?

It blows my mind, for example, that they're trying to make Washington D.C. a state. Article 1, Section 8: "To exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by Cession of particular States, and the Acceptance of Congress, become the Seat of the Government of the United States, and to exercise like Authority over all Places..."

The District is explicitly NOT a state. Without an Amendment, how can they even consider this legislation?

I couldn't agree with you more. Why is it that congresspeople think they can circumvent or undermine the constitution?

It blows my mind, for example, that they're trying to make Washington D.C. a state. Article 1, Section 8: "To exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by Cession of particular States, and the Acceptance of Congress, become the Seat of the Government of the United States, and to exercise like Authority over all Places..."

The District is explicitly NOT a state. Without an Amendment, how can they even consider this legislation?

The fact that this is being handled at the Federal level indicates it's just a Bush-era grab for additional surveillance.

Err... the "Bush era" has been over for quite some time.

Of the bill's sponsors and cosponsors:

Linda Sanchez is a Democrat.

Timothy Bishop is a Democrat.

Lois Capps is a Democrat.

William Lacy Clay is a Democrat.

Joe Courtney is a Democrat.

Danny K. Davis is a Democrat.

Raúl M. Grijalva is a Democrat.

Phil Hare is a Democrat.

Brian Higgins is a Democrat.

Marcy Kaptur is a Democrat.

Mark Kirk is a Republican.

Blaine Luetkemeyer is a Republican.

Lucille Roybal-Allard is a Democrat.

John Sarbanes is a Democrat.

Zachary Space is a Democrat.

Dina Titus is a Democrat.

John Yarmuth is a Democrat.

2 Republicans out of 18.

But I'm sure you're right that "Bush" is behind this.

Hah! The captcha is wiretap!

You're right. So I did:

Congressman xxx -

... I write to you regarding two concerns with legislation recently reintroduced in the House Judiciary Committee: HR 1966, known as the Megan Meier Cyberbullying Prevention Act.

The act, sponsored primarily by Congressman Linda Sanchez (D-Calif.), seeks to protect children who use the Internet and are active on social networking sites such as MySpace and Facebook. It is named for Megan Meier, a 13-year-old girl who committed suicide in October 2006 after an adult female allegedly posed as a 16-year-old male and harassed Meier online. The full text of the bill is available via the THOMAS search engine at http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:H.R.1966, and information on Megan Meier is available via Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megan_Meier.

Sir, HR 1966 would unreasonably and unnecessarily expand the power of the federal government. Harassment is already a crime at the state level, and state legislatures can easily amend their laws to include online behavior if they feel it necessary. Online harassment that crosses state or national boundaries is not, in my opinion, an issue that the federal government needs to address at this time.

But more serious is the bill's potential chilling effects on First Amendment rights to freedom of expression. Under the bill, "cyberbullying" is defined as "any communication, with the intent to coerce, intimidate, harass, or cause substantial emotional distress to a person, using electronic means to support severe, repeated, and hostile behavior ..." But what constitutes "substantial emotional distress," and is it really something we want federal prosecutors and federal judges trying to hammer out? Worse yet, what if a judge finds, e.g., that a political party's Web site contains content that "causes substantial emotional distress" to members of the opposite party?

The federal government's time and money are best spent on securing our nation's borders, economy, and energy supply -- not determining whether someone is a "cyber bully." Moreover, Americans have a fundamental right to express themselves freely as long as that expression does not endanger others; we do not, and should not, have the right to be sheltered to ideas and beliefs that may offend us. I hope that you will vote "No" on HR 1966 if it should be submitted to the House of Representatives for a full vote.

Might want to try taking a look at what Jefferson had in his library: http://catdir.loc.gov/catdir/toc/becites/main/jefferson/88607928.toc.html

U.S. Federal law actually provides a great deal of protection for digital signatures and authentication methods in a variety of contexts. See the Digital Signature and Electronic Authentication Law (SEAL) of 1998 (Fulltext) for financial institutions, or more broadly the Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act (Fulltext).

(Not a lawyer, just an interested citizen)

U.S. Federal law actually provides a great deal of protection for digital signatures and authentication methods in a variety of contexts. See the Digital Signature and Electronic Authentication Law (SEAL) of 1998 (Fulltext) for financial institutions, or more broadly the Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act (Fulltext).

(Not a lawyer, just an interested citizen)

You are correct. There's no shortage of Middle Eastern material already on the Internet ETCSL, Library of Congress, CDLI all have collections of cuneiform documents from Sumeria, Akkadia and Babylonia. It would have been child's play to collect all of that and add it to the collection.

They might well do so, in future. The standings in the league table are merely the starting point. But, yes, because of who is doing the starting, it IS no surprise that American and British researchers would concentrate on texts closer to home, particularly as there's going to be a national incentive to prioritize home-grown stuff above museum pieces. Especially if *cough* some of the museums would rather not remind people of what they have.

On the other hand, Middle Eastern countries don't have quite the same fascination with massively ancient cultures, many simply don't have the money or the resources (Iraq being a good example), and even when they DO have these, more than a few of the really early writings from the region are, ummm, elsewhere.

I wouldn't call him a social conservative at all, I think that's inaccurate.

From what I know of his platform, he doesn't believe it's the government's place to decide these things, but if it IS to be decided anywhere in government, it certainly should not be at the Federal level. He believes in state's rights - that doesn't mean he is a bigot or or a "social conservative."

What's he doing sponsoring the Federal Sanctity of Life Act then?

Sanctity of Life Act of 2007 - Declares that: (1) human life shall be deemed to exist from conception, without regard to race, sex, age, health, defect, or condition of dependency; and (2) the term "person" shall include all such human life. Recognizes that each state has authority to protect the lives of unborn children residing in the jurisdiction of that state .

Amends the federal judicial code to remove Supreme Court and district court jurisdiction to review cases arising out of any statute, ordinance, rule, regulation, or practice, or any act interpreting such a measure, on the grounds that such measure: (1) protects the rights of human persons between conception and birth; or (2) prohibits, limits, or regulates the performance of abortions or the provision of public funds, facilities, personnel, or other assistance for abortions.

So Mr. Will "never vote for legislation unless the proposed measure is expressly authorized by the Constitution" Ron Paul is like most Republicans: a selective strict Constitutionalist.

Here's what the actual stimulus law says on the topic :

US Geological Survey

For an additional amount for ''Surveys, Investigations, and Research'', $140,000,000, for repair, construction and restoration of facilities; equipment replacement and upgrades including stream gages, and seismic and volcano monitoring systems; national map activities; and other critical deferred maintenance and improvement projects.

Although when I looked for the source here it says $200M instead..

Anyways, I don't see the controversy, those things need public funding, and that's what it's about, they won't magically fund themselves, and they do cost money.

Not all that 17% goes to CEOs, there are salaries for many jobs, and that advertising creates jobs too. Government doesn't create new jobs or new wealth, it can't. I guess "fair" might be the day you or I reach the point that some young kid decides we are of no value and should be put down.

I'd love to hear more examples of the government running things efficiently. Katrina? The Big Dig? Highways and bridges to no-where? Iraq? Mogadishu? (to be fair), Challenger? Columbia? If you are a bit right minded and at least honest, here is a good list, including documentation about waste in the Medicare program.

Stupid expired search result pages. Bill permalink: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d111:s.00778:

H.R. 875 promises to do for farming what this bill would do for internet safety.

Wrong. This bill was introduced April 1st as S.778 to the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.

THOMAS link: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/D?d111:10:./temp/~bdcFpU::|/bss/|

Here's Rockefeller's press release: http://rockefeller.senate.gov/press/record.cfm?id=311060&

Run, don't walk, to call your senators.

That was actually the previous introduction, in 2007, which died at the end of the last Congressional session. This reintroduced one is here. It was introduced by the same person, though, so no substantive disagreement with your post.

The 2007 version had 30 cosponsors, who were 27 Democrats and 3 Republicans. The 2009 version has 17 consponsors so far, who are 15 Democrats and 2 Republicans. So I wouldn't say it's hugely bipartisan, especially since one of the few Republicans in both cases was Republican-with-an-asterisk Ron Paul (Jeff Flake is the other).

The Thomas link you give shows that the 2007 version was passed out of subcommittee in 2008 by a 7-3 vote. I'd be curious who the votes on each side were. By which I mean, of course, I want the names of those 3 fellows.

According to Thomas it was introduced by a Democrat.

But, sure, Republicans can sign on to bills that restore the rule of law to the USA, too.

I wonder where they find all that AIDS?
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/faid/faidfrquery.html

That doesn't even make sense.

Lots of what they have is already accessible anyway:

http://www.loc.gov/library/libarch-digital.html

Yes, they did. Accuweather had their pet senator Santorum(yes, he's good for more than bizarre comments about homosexuals) sponsor S.768. This would have forbidden the NOAA from providing publicly funded data to the public.

"Pretty sure the slavemasters had spears, swords and whips whereas the slaves had none of these"

You're right. And the slaves in the American South didn't have those weapons either. The point being that guns had nothing to do with the maintenance of slaves in the old south. If you do some research here http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/amlaw/lwjc.html you'll see the Bill of Rights adoption was not at all related to the question of slavery.

A much more interesting read can be found here: http://www.usconstitution.net/consttop_slav.html where you'll see that the 2nd Amendment and the slavery question have no intersection.

Or do some googling and see for yourself.

Actually, pushing back is a good idea.

Very true. But informing oneself fully about the issue in question is even more fundamental - to wit:

I have contacting my senators and congress woman concerning legislation that might make it difficult to have community and personal gardens (House and Senate bills HR 875 and S 425).

Having an active interest in both community gardening and organic farming, I spent a modest amount of time reading the text of these and other bills related to the recent food-safety debacles (like HR 814 - ref http://thomas.loc.gov/), and reading analyses from respected pro-consumer food safety advocates (eg http://www.foodandwaterwatch.org/food/foodsafety/background-on-h-r-875). It quickly became clear that there's been a bit of a rush to judgement by some people about just what's in these bills.

I understand that the last few years (heck, the last several decades) may have made many of us prone to hair trigger paranoia wrt govt/corporate quid-pro-quos. But breathless panic doesn't serve our personal or public interests any better than ignornace or willful denial.

To bring this back to the original topic, I'm glad KEI is pursuing this information and I hope that people will press the administration on it, but it does look as though this initial denial of FOIA can be laid at the feet of a longtime civil servant's overenthusiam for the rubber stamp, and not current Executive policy. I believe that the truly important part of this story will be to see how the Obama administration reacts when made explicitly aware of the issue.

Page 488 of the ARRA:

(b) STUDY AND REPORT ON AVAILABILITY OF OPEN SOURCE HEALTH INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY SYSTEMS.
(1) STUDY.
(A) IN GENERAL. - The Secretary of Health and Human Services shall, in consultation with the Under Secretary for Health of the Veterans Health Administration, the Director of the Indian Health Service, the Secretary of Defense, the Director of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, the Administrator of the Health Resources and Services Administration, and the Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, conduct a study on -
(i) the current availability of open source health information technology systems to Federal safety net providers (including small, rural providers);
(ii) the total cost of ownership of such systems in comparison to the cost of proprietary commercial products available;
(iii) the ability of such systems to respond to the needs of, and be applied to, various populations (including children and disabled individuals); and
(iv) the capacity of such systems to facilitate interoperability.
(B) CONSIDERATIONS. - In conducting the study under subparagraph (A), the Secretary of Health and Human Services shall take into account the circumstances of smaller health care providers, health care providers located in rural or other medically underserved areas, and safety net providers that deliver a significant level of health care to uninsured individuals, Medicaid beneficiaries, SCHIP beneficiaries, and other vulnerable individuals.
(2) REPORT. - Not later than October 1, 2010, the Secretary of Health and Human Services shall submit to Congress a report on the findings and the conclusions of the study conducted under paragraph (1), together with recommendations for such legislation and administrative action as the Secretary determines appropriate.

I'm planning on using this to justify why we're applying for ARHQ research funding for implementation of a non-CCHIT certified product... we're just trying to help them research open source options. ;-)

I assumed there was some sort of API anyway, I assumed thats what sites like opencongress.org were using:

http://www.opencongress.org/

Sort of. Thomas outputs all of it's bill data in XML and all URLs are in a nice predictable form(okay, not so nice). It's basically a big REST API in it's own right. Quite easy to parse.

An easier to use API would be an improvement, but congress already puts it out there and makes it quite simple to take and use. What I really want to see, is some sort of standardization of state legislatures. In the organization I work for, state legislation has to all be pulled by hand. Lots and lots of man-hours.

You'd be surprised by the ridiculous amount of pointless bills that are submitted in the House in the Senate.

I only just looked into it recently, and I was shocked! I'd love to see some real statistics, but probably a large percentage of all bills are things like:
  "recognize So-and-So for their great contributions to This-and-That,"
  "recognize Sponsor's-Home-Sports-Team for their great season,"
  "rename building XYZ to So-and-So Memorial XYZ"

So I ask: WHY?
What the hell are we paying for?
Don't we have more SERIOUS problems now?

If legislation related to essential issues (e.g. financial crisis, energy crisis, education almost-crisis, etc) isn't being agreed upon, then they better keep talking about it until they figure it out! And until that point, I don't want to see any more pointless, frivolous bills.

Check it out: go to the Library of Congress site and search for bills sponsored (not necessarily co-sponsored, though) by a senator or congressman*
http://thomas.loc.gov/bss/d110query.html

* the 'man' in 'congressman' refers to 'human' -- its definitely not 'congressperson'

So is a Macintosh computer, which has a built in screen reader which anyone can activate a "specialized device" that are "available only by prescription to people with a qualifying disability"? No of course not. Yet it has text to speech able to read books or anything else for that matter.

As I read the statute, PDF is not a "specialized format". If a PDF file is encrypted and its access control section has "read aloud" turned off, and a PDF reader passes the text of the PDF to NSAccessibility, the PDF reader becomes a circumvention device distributed in violation of the DMCA.

The makers of talking book players are happy to sell the devices to anyone who wants one, disabled or not.

Sure, you can buy the Digital Talking Book player. But you can't activate your device without the NLS authorization number, and you can't get one of those without an examination by a "competent authority".

Not at all, any person with a disability impacting their ability to read has a plethora of avenues that they can use, most of them better than Kindle.

Take a look at:

http://www.loc.gov/nls/

Note the sentence - "specialized format exclusively for use by blind or other persons with disabilities."

Here's a photo of the specialized format I'm talking about.

Also you don't need a prescription to get hold of a tactile interface.

But you do need proof of disability from a "competent authority" to get hold of a Digital Talking Book Player.

Note the sentence - "specialized format exclusively for use by blind or other persons with disabilities."

Here's a photo of the specialized format I'm talking about.

Also you don't need a prescription to get hold of a tactile interface.

But you do need proof of disability from a "competent authority" to get hold of a Digital Talking Book Player.

How do I acquire such a free audio copy? Do they demand medical proof of blindness?

Apparently so. I wrote another comment that analyzes the statute in question.

It is just so stinking ridiculous that you ask yourself, "how in God's green earth did they EVER get anyone to pay them money to build that thing?"

Uncle Sam?

The stimulus bill contains "an additional amount for `Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy', $16,800,000,000."

Bet they could get some of that.

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d111:s.00436:
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d111:h.r.01076:

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d111:s.00436:
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d111:h.r.01076:

Well I posted an article in rebuttal to your article. Then I attempted to post the actual part of the bill which we were debating (instead of a pdf file 1000+ pages long). However the current library of congress website does not save searches for an extended period of time.

Anyway..

1. goto http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:H.R.+1:
2. click #7
3. search or scroll to TITLE XIII--HEALTH INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

I'll raise you one biased article for another. Then here's the actual relevant part of the bill so people can read it themselves.

How is money to Amtrak going to produce jobs?

Build new trains. Keeps the steelworkers employed, improves our transit... you know. Smart investment.

How does extending unemployment benefits create jobs?

It doesn't. But it keeps the people unemployeed from moving into one of these. Or fuckem, right? ... you know those were named hoovervilles for a reason.

ACORN

Ah yes, ACORN, the freeper boogy man. Booh!!! ACORN!!! BOOO!!! ...scared yet?

I'll agree about birth control though. Even though the number is small compared to everything else--politically it was a stupid, stupid, stupid thing to put into a bill like this. Why provide ammo.