Carl Malamud has led a long hard fight against the processes of government information production. Until reading this post I had not realized the benefits I received from Mr. Malamud’s crusade.
His passion is the ready access to government produced information. The latest endeavor was access to case law. Now his fight is more strategic. He is lobbying to get assigned as the public printer of the United States. In this role he would direct the US Government Printing Office. According to Mr. Ambrogi’s post, Mr. Malamud already has powerful backers. What is more impressive to me is his clear strategy that addresses who publishes case law, how GPO data is presented on the Internet across agencies and provide greater transparency for the GPO itself.
Having succeeded with the SEC database publication of data which resulted in EDGAR, I think Mr. Malamud’s track record makes him an attractive candidate. If he succeeds in getting the job, tracking his success will no doubt be easy to do. For now, check out public.resource.org to find out just what goes on behind the scenes in getting access to publicly available information. As it stands there is access but usability is questionable for some areas. If Malamud directs the efforts of the GPO, I feel confident that access and usability will improve. Perhaps not across the board but then again the government is giant it will take persistence to dress it down once the slaughter is complete.
Constance Ard March 2, 2009
