#FreeTHOMAS - Sunlight Foundation

abernard102@gmail.com 2012-06-06

Summary:

“Does information about legislation belong to Congress or to the American people? This basic question is at the heart of a fight over how Congress releases data about what it does. Americans increasingly use the Internet to make sense of the world around them, and open data opens up Congress in a way that's never been possible before.  In the pre-YouTube pre-iPhone pre-Amazon days, Congress built a website -- THOMAS -- to let citizens follow legislation from home. THOMAS was revolutionary ... in 1995...  Congress doesn't share the data behind THOMAS with anyone. Instead, web developers must reverse-engineer the website to transmute its pages into usable data, like assembling a puzzle from thousands of ragged pieces without a picture on the box as a guide. This slow, difficult, and time-consuming process isn't perfect, but it's responsible for how most Americans follow what's happening in Congress.  The better approach is for Congress to publish the data behind THOMAS. Government regularly does this elsewhere, and ‘bulk data’ is responsible for clever new uses of information developed by citizens, journalists, and even the government itself.  In upcoming days, the House is likely to pass legislative language that pays lip service to releasing THOMAS data while putting the idea in a deep freeze. This would be a disaster. But it's not too late. Tell your representative that you want Congress to publish legislative data now.  PS. For more information and the latest developments, go here.”

Link:

http://sunlightfoundation.com/blog/2012/06/04/freethomas/

From feeds:

Open Access Tracking Project (OATP) » abernard102@gmail.com

Tags:

oa.new oa.data oa.comment oa.government oa.usa oa.legislation oa.advocacy oa.best_practices oa.crowd oa.lay oa.thomas

Date tagged:

06/06/2012, 11:32

Date published:

06/06/2012, 07:32