Tuesday, March 13, 2018

Sunshine Week & Freedom of Information Day

"Fun with FOIA" @ https://vimeo.com/133790152

Sunshine Week is a national initiative driven by the American Society of News Editors (ASNE), that seeks to educate on the importance of open government and the dangers of government secrecy. National Freedom of Information Day falls during Sunshine Week, on or near March 16th of each year, and highlights the benefits of government transparency. In 1965 the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) was enacted to provide the public/the people with the right to request access to records from any federal agency. The FOIA also requires that federal agencies proactively post publicly (online) certain categories of information.

Books on the Freedom of Information Act @ Armacost Library:

          

Organizations interested in government transparency: 

Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF)
Non-profit organization defending civil liberties in the digital world. Founded in 1990, EFF champions user privacy, free expression, and innovation through impact litigation, policy analysis, grassroots activism, and technology development.

Open the Government
Coalition of government groups, environmentalists, journalists, library and consumer groups, labor, and others united to make the federal government a more open place in order to ensure integrity and accountability in the operation of our governing institutions, foster confidence in representative government, and support our democratic principles.

Public Citizen
Non-profit, non-partisan organization that seeks to ensure that all citizens are represented in the halls of power. They have challenged the abusive practices of the pharmaceutical, nuclear and automobile industries, and are leading the charge against undemocratic trade agreements that advance the interests of mega-corporations at the expense of citizens worldwide.

Sunlight Foundation
National, nonpartisan, nonprofit organization that uses civic technologies, open data, policy analysis and journalism to make our government and politics more accountable and transparent to all.

FOIA'd data and information:

Archive Team
Collective of rogue archivists, programmers, writers and loudmouths dedicated to saving our digital heritage.

Muck Rock
Non-profit, collaborative news site that brings together journalists, researchers, activists, and regular citizens to request, analyze, and share government documents, making politics more transparent and democracies more informed.

National Security Archive
Investigative journalism center, research institute on international affairs, library and archive of declassified U.S. documents.

Happy Sunshine Week! 🙃

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