deborah | linkage, mostly government information related

Here's another great one from

free_govt_info: "Expect more from ExpectMore.gov". ExpectMore.gov provides performance reports on man government programs. If you want to be depressed, check out the list of programs marked as "ineffective", which includes programs such as Amtrak:

Amtrak's purpose is ambiguous, and the program has been ineffectively managed due to this lack of clarity. Congress has not specified whether Amtrak should: 1) provide alternative transportation nationwide at any cost, 2) maximize ridership, or 3)take a business-based approach focused on minimizing losses.

If it's not obvious, I vote for #1.

Anyway, the search engine is non-existent, but the transparency (we have a moderately effective "Geothermal Technology" program? An adequate "CDC: Sexually Transmitted Diseases and Tuberculosis" program? Only four DoE programs ranked "effective"? Who knew?) is truly awesome.

If you're not reading

free_govt_info, consider it. A few days ago they linked to The American Presidency Project's database of all presdential signing statements. Did you know that George Bush, Sr. felt that "To provide for the minting of commemorativecoins to support the 1996 Atlanta Centennial Olympic Games and theprograms of the United States Olympic Committee, to reauthorize andreform the United States Mint, and for other purposes" impinged on his constitutional authority?

In other linkage, from

openaccess_rss, a hilarious and apt analogy to the current academic publishing model:

I have an ingenious idea for a company. My company will be in the business of selling computer games. But, unlike other computer game companies, mine will never have to hire a single programmer, game designer, or graphic artist. Instead I'll simply find people who know how to make games, and ask them to donate their games to me. Naturally, anyone generous enough to donate a game will immediately relinquish all further rights to it. From then on, I alone will be the copyright-holder, distributor, and collector of royalties. This is not to say, however, that I'll provide no "value-added." My company will be the one that packages the games in 25-cent cardboard boxes, then resells the boxes for up to $300 apiece.

It goes on, getting more painful with every line.

And in incredibly depressing news, judges have been citing Wikipedia in verdicts. Copiously.