Living without the Freedom of Information Act

Something I found interesting here. It is a post by Danah Boyd of Apophenia

“Transparency is Not Enough”

At Gov2.0 this week, I gave a talk on the importance of information literacy when addressing transparency of government data:

“Transparency is Not Enough”

I address everything from registered sex offenders to what happens when politicians don’t like data to the complexities of interpretation.  In doing so, I make three key points:

1. Information is power, but interpretation is more powerful
2. Data taken out of context can have unintended consequences
3. Transparency alone is not the great equalizer

My talk is also available on YouTube if you prefer to listen to a different version of the same message (since my crib is what I intended to say and the video is what actually came out of my mouth).

 And Congress has not even  been able to pass the Freedom of Information Act. (Same thing happened with the other past 6 Congresses.)

So third world. Sorry.