Hi everyone,
During today's installment of the E-Government for All virtual conference
(www.egov4all.org), I conducted an hour-long online chat with with U.S.
Public Printer Bruce James, CEO of the U.S. Government Printing Office.
For those of you who missed it, here's a copy of the transcript:
1) Amy Ladd: Chat with U.S. Public Printer Bruce James
2) Amy Ladd: Welcome. Submit your questions to egovinfo@groupjazz.com
3) Amy Ladd: To continue to see the most up to date transcript, hit your
refresh button.
4) Andy Carvin : Hello, everyone: Welcome to our virtual chat with Bruce
James, Public Printer of the United States. Mr. James, welcome to the
E-Government for All conference!
5) Bruce James: Hello. Great to be here.
6) Andy Carvin : I thought we could start by learning a bit more about
you. Please tell us about your professional background and how you came to
be selected as Public Printer of the United States.
7) Bruce James : I bought my first printing press at 11, from there went
to RIT's School of Printing Management and Sciences. My first job on
graduation was with Keller-Crescent in Evansville, Indiana. As a young
printing salesman, my job was to convince businesses in far off cities to
entrust us to print their most important documents such as annual reports.
In the process, I learned that noone bought printing, what they were buying
were solutions to information dissemination problems. In 1970, I took the
knowledge that I had gained, moved to California and began to use technology
to build information businessess that operated around the world. After
building 13 of these businesses, I decided to retire when I turned 50, which
was in 1993. When the call came from the White House in December 2001, the
only one more surprised than my wife was me. It was a tremendous honor to be
asked to head the Government Printing Office and a real challenge. Now after
nearly a year in the job, I feel like I am finally getting my arms around
the problems and opportunities involved with the dissemination of
information for the Federal Government.
8) Andy Carvin: Could you tell us briefly what are the primary
responsibilities of the US Public Printer
9) Bruce James : To take charge of and manage the U.S. Government
Printing Office, which provides printing and information products and
services for the Congress, Federal Agencies, the courts and the American
public.
10) Andy Carvin: In your mind, what is the primary impetus for government
publishing going digital - convenience, cost-cutting, etc.?
11) Bruce James : By the very nature of Government information, much of
it is designed for reference not reading and having a searchable digital
database makes it easier for the public to find the right information
quickly.
12) Andy Carvin : As you may know, we have nearly 1000 people from 70
nations registered for this conference, and some participants have submitted
questions for you...
13) Andy Carvin : Connie Acton, who teaches computers to senior citizens
at West Contra Costa Adult Education, would like you to comment on the
following: "My personal concern is that government agencies are requiring
Adobe Acrobat for reading and downloading documents. This is a cumbersome
method and I would like to see it abolished. I realize that this may not be
in your domain but it is my immediate concern."
14) Bruce James : In the sweep of history, this is transitional but it
currently allows us to present information electronically as you see it on
paper. We also provide a text equivalent on www.gpoaccess.gov.
15) Andy Carvin : A group of librarians at the University of
California/San Diego have a question for you: In recent years GPO has
shifted away from depositing documents with Federal Depository Library
Program (FDLP) libraries and has increasingly taken on new responsibilities
of persistent access and long term preservation. As you recently pointed
out, GPO is "at the mercy of Congress" for such non-revenue-generating
activities. Today there is a growing number of libraries that are hosting
collections of digital information. In addition there are new technologies
(e.g., OAI, RSS, RDF) and software (e.g., dSpace, Eprints, Greenstone) that
make it possible to set up a distributed digital depository system.... With
this in mind, what are your thoughts about using the existing infrastructure
of FDLP libraries and the new technologies to restore the responsibility for
collection building, public access, service, and long term preservation to a
distributed, diverse group of libraries that are already dedicated to doing
this?
16) Bruce James : We are spending a great deal of time considering the
technological possibilities and constantly looking for partners to handle
key aspects of the growing FDLP Electronic Collection not already covered
under the permanent public access commitment for GPO Access. There are a
number of pilot projects underway with publishing agencies and our
depository library partners to safeguard portions of the collections at risk
and to ensure just the type of distributed permanence you suggest.
17) Andy Carvin: Could you tell us a bit more about Ben's Guide, which
you mentioned in your keynote?
18) Bruce James : Ben's Guide to U.S. Government is the educational
component of GPO Access designed to familiarize various age groups with the
operations of Government and the information available through GPO Access.
It has proven so popular, that an adult version is under construction and
should be available in the future.
19) Andy Carvin : Jennifer Hill asks: If going digital means that certain
groups will not have access to government documents, there is a conflict
between the values of efficiency and cost-effectiveness versus individual
rights to government information. How can the GPO help resolve this
conflict?
20) Bruce James : In the old days there were only two choices between
visiting a depository library and purchasing your own personal copy from the
GPO. Today, many more Americans can access information over the Internet
than was ever possible before as evidenced by the more than one million
consumer accesses to GPO Access everyday.
21) Andy Carvin : But as you note in your keynote, within five years
about 95% of govt documents will be published digitally... Yet it remains to
be seen if all Americans will have Internet access by then - especially
those with limited literacy skills, etc.
22) Bruce James: We have 1,280 Federal Depo
23) Andy Carvin : A related question goes to the issue of fee-based
services. According to the Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call, you recently
said at a library conference that the GPO might have to re-examine charging
fees for certain types of government-produced content. Could you elaborate
on this?
24) Andy Carvin : (It appears that part of your last response got cut
off, so i'm reposting it: bjames> We have 1,280 Federal Depository Libraries
across the country in almost every congressional district, each equipped
with public access work stations and trained government information
specialists available to assist in their use. In addition, there are
thousands of other public libraries with similar public access terminals.)
25) Bruce James : We are committed to retaining free public access to
government information through our Federal Depository Library Program. The
GPO has always maintained a sales program to sell government documents to
those who want to buy them. My comments to the library community concerned
novel ways that we might be able to continue the sales program in the
digital world.
26) Andy Carvin : Julia Wallace of the Government Publications Library at
the University of Minnesota offers the following comment/question on this
subject: While GPO's sales program has been expected to support itself with
sales of government publications, the Federal Depository Library Program
(FDLP) has always been supported through appropriations in order to provide
information to the public. You are combining some elements of these two
parts of GPO for efficiency, and that is laudable. However, we need to be
sure that does not somehow blur the distinction between the missions of the
two. Being "at the mercy of Congress" can also be looked at in a more
positive light. The FDLP is a program supported by Congress because they
have a commitment to inform the public. We want to be sure GPO is our
partner in making that case to Congress, and preparing requests to Congress
for the funding that will continue to support the program. When you do that,
you will have the support of librarians and citizens from across the
country. Can you say a little about how your proposals for generating
revenue fit in with this?
27) Bruce James: Right on. Great comments. We appreciate your support and
share your concerns.
28) Andy Carvin : Erik Baekkeskov asks: Does the US printing office use
outside contractors for its online initiatives, or is the information hosted
on government-operated servers? If both, what are the approximate shares of
information processed by each?
29) Bruce James : All of the materials in GPO Access are maintained on
GPO servers. Other materials in the FDLP electronic collection are
maintained on partner sites or other agency websites. For security purposes
we don't comment further.
30) Andy Carvin : Michael P. Watkins of the University of Wisconsin
Oshkosh's Forrest R. Polk Library asks: I was wondering what emphasis is
going to be placed on archiving digitized government publications for future
use. Since the technology , particularly the software used to create
electronic documents, seems to be market driven, what provisions can be
taken to insure that sometime in the future say thirty or forty years down
the road that the information on these documents will still be accessible?
31) Bruce James: This is a major initiative we are working on today with
other government agencies.
32) Bruce James:
33) Andy Carvin : Bob Walter of Pittsburg State University asks the
following: Would you please comment on your perception of government
information as a "public good" versus an "economic good"?
34) Bruce James: These policies are set by Congress and it's our job to
implement their will through the public laws of the United States.
35) Andy Carvin : Greg Benson, Executive Director of the NYS Forum,
offers the following: The keynote provides an excellent overview of how GPO
is now addressing the migration to the virtual arena (and does give some
projections as to short-term future). I'd be interested in your long term
vision of GPO within the larger context of e-gov. In short -- and with full
understanding of the unpredictability of technological developments -- where
do you see all of this ending up 15-20 years from now?
36) Bruce James : I think about this all of the time and have the good
fortune because of my position to be able to discuss these issues with those
who will be the digital architects of the future. It's likely that within
the next 20 years that the nature of the information that we are saving for
posterity will be in completely different form than it is today. I expect
that historians 100 or 200 years from now looking back at the early part of
the 21st century will find it much more useful to be able to view the
proceedings of Congress as they actually took place, to be able to switch to
the Washington Post, and see how CNN was reporting those events. Our
challenge over the next few years is to build the platform that will allow
this to take place.
37) Bruce James: Thank you all for participating in this historic virtual
conference.
38) Andy Carvin : On behalf of the organizers of the conference and our
many participants, I'll like to thank you again for taking the time for
chatting with us today. We truly appreciate your participation!
39) Andy Carvin : Note to conference attendees: For participants who'd
like to discuss this conversation further, I'd like to invite you to visit
the Bruce James Keynote discussion in the Week 1 section of the conference.
We want to hear from you! Thanks again for being with us.... -ac
*******************************
Andy Carvin
Senior Associate
Benton Foundation
acarvin@benton.org
www.benton.org
www.egov4all.org
www.digitalopportunity.org
www.digitaldividenetwork.org
www.edwebproject.org/andy/blog/
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