"Free"dom of Information?
Dateline: 05/23/99
Updated: 6/4/99
Add the Freedom of Information Reform Act of 1986 (the FOIA) to the Internet and what do you get? The most open Government in history. But, is the cost of "free" about to go up?
On May 18, the National Technical Information Service (NTIS) opened a Web search site called "gov.search" promising to provide easy, one-stop access to all Government information online. Great idea, huh? Trouble developed fast, however, as early visitors to go.search discovered this "access," to be anything but "free." With your good credit card, you could order a 1-day "try out" of gov.search for $15. Which, made the $30, 1-month "subscription" look like a huge bargain. A year's worth of access carried a $250 tab. Plus, these fees came on top of charges already assessed for some online government information.
Notice: As of 6/4/99, the free-use period for Gov.search has been extended through June 8. Hurry!
To people used to hearing the Clinton Administration's long-standing promise to make Government data on the Net more accessible to more people, gov.search's charges came as quite an unacceptable shock. At first, the Commerce Department defended the fees, but by the next day, the original "pay-as-you-search" gov.search page had been removed and replaced by this gov.search page offering the service free until June 1. A "free seminar" according to the NTIS.
Is It Worth Paying For?
Give gov.search a free
test-drive while you can. Choose to search either the "Special Collection,"
"NTIS Archive," or "World Wide Web." Searching in "All
Sources" returns far too many non-related hits. The "World Wide Web" search
returns links to US State and even foreign government web sites mixed in with US Federal
sites. (It simply searches the ".gov" domain, which you can do in the advanced
search mode of most free search engines.) Without a way to filter out non-US Federal
sites, most searchers will find gov.search no improvement over existing sources.
Otherwise, gov.search is fast and returns no more dead or misdirected links than any other
search engine. (Gov.search uses the Northern Light
search engine.)
Bottom line? Anything gov.search finds for you, can be found via many free Web resources. Without some significant enhancements to what it offers now, few users will choose to pay for gov.search. If the Fed does decide to charge for access to this service, look for prices to be substantially lower than first proposed.
Web Searching Hint
Whether it remains free or not, you can do the same kind of search
"gov.search" does by using AltaVista and
entering "what you are looking for" + domain:.gov in the search
box. (See AltaVista Help for
even more searching tricks.) Most of the major search engines allow you to specify a
domain through their "advanced" search pages, as well. You still have to cull
out the state and foreign links, but you're not paying $30 a month to do it.
Related or Just Plain Useful Sites
National Technical Information Service
United States Information Agency
Free Government Web Search Tools, from your About.com Guide.
Should the Government Charge for This Service?
Share you opinions on my new Public Opinion Forum.
