On this page are the assignments for Thursday of Week Four. 

DEADLINES: You should have your assignments completed by next Monday at 7 p.m.

Public Records

In a democracy, government and its officials work for the people, the public. The records of government officials therefore should be public.

The public votes for – “hires” – those officials. The public pays them. The public needs to have information to judge them. The public also should have information that's available to the government, such as birth certificates, death certificates and some financial records.

Public records are the records of governments made available to the people.

Examples of public records are:

• Voting records of politicians
• Donations given to politicians
• Court cases
• Birth and death certificates
• Financial records of non-profit organizations

Most of this information is not available through Google.

Many people are surprised to find how much information is available to them. They shouldn’t be. Government information belongs to the people.

The Internet has the ability to make information available as never before. Because of this, some officials would like to see access to public records curtailed.

1) To understand these issues more in depth, please read a brief presentation.

4-Public

This presentation, like some others, was constructed somewhat differently and may not work in browsers besides Explorer. If you have trouble with the above link, try:

4-Public05

Take some of the links from the presentation. Perhaps look up a non-profit organization you know. Check out your name at ancestry.com. (You may have to register at some locations.) Or look up a California birth certificate. Please send me an email detailing what you found. You get more credit for more sites visited.

2) I would also like you to visit an important web site that has been an early voice in keeping information free and accessible: The Electronic Frontier Foundation at http:// www.eff.org.

Please read and roam at this site and then send me an email detailing what you found. The rest of your time should be spent with your research paper. Thanks.

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