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GPO Access - Free After Six - contact Sen. Ford and Rep. Rose
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TAXPAYER ASSETS PROJECT - INFORMATION POLICY NOTE
CROWN JEWELS CAMPAIGN - Federal Register and Congressional Record
July 23, 1994
- Senator Wendell Ford and Representative Charlie Rose are
asked to support "free after six" for the GPO Access
program. The two members of congress chair the Joint
Committee on Printing in alternating congresses. Ford is
the current chair, and Rose is expected to take over in
January 1995.
- Representative Rose can be reached via the Internet at:
crose@hr.house.gov
- GPO Access is an online program available through the
Internet. Products include a WAIS server for the Federal
Register and the Congressional Record, a locator system, and
a "Federal Bulletin Board," with more than 5,000 files from
18 federal agencies. The product line is expected to grow
substantially.
- Prices for GPO Access products are expensive for individuals
or occasional users. The Congressional Record and the
Federal Register are priced at $375 each for an individual
users. Corporate users can buy either product for as low as
$9.40 per user.
- Congress has required GPO to fund the program through user
fees. GPO's budget is considered part of the congressional
appropriation, and under the terms of budget agreements,
congress must significantly cut its budget. GPO has borne a
significant share of the legislative branch's cuts.
- TAP and other groups are asking GPO and Congress to approve
"free after six," a program which would allow free searching
of the entire GPO Access product line after 6pm and on
weekends. Policy would allow GPO to charge fees during
prime time on weekdays, while giving individuals complete
access to the date collections every evening and weekend.
- Please contact Senator Ford or Represent Rose in support of
"free after six." Senator Ford and Representative Rose can
be reached by fax at 202/224-1176. Representative Rose can
be reached by email at crose@hr.house.gov.
thanks. jamie
A letter to Ford and Rose from TAP follows:
-------------------------------
July 22, 1994
Senator Wendell Ford
Chair, Joint Committee on Printing
United States Congress
Washington, DC 20510
by fax: 202/224-1176
Representative Charlie Rose
Vice Chair, Joint Committee on Printing
United States Congress
Washington, DC 20510
Internet: crose@hr.house.gov
Dear Senator Ford and Representative Rose:
The GPO has recently announced prices for the new GPO Access
program, which we have objected to, on the grounds that they
create barriers for ordinary citizens -- the amateurs of the
political process -- to obtain access to the GPO Access product
line. For example, we don't think that many individuals will be
able to pay $375 per year for access to the federal register or
the congressional record ($750 for both).
On the other hand, we know that GPO must raise money through user
fees, and that sales of information to businesses are important
for funding the GPO Access program.
We have asked Michael DiMario to consider a "free after six"
program, whereby the agency would make the entire GPO Access
product line available for free from 6 pm to 8 am EST on weekdays
and all day on weekends. [This is the time period when the
Department of Commerce Economic Bulletin Board (EBB) is available
at a deep discount.] Mr. DiMario has been open to this
suggestion.
We believe that if the information is available "free after six"
it will not cost the GPO many of its paying subscriptions, since
it is inconvenient for organizations to wait until after 6pm.
Moreover, we believe that the "free after six" program will help
"market" the daytime services for which the GPO will charge fees,
since data users will have the opportunity to explore and learn
about the service. As you may know, decisions about computer
research services are often influenced by the more junior staff
members who are more technically sophisticated, and these are
precisely the persons who will get the opportunity to "test
drive" the product in the evenings. We believe the marketing
benefit to GPO will thus be substantial. Indeed, private sector
firms have long recognized this. That is why American Online,
Compuserve, Prodigy, LEXIS and many other services offer free or
deeply discounted trial uses. But even more important than the
future financial success of GPO is the public's access to these
important databases, and the free after six program will
radically improve the ability of "amateurs" in the political
process to become better informed.
We believe that if the GPO Access information is available "free
after six," it will be a much different program than if any fee
is charged. The reality is that huge numbers of Americans will
not use the service if any fees are charged, in part because
school children, families and many businesses may never take the
time to establish a line of credit with GPO. Thus, a
"compromise" which results in low fees, such as are charged for
the EBB after 6pm, will improve matters, but it will not allow
the Congress to truly provide more democratic access to this
information. Fortunately, we believe that the difference in
revenues between an off-peak discounted service and an off-peak
free service will be trivial, in terms of revenue for GPO, so the
trade-off between revenue and public access is very good for the
free access, even without considering the marketing benefits.
[You might ask the Department of Commerce, which runs the EBB, to
confirm the fact that its deeply discounted off-peak sales
generate a small amount of that program's revenue.]
We would like you to write a letter to GPO in support of the
"free after six" proposal. We would also appreciate your
assistance in getting some information from GPO. In particular,
we would like the following information regarding the current
number of subscribers to the GPO program as well as current
subscribers of the paper versions of the Congressional Record and
the Federal Register.
1. Please provide information on the total number of
subscribers for the Federal Register and the Congressional
Record, broken down by those who buy the service from GPO
Access, and those who subscribe in paper formats.
2. For the information in (1), please break down how many
subscribers there are for each state in the United States.
3. For the information in (1), please break down the
information according to subscriptions by individuals,
subscriptions by libraries, subscriptions by non-profit
organizations, and subscriptions by businesses.
4. Please provide the number of subscribers to the GPO Federal
Bulletin Board, broken down the state, and if possible, the
type of subscribers (i.e. individual, business, library,
etc).
5. What is the total revenue in user fees from the FBB?
Thank you very much for your help on this issue.
Sincerely
James Love
Taxpayer Assets Project
P.O. Box 19367, Washington, DC 20036
internet: jamie@tap.org
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