In 24 hours I’ve heard two news stories that are more or less unrelated except for the overarching theme of content access. Both reminded me of how Access with a capital ‘a’ seemed such a hot-button issue during my first semester in Library school and how in my current daily life it has since come to signify whether or not students can get into a database from off-campus.
The first story was NPR’s coverage of the new ban on photography in the rotunda of the National Archives. Despite the temperature controlled layers of glass separating the Constitution, Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights from damaging environmental factors, and the earlier ban on flash photography, the documents still suffer the effects of short sharp bursts of light from tourists who don’t know how to operate their digital cameras. The ban went into effect today, and although the documents are not, by any means, inaccessible, the price of accessibility is evident in the current and continual degradation of the documents themselves: “The ink on the parchment is so faded, conservator Kitty Nicholson can only read the big print. . . thanks to two centuries of heat, humidity and, yes, bright light.”
The second story that caught my attention was the conviction in Italy of 3 Google employees for violation of privacy laws. In today’s New York Times, Rachel Donadio write:
The case. . . could have sweeping implications worldwide for Internet freedom: It suggests that Google is not simply a tool for its users, as it contends, but is effectively no different from any other media company, like newspapers or television, that provides content and could be regulated.
In Italy, where the prime minister “owns most private media and controls public media”, the issue is clearly politicized and Donadio cites sources who point out that the bureaucratization of the Internet can only stifle free expression.
Access, whether free and unlimited or restricted and controlled, has it’s price.
