Browse Congressional Hearings

Checking the site
I always try out a “libraries” search at these sites, and turned up the following interesting tidbit in FDLP Administrative Notes, Feb. 25, 2004.
And not just because of the “Pubic Printer” typo.

How is GPO going to make money at this? [digital distribution] We are here now because the GPO and FDLP were established with a sustainable model that was made many years ago. GPO is charged by law with recovering the expenses for what it does. That broke down several years ago. All of the money that GPO had to move forward has disappeared. GPO has lost tens of millions of dollars.

Bruce James seeks to make GPO work like a business. He never worked in a union environment before. The unions have been some the best partners management has, giving the Pubic Printer unbelievable cooperation, and they are working with management to make needed changes.

10 years ago, GPO tried to charge for information distributed on the Internet, but it cost GPO more to collect the money than was made. So GPO made it free to the general public. This cannot continue. GPO needs to create a business model and bring revenues in the door so it doesn’t have to go to Congress all the time. Bruce James and Judy Russell have met with representatives of the information industry to discuss this issue. Bruce James suggested that GPO must find a way to partner with the information industry and that these partnerships have to protect the Federal Depository Libraries. “This means at the end of the day, whatever we do, they have to get for free.” Industry representatives recognized this as a fact of life if they wanted to partner with GPO. Bruce James would appreciate recommendations from Council on ways GPO can do this that will be acceptable to the FDLP librarians.