Date: Wed, 13 Aug 2003 09:40:11 +0530
From: Subbiah Arunachalam
Dear Fred and members of bytesforall and Lis-Forum lists:
Here is an excellent initiative from the USA. Do you think that we in India
should mount such an effort and make audio recordings of all Supreme Court
proceedings available to the public free of cost? Best wishes.
Arun
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Subject: US Supreme Court Cases Get a Fresh Hearing (fwd)
SUPREME COURT CASES GET A FRESH HEARING
Since 1994, Northwestern University's OYEZ project has made audio of US
Supreme Court cases available in a "streaming" format that requires a
continuous Internet connection. Now the project is converting the files to
MP3 format, which permits downloading, file sharing and use on portable
devices. The MP3 files are free and sharable, if users agree to credit OYEZ
and limit usage to noncommercial purposes. Jerry Goldman, the project's
director, hopes to make available with search functionality all of the
approximately 6,000 hours of the Supreme Court recordings since 1955, when
taping of oral arguments began. "The whole idea is to build a digital
commons, make accessible materials that are really valuable in a free and
open society," he said. Particularly with controversial cases such as
affirmative action and abortion, "there's so much more information and
emotion in the human voice that a transcript can't do it justice," explained
Goldman.
SOURCE: Washington Post; AUTHOR: Phuong Le
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A41812-2003Aug10.html
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