CAMPAIGN TO DEFEND PERSONAL WEB PAGES AT THE UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM

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Update - 26th March 2005:

Sue has, for now, moved those sites deemed by the School of Humanities to be "non-academic" to her own site, www.sue.be. However, her home page on the University server now has direct links to the pages on her own domain, so there is little difference in practice for those surfing the site.

She is STILL awaiting the outcome of her Formal Grievance which is currently being considered by the Dean. This was submitted in August 2004! Apparently there is no time limit for the resolution of grievances submitted by University staff (student ones have to be dealt with in two weeks, we believe). You can read the entire Grievance here. (Warning: not for the faint-hearted!) Some of the issues have now been resolved and Sue looks forward to reaching an acceptable compromise - but when?

These campaign web pages are among those which have been moved to www.sue.be, but Nat Queen's mirror site is also still running on http://www.queen.clara.net/web_cam paign/.

The previous policy, which has been in force for the last decade, is pretty much contained in the following documents, which have now been superseded:

1. Registering for Personal Web space: Personal Information Providers
   (this page was formerly at http://www.helpdesk.bham.ac.uk/support/webauthors_pip.htm)
2. Application to become a World Wide Web Personal Information Provider
   (this page was formerly at http://www.helpdesk.bham.ac.uk/support/webauthors_pip_qa.htm)
3. Notes for Personal Information Providers
   (this page was formerly at http://www.webmaster.bham.ac.uk/pips_notes.html)
4. Guidelines for Information Providers (NB: Last revised 1996!)

The New Policy

• Link to the official application forms etc.
• Version of new policy issued to staff on 5th February
• Intermediate version of new policy (Version 3, apparently)
• Intermediate version in Word format
• Earlier version of proposed new policy (now superseded, see above)

Why we oppose the new policy

• Why the proposed policy is rubbish

• Other academic institutions' policies on personal websites

• Whose bright idea was this?

• Some sites which are threatened by the new policy
  (You will now find virtually all of these blocked if you try to access them from outside the University of Birmingham.)

• What you can do to support this campaign

• We'r e in the news! Read the report in the Guardian, Thurs 11th March 2004

Interesting Links:

The Electronic Frontier Foundation
A San-Francisco based site which describes itself as follows:
"The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) was created to defend our rights to think, speak, and share our ideas, thoughts, and needs using new technologies, such as the Internet and the World Wide Web. EFF is the first to identify threats to our basic rights online and to advocate on behalf of free expression in the digital age."

Paul Vigay's site
Various idiosyncratic links, some of them concerned with civil liberties and privacy. In the past it has linked to this site.

The Icon Bar
Site dedicated to RISC OS, whose News Archive gives us a mention at: http://www.iconbar.com/newsarchive/ 432/

Drobe Launchpad
Yet another RISC OS site which mentions us.

JISC Legal Information Service

"Academic Freedom, Filtering, Censorship and Institutional Reputation"
Paper given at the JISC one-day seminar on 23rd September 2003, by Andrew Charlesworth, Senior Research Fellow in IT and Law Director, Centre for IT & Law, School of Law/Department of Computer Science, University of Bristol. This paper is in .RTF format; also available as a Powerpoint presentation here.

Last updated: 26th March 2005