UPDATE: 12/3/08 Change.gov has changed their copyright statement to a Creative Commons attribution license. Read more about it here at FGI.

There is discussion going on at the FGI website about the copyright status of the President-elect's website, Change.gov, as well as the vanishing contents of the website, among other concerns. We at FGI created a standard letter for you to use (see below) if you wish to contact Change.gov and let them know your concerns.

You can email the change.gov website by going to their Contact page at: http://www.change.gov/page/s/contact

(Reposted from Free Government Information.)

On Tuesday, I received several exhortations to vote – via e-mail, Facebook, and other social networking sites. I found it somewhat amusing – since I received most of these exhortations after I voted. I also found it somewhat frustrating, because while voting is arguably the most powerful tool citizens have to engage with their governments, I think people are often ignorant of other ways to be civically engaged.

I should clarify that by "civic engagement," I'm referring to active dialogue with one's government. Political blogs such as DailyKos and Instapundit have hundreds of thousands of subscribers. I'm willing to bet that far more people read political news and blogs than read government publications like the Federal Register - and actually respond to its requests for comments.

I've caught the widget bug, thanks to Daniel Cornwall, who mentioned on Twitter that he found some nifty EPA Widgets.

So, out of curiosity, I did a search for other Government Agency widgets and widgets that use government information (such as those found on Govtrack.us or the Sunlight Foundation website). I found quite a few but I know there must be more out there.

I've compiled a "government widget guide" at my Gov Docs 2.0 wiki page. Please feel free to suggest others by commenting here or on the wiki page.

I thought it would be nice to have a guide so you can quickly browse widgets that you may want to add to your blog or webpage. For example, see my Environmental Law guide (a work in progress, mind you) for ideas!

EconomicRecovery.gov is a new interagency website from the Commerce Department that acts as a resource for the "latest information from government agencies on America’s economic recovery for people to keep their homes, find jobs and protect their savings".

It includes an interactive online forum, "Ask the White House." Various help guides include: "Guide to Avoiding Foreclosure" or "Eating Right When Money is Tight". Good to know!

Bats are indeed scary, night-flying, house-invading, sometimes rabid, and generally Halloween-y little critters.  They're also bug-eating, very beneficial, and some are almost cute.

To learn more about bats, see these sites:

Introduction to Bats (U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service)
http://www.fws.gov/endangered/bats/bats.htm