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http://www.theverge.com/2013/9/17/4741292/broken-pentagon-fax-machine-rejecting-foia-requests-media

The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) is supposed to guarantee that the press gets access to public records within a timely fashion, and has been instrumental in gathering documents related to the recent National Security Agency revelations. But the existence of the Act isn't enough to make reporters' lives easy.

Until recently, the most efficient method for making FOIA requests to the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) was via fax. It was speedy and reliable, unlike snail mail and the registration-required web portal. About two weeks ago, MuckRock reports, the fax machine stopped working and won't be back up any time soon. "We would hope that it is back up sometime in October, but could extend into November," a spokesman said.

The OSD handles records related to the Secretary of Defense and Joint Staff, and does not process requests for the entire Department of Defense. Even so, it's still managed to build up a substantial backlog of FOIA requests: more than 1,000 awaiting processing. Perhaps the broken fax machine will help.

Between this and the "secret court" determining that the cell phone monitoring is perfectly legal because none of the major cell phone companies have complained about doing it, I feel perfectly safe and comfortable living in 1970s USSR.

 d-usa wrote:
Until recently, the most efficient method for making FOIA requests to the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) was via fax. It was speedy and reliable, unlike snail mail and the registration-required web portal.

I'm less concerned with the broken fax machine and more concerned with why it was faster than email via the web portal.

By the length of time those repairs take this may be some sort of temporal based fax machine technology. Would explain being faster than email.

 daedalus wrote:
Between this and the "secret court" determining that the cell phone monitoring is perfectly legal because none of the major cell phone companies have complained about doing it, I feel perfectly safe and comfortable living in 1970s USSR.

Excellent Comrade! Pass the Vodka!
We have the surveillance, the crappy economy, now even the crappy music.

Just not the hair cuts! NOT THE HAIR CUTS!!!!







NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!

There was me thinking that the OSD would have a large enough budget to just, y'know, go out and buy another fax machine.

What a grossly obvious fob off.

You know, I work for the federal government.

Our fax/printer breaks on a regular basis.

It's a multi-week project to get it fixed every time...

 d-usa wrote:
It's a multi-week project to get it fixed every time...

Why? What purpose does your fax machine serve?

 daedalus wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
It's a multi-week project to get it fixed every time...

Why? What purpose does your fax machine serve?

I imagine it involves a copying machine and genitals.

Surely you could just email it, or talk about it on your phone, and the NSA will get your request and pass it along

 Soladrin wrote:

I imagine it involves a copying machine and genitals.

I... I walked into that one, didn't I?

 daedalus wrote:

 Soladrin wrote:

I imagine it involves a copying machine and genitals.

I... I walked into that one, didn't I?

Walking into genitals is nothing to be ashamed of.

It's sometimes a pretty ballsy act though.

Oh dangly parts, how you brighten my day.

I thought that was where the Sun don't shine?

No, the sun dont shine on your ass. The gentleman and his friends are totally OK

 daedalus wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
It's a multi-week project to get it fixed every time...

Why? What purpose does your fax machine serve?

We usually use it to fax and copy things.

 d-usa wrote:

 daedalus wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
It's a multi-week project to get it fixed every time...

Why? What purpose does your fax machine serve?

We usually use it to fax and copy things.

You knew what I was trying to ask. My point is, if it's mission critical, it'll get done much faster than if it's just something that gets used sometimes, or has something you can use as a workaround.

 Ouze wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
Until recently, the most efficient method for making FOIA requests to the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) was via fax. It was speedy and reliable, unlike snail mail and the registration-required web portal.

I'm less concerned with the broken fax machine and more concerned with why it was faster than email via the web portal.

I think the registration part of the portal must scare some Journalists away from using the web portal. That, or I completely misunderstood the sentence.

 daedalus wrote:

 d-usa wrote:

 daedalus wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
It's a multi-week project to get it fixed every time...

Why? What purpose does your fax machine serve?

We usually use it to fax and copy things.

You knew what I was trying to ask. My point is, if it's mission critical, it'll get done much faster than if it's just something that gets used sometimes, or has something you can use as a workaround.

I work in a hospital. We use the fax machine to get medical records from outside facilities, our doctors fax consultations to their attendings and fellows, a lot of our inter-agency communication (such as on-call rosters, pharmacy notes, etc) are done via fax.

And then the whole actually being able to copy things we need to copy.

Our work about is to march our butts to another floor, as long as their machine is working.

 daedalus wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
It's a multi-week project to get it fixed every time...

Why? What purpose does your fax machine serve?

The length of time, more than likely has to do with contracted maintenance. In which case the "maintenance" servicing agency is always booked out a couple of weeks, unless it's a "Class 1 Priority" work order (which is reserved for A/C in Texas, and Furnaces in Alaska)




I would bet that the article claims it is quicker to do faxing than even the "email system" not because the email system is slow, but rather journalists are probably very hesitant to "register" on such a site... Which I would have thought that a journalistic agency would have created a Mickey Mouse alias for everyone in the office who covers that sort of thing to use.

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:
Which I would have thought that a journalistic agency would have created a Mickey Mouse alias for everyone in the office who covers that sort of thing to use.

That's probably a felony.

Haha can't believe it.

*Ugh*. Having worked for multiple support desks now where legacy support for old systems is a necessary evil... I *STILL* don't understand the last-gasp refusal to die of the humble fax machine.

We have now had email for decades. Multi-function devices that can perform a copy and then immediately email the copy to you don't just exist, they're pretty common, and getting cheaper all the time. Meanwhile a newer machine is going to be ten times more reliable than the fax that must be at least ten years old because hey, who buys a new fax machine these days?

They're not even cheaper - because offices use separate printers and copiers anyway the maintenance costs are only extra. As will any phone charges be over the compared cost of email because the Internet access cost of your average business is at fixed rate, and unless you think "innovation" means a round of applause coming from a tavern, you're already experiencing and paying for way more traffic by email than fax anyway.

*shorter version of rant* - WHY DO PEOPLE STILL USE FAX MACHINES?! It does not make any business sense.

Because they think its cheaper to hold onto the old piece of crap for as long as possible?

I work for the government, too.
We're approaching the end of the fiscal year, so what little money we have left is spent only on "mission critical" items. And, at the start of the fiscal year, it's usually the same situation thanks to our wonderful Congress that hasn't passed a budget on time for about as long as most of us have been alive. So, yeah, in out building, as long as we have one working fax machine, we won't replace a broken one until we have the money to spare.
Now, on the other hand, I'm sure the Pentagon has an extra fax machine SOMEWHERE in the building they can use to temporarily replace the broken one.

Why continue to use fax machines? Because not everyone has a scanner to scan documents with, and not everyone wants to give their email address away when emailing documents. Also, a fax machine is not connected to any internal network, so it could be a security thing.

 Tannhauser42 wrote:

Why continue to use fax machines? Because not everyone has a scanner to scan documents with, and not everyone wants to give their email address away when emailing documents. Also, a fax machine is not connected to any internal network, so it could be a security thing.

Sometimes a very simple machine that is based on decades old technology that works by plugging into a simple phone jack that can be easily kept separate from all other parts of your network is a lot more reliable than a giant enterprise system composed of how many individual networks and components.

At our job, when systems crash and the entire network goes down, we can still fax orders and results from department to department.

Or sometimes the people using the fax machine are stuck in the 1970s and not advancing any time soon. We have several customers who refuse to use our lovely, simple to use order form because email's too much of a pain for them (never mind the many emails they send me regularly bitching about one thing or another) every time the fax machine clatters it means a tedious 15 minutes or so of manually copying the data from their illegible chicken scratch onto the excel spread sheet we update and send them several times a week.