Federal News Service:
Federal News Service (http://www.fnsg.com/) is a subscription-based library of government-related transcripts. Federal News Service was founded in 1985 in response to an urgent and growing need for immediate verbatim transcripts of government briefings, speeches, press conferences and other newsmaker events to the many domestic and international news bureaus in Washington, D. C. Quickly, FNS assumed a broader mandate and began to transcribe Congressional hearings, National Press Club speeches, and significant events such as conferences at Brookings Institution, Carnegie Endowment and broadcast interviews with opinion leaders.
We pay thousands of dollars to use this service not necessarily because we want to take the transcripts directly but rather to find them faster. For every transcript we find on FNS, we need to find another source (with the exception of Press Conferences & Stakeouts). We do this primarily because it is unhelpful to provide the general public with links to a subscription service if they wish to read the entire transcript.
There are only three FNS log-ins for the entire organization to share. Your supervisor will provide you with the log-in name and password.
Collecting Media Transcripts from FNS:
- Click "My FNS" on the far right of the top toolbar.
- Log in using one of the usernames and passwords:
- cornelia/votesmart2
- mia/votesmart3
- Click "Advanced Search" under the search box
- Select the "Interviews" box.
- Enter the past two days' date range.
- Open each TV or radio transcript in a new tab.
- Open the Public Statements page in admin for the official quoted in the transcript.
- Enter into Admin. Take questions and answers for interviews and debates. Begin with BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT and end with BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT.
- Go to the website of the TV channel or radio station (see listed below). Find either the exact transcript, or, if no transcript is available, the video and cite this for the URL. Be sure you are citing the correct URL. Ask your supervisor if you should take transcripts for which there is no direct source.
- Date: Date of the interview, located at the top of the transcript
- Location: Unknown, unless otherwise stated
- Type: Interview
- Source: Leave blank
- URL: URL of the official transcript or video located on the network cite
- Title: (Network) "(Show)" - Transcript Use the exact network name as shown in the list below
Lexis Nexus
Also in 2005, we changed our usage of Lexis (www.lexis.com).
Lexis Documents – TV Transcripts and Congressional Hearings
Pre-2005, we collected transcripts of television shows and congressional hearings directly from Lexis. Threatened with a suit, we revised our collection of these documents. Additionally, any documents that we were able to identify as coming from Lexis (due to key formatting hints) were taken down from our website. These documents are still in admin, but are listed as inactive.
TV Transcripts now come directly from the websites of a selection of television shows. They are located using National Journal’s Early Bird section and by searching each website.
Congressional Hearings now come directly from the websites of Congressional Committees or from the Government Printing Office (http://www.gpoaccess.gov/) Opening statements and testimony are generally available earlier than full transcripts. There is a sizable delay in the posting of hearings on the GPO website (3-6 months or more), but it appears some hearing transcripts are only available this way. It would be a good idea to set up backlogging these hearing transcripts as a yearly project for a couple of summer interns.
General Information about Lexis
Project Vote Smart currently has six Lexis id’s (two in the research department). The id’s are listed on cards and in a document in the Speeches folder on the Research drive. It’s important to keep track of the cards, because we are only allowed to have one person access Lexis through each id at a time.
We renewed our contract for two years in September 2005. Our contract with Lexis is a sizable expense. Each time the contract comes up for renewal, we reconsider the value of their services.
