VoxGov Federal

Tabbed

Overview

VoxGov Federal is a platform that aggregates a broad range of official and ephemeral information resources issued by U.S. Federal Government agencies and and individual representatives. VoxGov Federal focuses on the regulatory process (lawmaking, rulemaking, and compliance). Though much of the information aggregated by VoxGov Federal is available in VoxGov's core product (VoxGov for Education [1]), this distinct platform adds significant regulatory content and offers a different lens on government process.

https://federal.voxgov.com [2]

Provider:

voxgov [3]

Posted:

Feb 27, 2019 12:46pm

Updated:

Jul 19, 2019 12:35pm

Source

CRL reviews are based on independent research. Information is researched by CRL staff and other specialists at CRL libraries. See CRL Review for additional source notes.

Collection Content

Subject Areas:

Science, Engineering and Technology

Social Sciences

Resource Types:

Government publications

Government records

Laws and regulations

Legal documents

Major Languages:

English

- Denotes data sourced directly from publisher

Terms and Provider Details

Provider:

voxgov [3]

Website:

https://www.voxgov.com/ [4]

Main Address:

1115 Broadway

Suite 1200

New York, NY 10010

United States

CRL Review

Collection Content:

VoxGov Federal is a discovery platform focused on the regulatory process of the U.S. government. VoxGov harvests, aggregates, and indexes a broad range of official and ephemeral information issued by U.S. Federal Government agencies and representatives. VoxGov Federal is distinct from VoxGov's core product, Voxgov for Education [1], though much of the content contained in the Education product is also present in this platform.

As of February 2019, VoxGov Federal reportedly contains more than 45 million documents.This includes more than 30 million social media posts, 5 million "official releases" from agencies and government representatives, and 1.2 million Congressional documents and official legislation. Notably, VoxGov Federal includes mearly 12 million regulatory documents, including "Primary Regulatory Documents" (notices and rules, presidential proclamations, Executive Orders), Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) documentation, and "Third Party Info."

This last category of content distinguishes VoxGov Federal from the core Education product. A search for the term "caribou," for example, pulled up 101,904 documents in Federal, while Education resulted only in 15,220. The difference in results appear to be principally driven by the inclusion of additional regulatory documentation in Federal, most notably the third-party "Regulatory Comments" indexed from regulations.gov [5]. On the search described above, comments made up 85% of the results.

Delivery:

VoxGov Federal is a platform built on the infrastructure of VoxGov's core product (Voxgov for Education [1]). As such, this review focuses only on the distinct features of VoxGov Federal.

Unlike VoxGov Education, Federal does not offer a simple ("Google-like") search interface, but instead presents users with a full display of results and available filters under the rubric of "Due Diligence." Users may search and filter results by date, content type, source/agency, branch of government, political party, and demographics. Federal offers additional filters such as Code of Federal Regulation (CFR) citation and Regulatory Information Number. Federal also offers to filter results by "Mentions," including names of government agencies, national associations (such as the NRA), accounting and law firms, corporations and non-profits, and unions.

To further aid navigation, Federal allow users to filter results into four principal areas of the regulatory process: Due Diligence, Lawmaking, Rulemaking, and Compliance. The Due Diligence filter focuses the user's attention on the latest news and information related to compliance, legal oversight, and bureaucratic activities. The Lawmaking filter page provides access to all information related to members of Congress as well as the activities of government agencies. The Rulemaking section, meanwhile, appears to direct users to documentation and news that relates to all aspects of lawmaking and regulatory processes. The Compliance section features reports and documentation related to: Decisions, Opinions, and Orders as well as Directives (as identified by VoxGov Federal). Finally, users can browse by the "Trending" filter, that reveals the most popular: keywords, hashtags, names, organizations, and places.

As with Education, VoxGov Federal provides an array of tools to interpret and manage search findings. A particularly useful feature is the indexing of regulatory documents that allow users to see the relationships between proposed rules, supporting documentation, comments, and related agency documentation.

Finally, VoxGov Federal offers a "Trending" filter similar to VoxGov Education to show trending words, names, hashtags, organizations, and places.

Strengths and Weaknesses:

VoxGov Federal offers a valuable and distinctive service for researching the regulatory process. This platform builds on the aggregation and indexing strengths of VoxGov, and adds useful features for researchers interested in the regulatory process. Rulemaking and compliance once legislation is signed into law are important factors, and this product does much to bring the disparate strands of information together.

This product might be of greatest interest to law scholars, but it has applicability for social scientists andhistorians interested in current and historical events.

The site lacks contextual information about sources and is bereft of any "help" documentation, which may leave users uncertain as to the scope or comprehensiveness of information contained in the product.

Reviewers:

James Simon & Maria Smith, CRL

Sources

Sources for this review include information publicly posted or obtained directly from the publisher; data collected by CRL staff and specialists at CRL libraries; and examination of the digital collection when possible. Other sources are noted where cited. CRL continues to gather additional information on this resource and to solicit critical assessment.

CRL Offers & Status

Status	Current	Description
CRL Flagged	yes	Potential interest to CRL community
Offer Pending	yes	Currently a candidate for CRL offer
Active Offer	no	Currently offered for purchase or new subscription
Trial Access	no	Available for trial
Renewal Offer	no	Currently offered for renewal
Expired Offer	no	Past offers
Inactive / Declined	no	No longer under consideration by CRL
Reviewed by CRL	yes	Evaluation available by CRL and community
Special Access	no	Member-only access available for a limited time

The complete offer and activity details for this resource are only available to CRL members.

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