The Internet Archive needs our help. According to their blog:
You may not know this, but your support for the Internet Archive
makes more than 3 million e-books available for free to millions of Open Library patrons around the world.
Your support has fueled the work of journalists who used our Political TV Ad Archive in their fact-checking of candidates’ claims.
It keeps the Wayback Machine
going, saving 300 million Web pages each week, so no one will ever be
able to change the past just because there is no digital record of it. The Web needs a memory, the ability to look back.
Throughout history, libraries have fought against terrible violations of
privacy—where people have been rounded up simply for what they read.
At the Internet Archive, we are fighting to protect our readers’
privacy in the digital world.
So this year, we have set a new goal: to create a copy of Internet
Archive’s digital collections in another country. We are building the Internet Archive of Canada because, to quote our friends at LOCKSS, “lots of copies keep stuff safe.” [November 29, 2016 by Brewster Kahle]
Find out how you can help on the Internet Archives Blog:
Help Us Keep the Archive Free, Accessible, and Reader Private
How many of you remember "the good old days" pre-Internet when we spent hours in libraries and archives scrolling through microfilm in a dark room? I sure do!
Now, thanks to The Internet Archive, (part of the WayBack Machine) microfilm is coming right to your computer! Here is their description of the focus of this project:
As books become old and begin to fall apart, librarians depend on
microform to preserve their content for the future. Tiny photographs on
long strips of film (microfilm) or small cards of film (microfiche) are
all that remain of hundreds of thousands of documents that have
disintegrated over the last century. While microfilm is perfect for
storing and protecting this material, it is a does not allow for much
access. In following its mission to provide universal access to all
human knowledge, the Internet Archive is teaming up with libraries all
over the world to begin digitizing microfilm and microfiche. The goal
is to get as much content off the shelves and online.
The books in this collection are from a variety of libraries including the University of Chicago Libraries, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, the University of Alberta, Allen County Public Library, and the
National Technical Information Service.
You may also want to view the newspapers that have been digitized from microfiche.
So don't wait, click over to https://archive.org/details/microfilm and let your fingers do the walking!
Internet Archive suffered a major setback this morning when a fire broke out at its San Francisco office, causing an estimated $600,000 in damages. The good news is that no one was hurt and no data was lost. Some physical materials were in the scanning center and were lost.
As their blog post states "This episode has reminded us that digitizing and making copies are good strategies for both access and preservation. "
The Archives, which includes the wonderful Wayback Machine, will need to repair or rebuild the
scanning building.
Here is how you can help
- Funding. Your donations will help rebuild the scanning capabilities in books, microfilm, and movies.
- Scanning. The employees affected by the fire will need continued digitization work at an alternate location while they recover.
