Blog

The following interview with African folklore scholars Laura Gibbs and Helen Nde is part of our Vanishing Culture series, highlighting the power and importance of preservation in our digital age. Selections from Laura Gibbs’ “A Reader’s Guide to African Folktales at the Internet Archive“ Crafting and sharing folktales by word or performance is a long-standing tradition on … Read more

More than one hundred supporters gathered on the steps of the Internet Archive last Saturday to rally support for our library in the face of a judgment that threatens the digital future of all libraries.  Digital rights advocate Lia Holland of Fight for the Future read from the letter signed by Neil Gaiman, Naomi A. Klein, Chuck Wendig, Karen Joy Fowler, Cory Doctorow and more than 1,000 additional … Read more

How can public interest values shape the future of AI? With the rise of generative artificial intelligence (AI), there has been increasing interest in how AI can be used in the description, preservation and dissemination of cultural heritage. While AI promises immense benefits, it also raises important ethical considerations. WATCH SESSION RECORDING: https://archive.org/embed/generative-ai-meets-open-culture In this … Read more

We want to hear from you: How does the appellate court’s decision affect your reading or research? What does it mean to you that 500,000+ books are no longer available in our lending library? Please share your story: https://forms.gle/JgwWLxhvKgAZdV9T7

A post in the series about how the Internet Archive is using AI to help build the library. Freely available Artificial Intelligence tools are now able to extract words sung on 78rpm records.  The results may not be full lyrics, but we hope it can help browsing, searching, and researching. Whisper is an open source tool … Read more

We are disappointed in today’s opinion about the Internet Archive’s digital lending of books that are available electronically elsewhere. We are reviewing the court’s opinion and will continue to defend the rights of libraries to own, lend, and preserve books.  Take ActionSign the open letter to publishers, asking them to restore access to the 500,000 … Read more

After spending years researching the history of U.S. copyright law, Jessica Litman says she wants to make it easy for others to find her work. The law professor’s book, Digital Copyright, first published in 2001 by Prometheus Books, is available free online (read now). After it went out of print in 2015, University of Michigan Press … Read more

San Francisco City Hall from east end of Civic Center Plaza In a stunning show of support for libraries, late yesterday afternoon the San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted unanimously to support a resolution backing the Internet Archive and the digital rights of all libraries. Supervisor Connie Chan, whose district includes the Internet Archive, authored … Read more

Join journalist MARIA BUSTILLOS for a virtual book talk with author & professor of law JESSICA SILBEY for her latest book, AGAINST PROGRESS. Watch recording:https://archive.org/embed/against-progress When first written into the Constitution, intellectual property aimed to facilitate “progress of science and the useful arts” by granting rights to authors and inventors. Today, when rapid technological evolution … Read more

Libraries are full of stories in a variety of formats from picture books to large print, audiobooks to ebooks, and more. But there’s so much more to the story. To celebrate the American Library Association’s National Library Week 2023, we are introducing readers to four staff members who work behind the scenes at the Internet Archive, … Read more