Community Turns Out to Celebrate Promise of Democracy’s Library
Posted: Sat Jul 12, 2025 4:45 am
Friends and supporters of the Internet Archive gathered October 19 at the organization’s headquarters in San Francisco to celebrate the launch of Democracy’s Library.
Plans to collect government documents from around the world and make them easily accessible online were met with enthusiasm and endorsements. Speakers at the event expressed an urgency to preserve the public record, make valuable research discoverable, and keep the citizenry informed—all potential benefits of Democracy’s Library.
“If we really succeed — and we have to succeed — then Democracy’s Library might become an inspiration for openness in areas that are becoming more and more closed,” said Internet Archive founder Brewster Kahle.
The 10-year project aims to make freely available the massive phone number database volume of government publications (from the U.S. and other democracies), including books, guides, reports, surveys, laws and academic research results, which are all funded with taxpayer money, but often difficult to find.
To kick off the project, Kahle announced the Internet Archive’s initial contributions to Democracy’s Library:
United States .gov websites collected since 2008;
Crawls of the U.S. state government websites;
Digitized microfilm and microfiche from the U.S. Government Publishing Office, NASA and other government entities;
Crawls of government domains from 200 other countries;
50 million government PDF documents made into text searchable information.
It will be a collaborative effort, said Kahle, calling upon others to join in the ambitious undertaking to contribute to the online collection.
Plans to collect government documents from around the world and make them easily accessible online were met with enthusiasm and endorsements. Speakers at the event expressed an urgency to preserve the public record, make valuable research discoverable, and keep the citizenry informed—all potential benefits of Democracy’s Library.
“If we really succeed — and we have to succeed — then Democracy’s Library might become an inspiration for openness in areas that are becoming more and more closed,” said Internet Archive founder Brewster Kahle.
The 10-year project aims to make freely available the massive phone number database volume of government publications (from the U.S. and other democracies), including books, guides, reports, surveys, laws and academic research results, which are all funded with taxpayer money, but often difficult to find.
To kick off the project, Kahle announced the Internet Archive’s initial contributions to Democracy’s Library:
United States .gov websites collected since 2008;
Crawls of the U.S. state government websites;
Digitized microfilm and microfiche from the U.S. Government Publishing Office, NASA and other government entities;
Crawls of government domains from 200 other countries;
50 million government PDF documents made into text searchable information.
It will be a collaborative effort, said Kahle, calling upon others to join in the ambitious undertaking to contribute to the online collection.