News from the Internet Archive
No. 1, 18 June 2012
In this issue, Archive-It’s two hundredth partner, picks from our collection, Brewster Kahle talks about Internet Archive news, and more.
Internet Archive Sues to Stop New Washington State Law
The Internet Archive has filed a federal challenge to a new Washington State law that intends to make online service providers criminally liable for providing access to third parties’ offensive materials.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation is representing the Internet Archive in order to block the enforcement of SB 6251, a law aimed at combatting advertisements for underage sex workers but with vague and overbroad language that is squarely in conflict with federal law.
“The Internet Archive, as an online library, archives the World Wide Web and other digital materials for researchers, historians, and the general public,” said Brewster Kahle, Digital Librarian and founder of the Internet Archive. “We strongly support law enforcement efforts to combat child sex trafficking, but this new law could endanger libraries and other entities that bring access to websites and user-generated content.”
Read the entire press release:
https://www.eff.org/press/releases/internet-archive-sues-stop-new-washington-state-law
From the Digital Librarian and Founder
I was honored to be inducted into the first group of Internet Hall of Fame-ers. We take this as a positive community support for the Internet Archive and my earlier role in helping bring publishing to the Internet. You may read more here: http://blog.archive.org/2012/04/24/internet-hall-of-fame/
In other news, IPv6 is a new Internet protocol that will bring more addresses and other features to the Internet. Adoption has been slow, so the Internet Society declared June 6th IPv6 day and getting websites and Internet service providers to support it. We put up a page at http://ipv6.archive.org for those intrepid souls with a modified logo, does any IPv6 user get the joke? (Note: this link won’t work unless your computer network is configured for IPv6.) For more information, please see http://blog.archive.org/2012/06/06/our-first-step-into-ipv6-world/
—Brewster Kahle
Archive-It’s Two Hundredth Partner
The Archive-It subscription web archiving service recently signed our two-hundredth partner. We are very excited to have reached this milestone and thank all our partners for their support.
Archive-It was first launched in early 2006 and is represented in 43 US states and 15 countries around the globe. The access portal is available at http://www.archive-it.org/. Content can also be indexed into the General Archive at regular intervals.
Partner organizations collect, catalog, and manage their collections of archived content with full text search available for their use as well as their patrons. Content is hosted and stored at the our Internet Archive data centers.
—Lori Donovan
Picks from the Archive
The animal kingdom, arranged according to its organization, serving as a foundation for the natural history of animals : and an introduction to comparative anatomy (1834)
Once upon a time, a time before learned scientists talked about string theory and living in eleven dimensions, there was an age in which we knew about our world with certainty. And in the case of this book, we could list and illustrate those things, even though the oldest photograph in the world wasn’t even a decade old. The book promises “with pictures designed after nature,” and delivers.
http://www.archive.org/details/animalkingdomarr03cuvi
— recommended by Stefano Olieri
The Conet Project—Recordings of Shortwave Numbers Stations
If you thought advances in telecommunication, encrypted email, and other new technologies obviated the need for short wave radio, then it’s time to think again. Here are a few lines from the introduction to this remarkable collection.
For more than 30 years, the shortwave radio spectrum has been used by the world’s intelligence agencies to transmit secret messages. These messages are transmitted by hundreds of Numbers Stations. Why has the phenomenon of Numbers Stations gone almost totally unreported? What are the agencies behind the Numbers Stations, and why are the eastern European stations still on the air? Why does the Czech republic operate a Numbers Station 24 hours a day? How is it that Numbers Stations are allowed to interfere with essential radio services like air traffic control and shipping without having to answer to anybody? Why does the Swedish Rhapsody Numbers Station use a small girl’s voice?
http://www.archive.org/details/ird059
— recommended by Sarah Dillman
Mission Mind Control (July 10, 1979)
“This is the story of a thirty-year search by U.S. intelligence agencies to perfect mind control.” That’s how this 1970 ABC News documentary begins, after an unmistakably seventies musical introduction.
The film, part of the Archive’s FedFlix collection, hasn’t aged well, which is part of its appeal. With no pun intended, what a trip!
http://www.archive.org/details/FedFlix
— recommended by Alexis Rossi
What are your Archive favorites? Please suggest a link or two and a few words about why you appreciate your recommendation to:
—David Glenn Rinehart
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David Glenn Rinehart is an artist in residence at the Internet Archive as well as a cartoonist, composer, filmmaker, musician, and writer. His work’s at http://stare.com/ and elsewhere.
Thank you very much for highlighting the Conet Project box set! I first encountered the recordings back in 2010, and have been making my way through the tracks ever since with increasing enjoyment. A highly recommended listen! 🙂
Anybody know where i can find the gov’t film of the “psychedelic experience” heavily used in this (awesome) news piece?