Throughout our past, the recording of history and preservation of knowledge has been one of the most essential tasks for anyone involved in academics. Great houses of knowledge and learning have been built and burned. History has burned with them sometimes - We might have had a wealth of knowledge on certain obscure time periods and places if not for the destruction and restriction of their histories. Throughout time, there has been a great war raging between those who write history and those who destroy it for personal gain.

This struggle has been complicated by the invention of the Internet. A tool of knowledge and connection, the Internet has made many things accessible, with affordable journal articles and books right at your fingertips. Not only does the Internet help one access histories, it is in itself a piece of history. With over 1.7 billion websites today[1] and with 59% of the world’s population having access,[2] the Internet has developed to the point that it is an essential part of 21st century history. With such an important part of our heritage, it has become an imperative in the struggle for history to preserve the history of the Internet.

That is the task of one part of the Internet - the Internet Archive (archive.org). Known for its Wayback Machine, the Internet Archive might be one of the greatest libraries ever made. Not only does it have millions of free books, movies and other forms of media, it is responsible for the archival of the Internet.

How is such a task performed? The Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine automatically goes through the Internet with a bot from time to time. People themselves can decide to archive websites by going to the Wayback Machine’s home page. The Wayback Machine has been responsible for the archival of billions of webpages over 20 years. As for the archival of books, TV broadcasts, movies and audio, the Internet Archive has many volunteers responsible for scanning and archiving books, and they work with different collections around the world to build a bastion of knowledge on the Internet.[3]

The Internet Archive is an invaluable source of history. When looking through citations on old Wikipedia articles, many of the links are dead, but have archived versions on the Internet Archive. The Archive keeps free knowledge, available to borrow anywhere. Researchers and students with Internet access can freely browse their huge collection of archived media. One could imagine what would happen to knowledge on the Internet without it - Without the archival of Internet history, all that we would see on the Internet would be what sites look like now. This is a dangerous thing - this means that, when a source of knowledge is removed from a webpage, we might not see it again until it is put up. By making it so that people can only see the current version of a webpage, administrators and corporations can freely twist the window into reality that is the Internet. An example would be UK Minister Dominic Cummings’ blog, which he changed when he claimed he had been warning of pandemics for years. The fact that he changed old lines in his own blog was quickly found out by people using the Wayback Machine.[4] Media is a powerful thing - With something as simple as a change in perspective, our perceptions of reality can be warped.

And what of the Open Library? If that was taken down, access to books and resources would be much harder. One would either have to pay sums of money or physically go to a library to borrow books, which would not be a good idea during the current pandemic. The Open Library gives people a whole world of knowledge at their computers - removing that would be a huge hit to the work of history and the preservation of knowledge.

Such a reality mentioned above would be undesirable for those who seek to build their own truth and knowledge. This reality, however, is fast approaching. Normally, the Internet Archive has waitlists to borrow books - The amount of people allowed to borrow a book at one time is equal to the amount of copies of the book the Archive has physically. However, during the chaos that is the current pandemic, the Archive has created a “National Emergency Library”, suspending waitlists and allowing anyone to borrow a book regardless of the amount of physical copies the Archive has in store. This has caught the attention of major publishers such as Penguin Random House, Wiley & Sons, and HarperCollins, accusing the Archive of “mass copyright infringement”.

In a lawsuit filed last Monday by the publishers, they accused the Archive of having “a profound disregard for the boundaries and balance of core copyright principles”. The Archive’s Brewster Kahle responded with a statement hoping “that this can be resolved quickly”.[5] Earlier, the Archive returned to controlled lending, putting up waitlists again.[6] However, the publishers have not yet responded.

Not only are the publishers attacking the “National Emergency Library”, they are attacking the Internet Archive itself at its base. They express their intentions to take down the Internet Archive and their Open Library - If publishers are doing all they can to stop the activities of the Internet Archive, we must, as seekers of knowledge, push back. Donate to the Archive. Sign petitions. Do whatever you can to stop this attempted erasure of knowledge.

Welcome to the modern battlefield of history.

1. internetlivestats.com/total-number-of-websites/

2. internetworldstats.com/stats.htm

3. archive.org/about/

4. uk.news.yahoo.com/dominic-cummings-internet-knows-youve-122822393.html

5. npr.org/2020/06/03/868861704/publishers-sue-internet-archive-for-mass-copyright-infringement

6. blog.archive.org/2020/06/10/temporary-national-emergency-library-to-close-2-weeks-early-returning-to-traditional-controlled-digital-lending/