[sasi] www.openlibrary.org and Internet Archives

[Edyanne Haafke]

Dear Ones,

I am curious here...came across this piece below my signature and have
wondered if anyone who's DB have already utilized any of what's
discussed in this article??  Or if any of these can or are made
available to anyone who's DB??

I'd pulled this article from a mailing list.  Let me know what you think.

Also:  Could I possibly post this piece on my Facebook page somehow??
One problem is this - I have no idea where it's reference came from so
have no idea what to do w/ that....so until I know of it's source, I
probably shouldn't post til get more info on it's source, huh??

Thanks for any input; it's *very* much appreciated!!

 ~Edy~ :)
-- 
Edyanne "Edy" Haafke
Sioux Falls SD
"How far that little candle throws his beams.  So shines a good deed
in a weary world."  -William Shakespeare

Subject: www.openlibrary.org

The Internet Archive: An Untapped Resource for the Blind

by Daniel B. Frye

Today blind people can and do access record amounts of written
information through the emergence of scanning and digitization and
assistive technology. We read newspaper articles, books, and other
written materials using NFB NEWSLINE for the Blind®, the National
Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped (NLS),
Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic, Bookshare, and Audible.com among
other resources. Even when something is not available in an accessible
format, current technology allows relatively easy access to printed
texts. Because of the rapid evolution of access to information, some
may even feel overwhelmed by the array of accessible reading options
now available.

The Braille Monitor has recently learned of another Internet-based
resource that makes more than 1.8 million digital books and other
material freely available to everyone with access to the Internet.
Founded by Brewster Kahle in 1996, the Internet Archive, a nonprofit
digital library based in San Francisco, California, promotes universal
access to knowledge. Although the Internet Archive management team did
not have the needs of blind people in mind originally, they have been
receptive to suggestions for making their vast content accessible to
blind computer users. Toward this end the Internet Archive is
exploring a partnership with the National Federation of the Blind to
digitize and preserve our audio and video files through a grant
application to the Institute for Museum and Library Services, a
federal agency. The Archive is also negotiating with the NLS to use
its disability-verification system so they can provide accessible
formats of copyrighted materials to eligible blind and print-disabled
people in the United States. Moreover the Internet Archive has already
been producing its downloadable collection of books (most older and in
the public domain) in the internationally recognized DAISY format.

According to Linda Frueh, the Internet Archive's regional director for
Washington, D.C., Kahle and his wife established a foundation and
launched the Internet Archive with the goal of recording the entire
Internet. Frueh said that Kahle reasoned, "Here's an enormous, new
technology changing from day to day, and nobody's recording it." Using
Web-harvesting technology, a specially designed computer program that
copies and saves Web pages, the organization has been preserving the
evolving Internet. Kahle began by conducting a bimonthly Internet
crawl. "We have one hundred and fifty billion Web pages archived since
1996," Frueh said. She explained further, "The way people access old
Web pages is through the Wayback Machine, a search engine for all of
the old Web pages archived at <www.archive.org>. On the results page
you'll get a timeline of the various versions of the Web pages for
which you are looking." Historians interested in the NFB, for
instance, could use the Wayback Machine to review the evolution of our
Internet site for the last fourteen years.

Having launched the Internet archiving project, the organization
expanded its goals to digitize other media. Its online library now
posts digital books, music, audio recordings, films, software
collections, and more from its Website. Everything is made available
free of charge. "We never have charged and never will charge for any
of our content. Our goal is to make as much information as possible
available to everyone who wants it; we're not invested in whether we
provide information under our own name or as the behind-the-scenes
resource for other Internet services," Frueh said.

Though much of this additional content may be of interest to blind
people, the greatest benefit to the blind will be the large digital
book collection it has already assembled. The most effective way to
access these digital books from the Internet Archive is to visit its
dedicated digital book Website <www.openlibrary.org>. Though visitors
can reach the collection through the main Internet Archive Website,
Frueh advises that both blind and sighted users who are interested
only in downloading books will find it easier to go directly to the
dedicated digital Website. The NFB is working with the Internet
Archive to help evaluate and maximize the accessibility of its several
Websites. These are clearly growing in popularity with a reported
three million people a day visiting <www.archive.org> and two hundred
and fifty thousand visiting <www.openlibrary.org>.

The Internet Archive's book collection reflects its history of working
with academic institutions, libraries, and government agencies. It has
3,324 books in its children's collection at
<http://www.archive.org/detail/iacl>. For examples of scientific
literature scanned by the Archive from the Biodiversity Heritage
Library, visit <http://www.biodiversitylibrary.org>. The Archive has
scanned over thirty-three thousand items in this collection. Frueh
says that the Internet Archive also has the largest Arabic collection
outside of the Middle East and the Library of Congress. The Internet
Archive digital library dwarfs the NLS digital collection, but Frueh
reports that her organization would be delighted to explore expanding
its partnership with NLS, allowing the national library to make all of
these titles available through its frontline resources.

Readers should know that the Internet Archive, a member of the Open
Book Alliance, opposes the currently proposed Google Books settlement.
The Internet Archive and its supporters believe that the settlement as
currently drafted creates an uneven playing field in out-of-print book
publishing, an obscure area of debate among legal and academic
scholars about one aspect of copyright law. Its objections, however,
have nothing to do with the accessibility provisions and promise of
rapid access to many digital books that the Google Book agreement
would generate.

Blind readers now have another significant resource at our disposal
that will enrich our lives. We can visit the Internet Archive and its
related Websites for study, work, and recreation. The NFB looks
forward to an ongoing and fruitful partnership with the Internet
Archive.