In response to the Internet Archive losing their recent court case, I want to (first off) tell you how ridiculously amazing the Internet Archive is and (secondly) suggest that you donate to them. This was kind of their idea, but I am so glad for the suggestion.
Books
There is a massive middle-ground of books that are both under copyright and out of print, so basically totally unavailable. Public Domain in America is hopelessly stalled, with books from the 1920s just entering the public domain this year (I want to say Great Gatsby came in last year?). On the other hand, take any book from the 90’s that wasn’t a hit best seller and try to find it on Amazon. It probably doesn’t have a Kindle book (the publisher is unwilling or unable to digitize it, and what sort of market would there be for that book anyway?) and if you want to buy a hard copy, it’s through some random reseller and may be at an extreme/unreasonable markup. Likely, and often, it’s not available at all. The popular term for these is “orphaned works”, but the better term (IMO) is “hostage works”.
The Internet Archive buys up tons of these books, scans them in, and then lends them out. The process is called “Controlled Digital Lending”, and they get to do it because they take those physical books and put them in a big warehouse somewhere, so the same way that a library can lend out a copy of their books, the Internet Archive lends out copies of the books that they own. They also OCR the books and allow full text search on them.
This is absolutely incredible. The Internet Archive right now is what I always thought Google Books was going to be.
Take a concrete example: Bobby Seale’s A Lonely Rage. The 1978 autobiography of the head of the Black Panther Party, who went on trial in Chicago and was bound and chained in the courtroom. On Amazon, it’s a hardback copy that costs $289. On the Internet Archive, you can borrow it for free for an hour.
Or I just saw that MLB The Show 23 has a great storyline on the Negro Leagues, and they recommended a book. How do you figure out if you want to read an academic book about the Negro Leagues without spending $20? Borrow it from the Internet Archive.
Webpages/The Wayback Machine
In addition, if you’ve previously heard of archive.org, it’s probably because of the Wayback Machine. They scrape tons of webpages, then host not only the current version but all of the history on their website. I find it most useful for going back in time and figuring out what someone shared that now 404s. Like a bunch of aerial panoramas taken from a kite!
Or take a website that’s live today and go back in time to see what it looked like many years ago. How much was the National Merit Scholarship worth at Harvey Mudd when I went to college? (I know you’re supposed to do “What did CNN.com look like on September 11th?”, but let’s be honest, this is what I actually look for.)
Software
Beyond that, they host playable interactive early software. Three great examples:
The Oregon Trail (there’s more strategy to it than when you were in 5th grade)
The Fool’s Errand (it’s a really great puzzle game)
Glider (did anyone else every play this one?)
Audio
They also host a huge amount of free internet audio. Here is the Umphrey’s McGee show from the Vic in Chicago in 2007 that I went to with my friend Caroline. (When you let people tape, your shows live forever!) Here is the Horne Section BBC Radio show from Alex Horne, creator of Taskmaster.
How you can help
Anyway, support the Internet Archive. Here are some of their recommended steps:
Use the Internet Archive
Become a patron
Curate and upload things to them
Tell other people that the Internet Archive exists
But most of all, take care of yourself first