Democracy’s Library exists as a project of the Internet Archive to make government publications and information broadly accessible and available. But Democracy’s Library is about more than collections – it is also about building community. 

What we heard

• There are many efforts, but no common map. Libraries, journalists, technical teams, and community groups are all doing serious work, but no one holds a full picture of what exists, what has been saved, and what is already gone.
• Stewardship is more than storage. Bytes can survive while public access disappears. Metadata, documentation, interfaces, and sustained human expertise are part of preservation.
• This work must evolve from emergency response to durable infrastructure. Rescue work has been indispensable and is also unsustainable. Triage can’t substitute for the maintenance.
• While policy exists, enforcement and access do not. Records laws are on the books, yet information still gets removed, obscured, trapped in unusable formats, or placed behind paywalls. Web harvesting restrictions aimed at AI crawlers can also block public interest archiving.
• Who is government information for? Local government records, climate data, health data, and disaggregated data that lets communities see themselves in the record were all named as especially vulnerable. Broadening participation beyond specialists was a recurring call.

What participants told us

Responses to the post-event survey were very positive:

• 93% said the Forum strengthened connections across organizations
• 89% identified opportunities for collaboration or shared initiatives
• 83% learned about tools, workflows, or preservation methods used by others
• 98% planned to stay in contact with people they met
• Roughly 20 respondents described a specific collaboration or initiative they intended to pursue

Democracy invites participation; democracies require it.

One concrete outcome of the Forum is Preservation of Government Information: A Call to Action, which argues that public access to government information cannot be left to chance. Individuals and organizations are invited to sign in support.

Coming together in community and common purpose helps to drive our work forward. We hope you will plan to join us at our upcoming event, Democracy’s Library: Tools for Participation which will take place at the Internet Archive Headquarters and online on Wednesday, October 21, 2026. We will celebrate what we have accomplished and look to continue this work together.