The mission statement of the Library of Congress reads: “The Library’s mission is to make its resources available and useful to the Congress and the American people and to sustain and preserve a universal collection of knowledge and creativity for future generations.”
Since its establishment by an act of Congress in 1800, the Library of Congress has become on of the foremost cultural institutions, acquiring and proudly offering a vast wealth of resources to the public which is unmatched anywhere else in the world. It is indeed the largest library collection on Earth with more than 144 million items, including: more than 33 million cataloged books and other print materials; more than 63 million manuscripts; North America’s largest rare books collection; and the world’s largest collection of legal materials, films, maps, sheet music and sound recordings.
Last month the popular global social networking service, Twitter, donated to the Library its entire digital archive of public tweets (2006-present). Twitter reported the acquisition on its blog and the Library on its website. One asks: how does a potentially infinite collection of digital artifacts factor in to the Library’s stated mission of “preserving a universal collection of knowledge?”
Over 100 million users worldwide send more than 50 million “tweets” daily, so this extraordinary cultural database currently numbers in the billions and is continuously growing. The 140-character messages we publish every minute of every day provide an unparalleled barometer of the entire global human population at a specific moment in time over a period of time. Twitterers collectively produce an instantaneous snapshot of the world’s social and cultural milieu. Every tweet preserves the intimate details of one person’s thoughts about his/her status, of where s/he is and what s/he is doing; a whole day of tweets is his/her public bulletin board of firsthand information. Combined these bulletin boards offer a perfect composite depiction of the contemporary way of life across and through time and space.
Tech news website Ars technica acknowledged the Library of Congress’ “turn toward historicism” in their acquisition: “The idea is to better understand the context of a time and place, to understand the way that all kinds of people thought and lived…As twitter continues its march into the mainstream, the service really will offer a real-time, unvarnished look at what’s on people’s minds.”
By acquiring Twitter’s entire public archive, the Library of Congress recognizes these digital artifacts as one whole evolving body of work worthy of inclusion in its ongoing digital preservation project, the National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program. (Click here for the program’s history and initiatives since 2000.) Librarian of Congress James H. Billington said of the transfer: “The Library looks at this as an opportunity to add new kinds of information without subtracting from our responsibility to manage our overall collection. Working with the Twitter archive will also help the Library extend its capability to provide stewardship for very large sets of born-digital materials.”
What do you think of the Library’s acquisition of the world’s tweets? Do they deserve such “stewardship” of our species collective past and future digital heritage? Is the Twitter archive more or less “universal” than other types of cultural heritage? If UNESCO decides to recognize the universal value of digital heritage, would there possibly be such a thing as a World Heritage (Web)Site?
[Culture in Peril is now on Twitter @cultureinperil]
Culture in Peril 
As far as statistical analysis goes and the accessibility of evidence for future research (even near future research), I think it's a good move. We'll be able to make some interesting comparisons, regardless of how telling they are of a larger cultural moment. The LoC stresses the 'research value' of tweets, and I think this value spans enough disciplines that whatever LiLo says on twitter is probably worth archiving with everything else. Since the LoC announced its plans, I've assumed that the Twitter archive would serve as a kind of research sample space.As far as tying that in with UNESCO and cultural heritage, I feel like the problem might be in defining and limiting what is considered digital heritage, as well as in evaluating the longevity of digital media such as Twitter. For me it comes down to two questions: does it really need to be preserved when I can just Google it? And how long will it be Google-able?
I would love to see a UNESCO digital site. Just comb through archive.org and look at key sites at pivotal historical moments. It definitely is a part of humanity's identity. The subjectivity of selection would be no more contentious than UNESCO selecting geographic sites to recognize; in fact, due to the low opportunity costs and tremendous selection material available, the recognition of digital media could be more prestigious than non-digital media.