Internet Archive’s digital librarian, Brewster Kahle, leads a tour through the Physical Archive.Visitors who came to the open house at the Physical Archive in Richmond, California, on October 20 were curious. They wanted to learn about the range of items collected, the process of preservation, and the staff responsible for making it all happen. As people toured the space and observed the various media being saved, many also expressed support and reverence for the Internet Archive’s work to provide universal access to all knowledge.VIEW PHOTOS FROM THE EVENT“I really care about preservation and digital culture. Places like this are important to maintaining and building the society we want to live in,” said Sidney Le, a film archivist who now works in logistics, of his third visit to the Physical Archives. “It’s good to see that people here are taking seriously the idea of holding on to culture and preserving it.”A Closer Look at CollectionsLiz RosenbergLiz Rosenberg, donations manager for the Archive, welcomed the crowd in Richmond and provided directions for the evening.“Thank you all so much for coming to our open house, where we can showcase the amazing preservation work done in the Internet Archive,” she said. “Here, you will see many special collections and interesting preservation demos showcasing the work that our incredible team does to preserve, digitize, and make accessible collections to patrons from all over the world.”Rosenberg invited visitors on tours of the facility with Internet Digital Librarian and Founder Brewster Kahle, as well as a chance to see the Scribe book digitization workstation, a presentation on dehumidification of books, and observe microfiche digitization.For visitors in the special collections room, Caslon Kahle pointed out new donations on display including Romanian history documents from the estate of professor Keith Hitchins, climate records from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and materials from more than 9,000 Freedom of Information Act requests filed by San Francisco’s legendary researcher Ernie Lazar.Why These Collections MatterIvy Shaw and Max Buettner, both doctoral students at University of California, Berkeley, came to the event because they said they are big fans of the Internet Archive.Buettner said he was impressed by the sheer quantity of material at the facility and unique items in special collections, such as a paleotectonic map of the Jurassic. Studying classics, he said he relies on the Internet Archive for rare materials he can’t find anywhere else – once discovering a manual on the Etruscan language online.“Our library at Berkeley did not own a copy of this very important book, and the Internet Archive did,” Buettner said. “It’s sort of a miracle that we have this Internet Archive that can supplement these university libraries.”Shaw, who is in a French PhD program, said seeing the books at the Physical Archive on so many topics made her appreciate the nonprofit organization’s effort to make knowledge available to all. “The Internet Archive allows you to access things in a very ethical way so you can feel good about supporting it,” Shaw said.On a recent Friday tour of the Internet Archive’s headquarters in San Francisco, Shawdi Sani became curious about how the physical material was stored, so she registered for the event. Exploring the Richmond facility, she was captivated by the microfiche station and the customized software and equipment used in the restoration. “It was interesting how they brought that back to life,” she said. “It was kind of archaic and now it’s very useful.”Sani, who works in applied machine learning, said she’s interested in seeing how the internet has evolved over time.“As someone in Gen Z and with AI everywhere, there’s a huge need I see among my peers to go back to when the internet was less monetized and more raw,” said Sani, who enjoys exploring old websites, such as Gawker, saved by the Archive.Preserving Today for TomorrowNew to the event this year was a recording studio set up in an Airstream trailer parked outside the warehouse. “Talk to the future,” Marc Weber said to visitors who walked up to check it out. Those who were game were asked to pull a question out of the hat such as “Why do you think preservation is important?” or “What’s your favorite item/collection on the Internet Archive?” to answer.The soundbites will be shared on social media and preserved online. “It’s an informal way to capture what people are thinking today,” said Weber, an historian and curator for the Internet Archive. “Ten or 20 years from now it will be interesting to see what was on people’s minds.”There were also postcards set out for people to fill out asking: “What’s your commitment to preservation?” Then, Archive staff will mail the postcards to them in three months as a reminder of their pledge, explained Chris Freeland, director of library services at the Internet Archive.Charlie Robinson, an engineer from San Francisco, said he relies on the Internet Archive often when he can’t find a book or piece of media anywhere else. “The Internet Archive is one of those things where if it didn’t exist and somebody tried to explain it to you, it wouldn’t sound like an inevitable thing or even possible,” he said at the event in Richmond. “And I’m so glad that I live in a universe where it exists.”The Internet Archive’s efforts to preserve all forms of media and chronicle digital history is something to be revered, said Eric Ma, applied scientist working in tech in the Bay area. “It’s all in the public good and not motivated by profit. Honestly, I can’t really name another organization quite like it,” said Ma, who especially enjoyed seeing the collection of vinyl at the Physical Archive. “So many people are willing to donate their whole collection over to the Archive. It makes me have hope in humanity a little bit more.”The post A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Physical Archive first appeared on Internet Archive Blogs.