'Internet Archive' looks to document words of Donald Trump in San Francisco
SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- An effort is underway in San Francisco to archive webpages, books, TV shows, and the words of President-elect Donald Trump.
The building housing the Internet Archive was once home to a church. Now, you could think of it as a church of data - a sanctuary for information where books are digitized, and video games are preserved.
The archive has also been saving copies of TV news broadcasts, allowing them to create what they call the "Trump Archive," containing a growing collection of televised speeches and interviews by America's next President.
The archive is curated by hand, but they are looking for partners to help them use voice and face recognition. They are already working with news agencies to find and face-check significant statements. "You'll see who fact-checked it, and a direct link to the source of the fact check," TV Archive Director Roger MacDonald said.
The incoming administration has also prompted the start of another project at the Internet Archive - one that won't be housed in their building. "We're now looking to make a full copy in Canada, to basically keep things safe," Internet Archive Founder Brewster Kahle said.
The group is halfway to their goal of raising $5 million to back up the archive on servers in Canada, including snapshots of posts that have been deleted - a tool Kahle finds more useful now than ever. "There's a lot of tweets that have gone away, or denials of having said things, so having a permanent access to materials can be an antidote," Kahle said.
