Internet Archive's Historic Campaign, "From Wayback to Way Forward: The Internet’s Library for 25 Years"

Recognized by the US House of Representatives, the campaign included my role as the Campaign Communications Specialist, involving historical and futuristic research, along with social media and community engagement. 

In the initial phase of this project, I immersed myself in exploring historical events, tracing back to the 7th century BCE, extending to the 25-year history of the Internet Archive (spanning 1996 to 2021). 

Additionally, I received guidance from subject matter experts, legal professionals, and website designers to compile images and assist in writing scenarios projecting 25 years into the future, up to the year 2046. We sought to portray a dystopian world and highlight the events leading up to a future devoid of access to knowledge.

From our efforts, here's a glance of what we accomplished:

• Creation of multiple interactive timelines and a standalone anniversary website
• Video time capsules made by our community members and global partners
• Social media experiment with fans tweeting as part of the resistance from the year 2046
• Case study showcasing the creation of the Way Forward Machine, a search engine visualizing favorite websites in the year 2046
• Campaign branding & art direction case study
• Live stage show broadcast across social media and more!

Screenshots of our historic project, acknowledged by the United States House of Representatives:

We were honored to have prominent influencers such Vint Cerf, Vice President of Google; Cindy Cohn, Executive Director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation; Dawn Eden Goldstein, Author & Rock Music Historian; Peter Gabriel, Musician and Activist; Rick Wilson, Political Strategist and Commentator; The Library of Congress; The Wikimedia Foundation; Mitchell Baker, Chairwoman of the Mozilla Foundation and many others.

This campaign has been amplified by many authors, 14 global partners, and generated media coverage in over 30 news outlets. 

The campaign was also recognized by the United States House of Representatives as an official part of our nation's history. Here are some of those features.