If anyone out there is still trying to argue that Twitter is a passing trend, good luck.
The Library of Congress, the largest library in the world, announced today that it will house the social network's entire digital archive.
Yes, that's right: Kim Kardashian's bikini twitpics and Donnie Wahlberg's love of hump day will now live for eternity alongside a rough draft of the Declaration of Independence and an original Gutenberg Bible.
"Library to acquire ENTIRE Twitter archive -- ALL public tweets, ever, since March 2006! Details to follow," read the initial announcement shared via the Library of Congress' own Twitter account, @LibraryCongress.
(Let it be noted that the Tweet announcing the Twitter acquisition is now part of the Library of Congress' archive.)
The Library has spent nearly a decade archiving digital material through the National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program, but today's announcement has opened the floodgate for popular culture to find its way into one of the world's most important libraries.
This means researchers will have years worth of communication from huge swaths of the world at their fingertips. Experts are still trying to grasp the implications, the Library's director of communications, Matt Raymond, wrote in a blog post.
U.S. & World
"I'm no Ph.D., but it boggles my mind to think what we might be able to learn about ourselves and the world around us from this wealth of data," he wrote.
We have to agree, it is undeniable that the Tweet sent by Barack Obama the evening that he became President Obama represents a significant moment in American history -- it's just hard to believe that my own love of Sue Sylvester's rendition of "Vogue" will be forever housed in the nation's capital.
