The Library of Congress has already scanned parts of its collections and made them available via the World Wide Web. Here are some of the things
scanned to date and made available via the Library's World Wide web site:

* Selected books about the Library of Congress originally published by the Library. Some are available here <http://www.loc.gov/about/books/>

* Selected American History and culture materials via the American Memory Historical Collections <http://memory.loc.gov>. These comprise more than
eight million digital files;

* Current and recent (1973-present) congressional materials <http://thomas.loc.gov>;

* Books and studies, originally published by the Library's Federal Research Division <http://www.loc.gov/rr/frd/>;

* Selected copyright-free materials requested by other institutions <http://lcweb.loc.gov/rr/loan/illscanhome.html>;

* Selected prints and photographs <http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/catalog.html>; and

* Other materials via the Library's conservation and preservation programs <http://www.loc.gov/preserv/prd/presdig/prestoc.html>.

In some cases, these categories overlap.

The Library of Congress is considering a wide array of other digital projects. Materials that are converted to digital form for use only within the confines of the Library of Congress buildings are scanned with either the permission of the rights holders or under the "fair use" exceptions to copyright law. Some of the digital surrogates of photographs presented in the Library's Prints and Photographs Catalog, for example, may only be viewed by researchers within the Library's buildings. And selections of
manuscript materials from the Hannah Arendt collection are available in computer form only from within the Library of Congress Manuscript Reading Room. Other selections are available via American Memory (here < http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/arendthtml/>). Of course, since the Library of Congress is home to the United States Copyright Office, the Library must follow the law to the letter. The must also carefully adhere to the restrictions on materials placed by the materials' donors and their
heirs. These agreements are a particular issue when a prominent person donates or sells his or her personal or professional papers to the Library of Congress.

Some general information about may of the above programs, plus some information and a link to the National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program (NDIIPP) are here: <http://www.loc.gov/library/libarch-digital.html>. The NDIIPP is investigating all sorts of issues relating to the digital conversion of analog materials as well as the conservation of materials which are "born digital.". This is a new field of study and most of the answers are still unknown."