PRESS RELEASE
August 26, 2008

Maura Marx Named First Executive Director of the Open Content Alliance

The Internet Archive and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation announced today
the appointment of Maura Marx as the first Executive Director of the Open
Content Alliance (OCA). A search committee representing OCA member
institutions made the appointment after an intensive search process. Ms.
Marx will move to the OCA from the Boston Public Library, where she most
recently founded the Digital Library Program and was instrumental in
evolving the Library¹s philosophy toward Open Content principles.

The Open Content Alliance is an international alliance of leading academic
and cultural heritage institutions working to build joint digital
collections for free public access.  Ms. Marx has been appointed to the
new position of Executive Director in order to expand its activities as
the preeminent center in the world for promoting the creation and open
sharing of digital content.

³Maura's background in working both inside and outside the library system
will help her communicate with a broad public audience the shape of the
new public library services in this digital age." said Brewster Kahle,
Digital Librarian of the Internet Archive.  ³Her dynamic style,
deep-seated commitment to open principles, and demonstrated success at
implementing partnerships and initiatives in the digital space will be a
powerful combination in taking the OCA to the next level.²

³We are delighted that Maura will take on this leadership role at such an
important juncture for the organization.  The Open Content Alliance
represents the largest group of libraries, universities and cultural
heritage institutions in the world supporting a universal digital library
that is truly open, non-profit, and non-exclusive² said Doron Weber,
Program Director at the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. "Maura will help to
turn the OCA into a stand-alone membership organization that will play a
leadership role on the national and global stage. ³

"Over the past three years members of the OCA have made incredibly
important strides toward building a truly open digital information commons
and I am thrilled to have the opportunity to lead the organization to new
levels of growth and collaboration.³ Marx said.

Among Ms. Marx¹s first actions will be incorporation of the OCA in the
State of Massachusetts and creation of a Board of Directors. She will
focus on building collaborations across institutional boundaries,
expanding the OCA community and becoming involved in public policy
advocacy efforts.

Ms. Marx began her career in Europe in development for the arts with
organizations including the Guggenheim Museum (Salzburg) and Warner
Brothers.  She then worked as an executive in the U.S. technology sector
before coming to the library world.  Her accomplishments have included
strategic planning, fundraising, technology planning and public relations
for organizations at varying stages of growth. She is a member of the
Executive Committee of the Digital Commonwealth, the Massachusetts
statewide digital library, and holds degrees from the University of Notre
Dame, Middlebury College and Simmons College.  She an be reached at
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About the Open Content Alliance
The Open Content Alliance is an association of approximately 100 cultural
and academic institutions, working to engage in activities that support
the open sharing of information, including building joint online
collections. It was founded by Brewster Kahle and the Internet Archive in
2005 with 12 initial member institutions, and has grown to over 100 today.
 The OCA and has collectively provided over 400,000 books for digitization
and contributed them to the Internet Archive¹s shared public collections.
Information on member institutions and open content principles can be
found on the OCA web site at http://www.opencontentalliance.org/.

About the Internet Archive
The Internet Archive is building a digital library of Internet sites and
other cultural artifacts in digital form. The Archive is a partner to many
large institutions, including the Library of Congress, National Archives
and Records Administration, NASA, Bibliotheque Nationale de France and UK
National Archives, as well as many state and local institutions.  Some of
its well-known projects include OpenLibrary.org, nasaimages.org and the
many searchable collections at www.archive.org.  The Archive operates 12
scanning centers around the United States and internationally, and
operates a data repository in San Francisco.

About the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation
The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, a New York-based non-profit philanthropy
founded in 1934, makes grants for research and education in science,
technology, economic performance and the quality of American life. In
addition to the Open Content Alliance and the Internet Archive, the
Foundation has supported the Library of Congress, PALINET, SOLINET, the
Boston Library Consortium, the New Orleans Public Library, the Espresso
Book Machine and Wikipedia, among others, as part of its program in
Universal Access to Recorded Knowledge. Information about the Alfred P.
Sloan Foundation may be found on the Foundation¹s web site at
http://www.sloan.org/.