Where is it?
Individual indexes live on hundreds of different servers around the world. A set of catalog pages linking these pages is maintained at http://vlib.org. Mirrors of the catalog are kept at East Anglia (UK), Geneva (Switzerland), Argentina, and Illinois (USA).

Who runs it
Each maintainer is responsible for the content of their own pages, as long as they follow certain guidelines. The central catalog pages are maintained by Gerard Manning. A database of VL sections and their maintainers is kept by Alan Thornhill and Jennifer Drummond, who also maintain the VL mailing lists. The VL was first conceived and run by Tim Berners-Lee, and later expanded, organised and managed for several years by Arthur Secret [a fuller history is promised].

The central affairs of the VL are now co-ordinated by a newly-elected council, which took office in Jan 2000. Major decisions, including a set of bylaws (in progress) are decided by the membership at large.

With that solid democratic foundation in place, we expect to greatly increase the breadth of the Virtual Library by recruiting and developing new sites, and to increase the quality of sites with technical and organisational support for all members.

Many volunteers have given a great deal of time and effort to the VL, ever since the early days of the web. There is a partial list of VL alumni to recognise their contributions.

Interested?
Do you have a good list of sites for a particular area? Would you like to make your favourite area of the web safe for unwary travelers? If so, consider joining the VL and bringing your expertise to a new audience.

If you maintain a site you would like to have listed in a section of the Virtual Library, then please go to that site to find how to contact the individual maintainer. The catalog curator is not involved in the addition of external sites to the VL.