“The iBiblio.org domain name is so new that Google still doesn’t
show it, but a search for the site’s previous name,
MetaLab.unc.edu, turns up over 600,000 responses. To Linux users,
it is the home of the Linux Documentation Project and the world’s
largest repository of downloadable Linux and Open Source software,
but that is not what it started out to be and it is still not
iBiblio’s primary purpose, although Linux and Open Source and the
community concepts behind them are integral to iBiblio in many
ways.”
“It says on the iBiblio FAQ page that iBiblio “stands above
other digital libraries” by maintaining ‘a close relation to the
open source models for development and management of collections.’
The FAQ page also says, ‘We’re all about freedom, man! Free Tibet,
free Burma, Free Love, you get the picture. We offer a free
platform for the exchange of free thought. We host tons of cultural
sites like the DocSouth Project, Zen@iBiblio, and North Carolina
Raves (all of which can be seen from our collections index). We are
also one of the first servers to mirror the original Linux kernel,
so you can tell we’re big on free software, too….'”
“The current iBiblio name was chosen, in large part, because it
was available. Paul says, ‘Naming anything on the Internet these
days is a combination of what’s available and what you’re trying to
say.’ The old SunSite name had to go when the site’s relationship
with original sponsor Sun Microsytems (amicably) dissolved several
years ago. Then, Paul says, people both in the free software
community and the rest of the world seemed to associate the MetaLab
name almost entirely with the software aspect of the site (which
only makes up about half of it), and when the latest sponsor, red
hat center, donated $4 million to the project, a name change was in
order — but not to one that had either redness or hatness in
it.”