Material / Image Research Lab (MIRL)

Dubbing it “a million first steps,” the British Library announced they’ve posted over 1,000,000 images (1,019,991 to be precise) on their Flickr Commons account. As per the press release, these images are “for anyone to use, remix and repurpose. These images were taken from the pages of 17th, 18th and 19th century books digitised by Microsoft who then generously gifted the scanned images to us, allowing us to release them back into the Public Domain. The images themselves cover a startling mix of subjects: There are maps, geological diagrams, beautiful illustrations, comical satire, illuminated and decorative letters, colourful illustrations, landscapes, wall-paintings and so much more that even we are not aware of.”