Who are Archives of IT?
Archives of IT (AIT) is a charity founded by Roger Graham OBE in 2015 to capture, preserve and share the voices of people from the UK IT and Telecommunications industry. Its principal aim is to prevent this lived experience of the development of IT and Tech from being lost, and to share it with current and future generations.
In more detail, AIT’s aims are:
- To interview, share and preserve oral history interviews from the people involved in the development of the UK tech industries
- To capture IT history that would otherwise be lost and preserve it for current and future generations to use
- To encourage study of the industry’s history
- To provide educational resources for schools to encourage study of IT and promote it as a good place to have a career
- To demonstrate how IT, tech and telecommunications has changed the lives of human beings.
Our structure
AIT is governed by the board of trustees, who are senior and authoritative participants in the field, chaired by John Carrington.
Work is carried out by a team of volunteers and consultants. Find out more about who they are and what they do on our Meet The Team page.
Meet our trustees by watching the film below:
What does Archives of IT do?
Capturing the past
AIT is unique. Whilst other UK museums are focused on curating physical devices and working computers and machines, AIT collects the personal views, ideas and experiences of the people involved. The UK has a substantial record of innovation in the IT and tech industries and we believe their story should be told.
We are an online archive, with no physical premises. We record this through video and audio oral history interviews, which we make available to the public online. Supporters have donated company reports and other audio visual and physical media, and we make these available online where possible.
Inspiring the future
As well as saving this history, AIT shares it with the wider public. We do this in a variety of ways. For more traditional researchers, we have catalogued our website on both the Archives Hub and The National Archives’ Discovery catalogue to make our collections more discoverable. We inform the public about the individuals and organisations in tech, and the impact it has had on society through our news and features. Those who wish to know more about a certain topic, company or group of people can investigate more through our themes pages. We hold the AIT Forum event on the histories of the internet and networked society, past events can be viewed here.
AIT also provides teaching tools, including lesson and assembly plans for Key Stage 1 and 2 pupils, as well as careers advice. All is freely available on our website to use.
Contact us
Registered address: Manufactory House, Bell Lane, Hertford, SG14 1BP
We are on social media. For our most up to date posts, follow us on Linked In. You can also find us on on Twitter and YouTube.
Want to speak to one of the team? Please fill out the AIT Feedback Form.
Get involved
If you would like to get involved with or support our work, please find out more here.
You can also sign up for our Newsletter to be kept up to date with our work and for exclusive access to news and in depth features on the history of IT.
