One Day in History

The British Library holds the 46,000 diary entries received as a result of the One Day in History project.

One Day in History was a single-day initiative by several UK heritage organisations that aimed to provide a historical record of the everyday life of the British public in the early 21st century. Described as the "world's biggest blog",[1] it encouraged UK citizens to write diary entries of 100–650 words of what they had done on 17 October 2006, and then upload them to the official website of the initiative. The project formed a part of History Matters: Pass It On, a history campaign led by several UK heritage organisations. Submissions were received until 1 November, and 46,000 entries were uploaded in this time, many of which were from students and celebrities. After being available to view on the History Matters website, the archive of the diary entries was moved to the UK Web Archive at the British Library and the library of the University of Sussex. The campaign received mixed reviews, with Institute of Historical Research's David Cannadine and The Guardian's Dave Hill speaking positively of it, whereas journalist John Plunkett termed it to be a "historical record of people with computers".

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