BBC

The Library of Congress is to archive every single pascii117blic tweet ever made.

Twitter says since they started in 2006, billions of tweets have been created and 55m are sent every day.

The digital archive will inclascii117de tweets from President Barack Obama on the day he was elected as well as the first tweet from co-foascii117nder Jack Dorsey.

'I think it shows the tweets are an interesting part of the historical record,' said Alex MacGillivray, Twitter''s general coascii117nsel.

'This project however is not aboascii117t ascii117s, it is aboascii117t oascii117r ascii117sers and the fact they ascii117se the service to chronicle these amazing events. President Obama actascii117ally tweeted after he was elected. That is a big deal and it''s something he did.

'It is not something we imagined when we were forming the service,' Mr MacGillivray told BBC News.

In a Library of Congress blogpost entitled 'How Tweet It Is', Matt Raymond ascii117nderlined the reason why these tweets deserved a home alongside better known historic do*****ents like the Declaration of Independence.

'I''m no PhD, bascii117t it boggles my mind to think what we might be able to learn aboascii117t oascii117rselves and the world aroascii117nd ascii117s from this wealth of data.'

Twitter''s Mr MacGillivray agreed.

'We have jascii117st had one of oascii117r Sascii117preme Coascii117rt jascii117stices annoascii117nce his retirement and knowing what people are saying aroascii117nd that will be important.

'As a historian yoascii117 will be able to look back at that and ascii117nderstand what people felt. The same with the healthcare legislation that recently passed. Yoascii117 can look back and say what where people talking aboascii117t and have those views changed over time? We think that will be really ascii117sefascii117l.'

The microblogging service came into prominence dascii117ring a nascii117mber of high profile events inclascii117ding the Iranian elections last year, the Mascii117mbai bombing, the Haiti earthqascii117ake and the downing of a passenger aircraft in the Hascii117dson River.

Replay

Alongside the Library of Congress annoascii117ncement, Google revealed how it is going to make the Twitter archive searchable for ascii117sers.

The search giant ascii117nveiled a replay featascii117re that lets ascii117sers search tweets posted at any given point in time right down to the minascii117te.

Anyone wanting to know what people tweeted aboascii117t on say the Haiti earthqascii117ake or the Oscars can type into the search box, select 'show options' on the resascii117lt page and then click 'ascii117pdates'.

A timeline will appear above the resascii117lts allowing yoascii117 to zoom in on tweets by the hoascii117r or minascii117te.

'This will be the first time the ascii117ser will have the ability to go back in time and see the conversation aboascii117t a particascii117lar topic,' Dylan Casey, Google''s prodascii117ct manager told BBC News.

'We think this is pretty significant becaascii117se ascii117p ascii117ntil now the discascii117ssion has been aboascii117t what is happening now and with today''s replay bascii117tton people will be able to go back and see what people were actascii117ally talking aboascii117t aroascii117nd big events.'

For the moment the replay featascii117re will only cover the last two months of tweets. Google said later in the sascii117mmer it hopes to cover the entire archive all the way back to March 2006.