The Internet Public Library was created in 1995 by a group of graduate students led by Prof. Joseph James at the University of Michigan to “ask interesting and important questions about interconnections of libraries, librarians, and librarianship with a distributed networked environment.”
Over the last ten years, the IPL has expanded their mission to create a public service organization and a learning/teaching environment. According to a 2003 press release:

Through the IPL, librarians and library students learn to integrate the use of the Internet into their professional practice. Internet users get help in navigating the sea of information on the Internet in order to find information they actually need and can use. By training librarians, students, and to some extent users, in using, searching, and evaluating the Internet, the IPL improves information literacy, a much-needed skill in the 21st century. Librarians and library students learn from IPL’s examples, thus relieving them of the need to constantly “reinvent the wheel.” Internet users spend less time wading through garbage and more time getting their real work done.