June 2005: James Linton, director of the Library of Congress, proposed to UNESCO to establish a world digital library. June 5-38+February 2006: UNESCO and the Library of Congress jointly hosted an expert meeting attended by relevant people from all over the world. At the expert meeting, experts decided to set up a working group to formulate standards and content selection standards. June 5-38, 2007+10: The Library of Congress and its five partner institutions presented the future WDL model at the UNESCO General Conference. April 2009: WDL was launched to the international public, covering every member country of UNESCO.