The CIA World Factbook is dead. Here's how I came to love it

"When one of the world's most secretive and far-reaching organizations offers to share how it sees the world, it's worth taking a peek. That's the thought I had when I dove into the CIA World Factbook for the first time as a young editor at CNN International in the early 2000s. If journalists aim to write the first draft of history, I figured, then the Factbook, culling data from Cabinet agencies and other official outlets, could be a reliable primary source."

"The CIA World Factbook started out as a classified Cold War document, but it later emerged as an internet stalwart. In classrooms and public and private research spaces, people relied on it for presenting essential facts about countries and governments. But without warning, the CIA said this week that it will no longer produce the publication that it previously touted as "indispensable.""

The CIA World Factbook began as a classified Cold War document and later became a widely used online reference compiled from Cabinet agencies and other official outlets. Educators, researchers, librarians, students, scholars and reporters relied on it for essential country facts, government types, and demographic distinctions. The Government Publishing Office began publishing the Factbook in 1975 and called it a perennial bestseller. The Factbook included practical travel tips, such as Bulgaria’s reversed head-shake meaning, and detailed entries on religious majorities and government forms. The CIA announced it will no longer produce the publication, ending a long-running publicly available resource.

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