Large, Free, and Interesting SQL-ready Datasets?

Jon H asks: "I'd like to teach myself various platforms or technologies, involving accessing databases. The problem is, my ideas for projects to learn on usually are boring, toy projects, involving lots of boring data entry in order to create a useful database. Things like personal library databases. This doesn't particularly interest me. It would be much easier if I had a big, interesting dataset which I could load into an SQL database without too much trouble. Then I could spend my time on the php, or WebObjects, or JBoss, or whatever. I'd like something more real than the usual toy demo databases. Something weighty, 20 megabytes and up, big enough for poor software design to cause performance issues which might not be seen in smaller databases. Ideally, it'd be in a form that could easily be loaded into an SQL database, perhaps even including a schema. Any links would be appreciated. Do such beasts exist?

Comments

easy

[Jonny 290]

step 1: install windows xp on PC.
step 2: turn on application crash logging.
step 3: give to mother
step 4: ??? (aka wait 3 months)
step 5: collect 3gb dataset.

I hear . . .

[acceleriter]

. . . the U.S. Department of Justice has a foreign lobbyist database that should be big enough to test with.