For Wikipedia's non-encyclopedic visitor introduction, see Wikipedia:About.

Wikipedia
Screenshot of Wikipedia's multilingual portal.
URL	www.wikipedia.org
Slogan	The free encyclopedia that anyone can edit. Uniform Resource Locator is an URI which also specifies where the identified resource is available and the protocol for retrieving it A slogan is a memorable Motto or Phrase used in a Political, commercial, Religious and other context as a repetitive expression of
Commercial?	No
Type of site	Online encyclopedia
Registration	Optional
Available language(s)	236 active editions (253 in total)[1]
Owner	Wikimedia Foundation
Created by	Jimmy Wales, Larry Sanger[2]
Launched	January 15, 2001(2001-01-15)
Current status	perpetual work-in-progress

Wikipedia (pronunciation ) is a free,^[3] multilingual, open content encyclopedia project operated by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. An internet encyclopedia project is a large database of useful information accessible via World Wide Web In the Philosophy of language, a natural language (or ordinary language) is a Language that is spoken or written in phonemic-alphabetic or phonemically-related The Wikimedia Foundation Inc is a Non-profit charitable organization headquartered in San Francisco, California, United States, Jimmy Donal "Jimbo" Wales (born August 7 1966 is an American Internet entrepreneur known Lawrence Mark "Larry" Sanger (born July 16, 1968) is an American Philosopher, co-founder of Wikipedia, and the creator Events 588 BC - Nebuchadrezzar II of Babylon lays siege to Jerusalem under Zedekiah 's reign Year 2001 ( MMI) was a Common year starting on Monday according to the Gregorian calendar. The name Wikipedia is one of several different related terms based on the words Wiki and Encyclopedia. _____ __ / ___/ / /_ ____ ____ \__ \ / __/ / __ \ / __ \ ___/ / / /_ Open content, a Neologism coined by analogy with " Open source " describes any kind of Creative work published in a format that explicitly allows An encyclopedia (or '''encyclopædia''') is a comprehensive written Compendium that contains Information on either all branches of Knowledge A non-profit organization ( abbreviated "NPO" also "not-for-profit" is a legally constituted Organization whose objective is to support or engage The Wikimedia Foundation Inc is a Non-profit charitable organization headquartered in San Francisco, California, United States, Its name is a portmanteau of the words wiki (a technology for creating collaborative websites) and encyclopedia. A wiki is a page or collection of Web pages designed to enable anyone who accesses it to contribute or modify content using a simplified Markup language. Launched in 2001 by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger,^[4] it is currently the largest, fastest-growing, and most popular general reference work on the Internet. Jimmy Donal "Jimbo" Wales (born August 7 1966 is an American Internet entrepreneur known Lawrence Mark "Larry" Sanger (born July 16, 1968) is an American Philosopher, co-founder of Wikipedia, and the creator This article is about a kind of publication Reference work may also refer to the work that librarians perform at a Library reference desk. The Internet is a global system of interconnected Computer networks ^[5][6]

As of April 2008, Wikipedia attracts 683 million visitors annually^[7] reading over 10 million articles in 253 languages, comprising a combined total of over 1. International holidays and other major events April 1 - April Fools' Day April 4 - Qingming Festival (Mainland 74 billion words for all Wikipedias. The English Wikipedia edition passed the 2,000,000-article mark on September 9, 2007, and as of June 15, 2008 it had over 2,413,000 articles consisting of over 1,048,000,000 words. The English Wikipedia is the English language edition of Wikipedia. Events 1000 - Battle of Svolder, Viking Age. 1379 - Treaty of Neuberg, splitting the Austrian Year 2007 ( MMVII) was a Common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. Events 763 BC - Assyrians record a Solar eclipse that will be used to fix the Chronology of Mesopotamian history 2008 ( MMVIII) is the current year in accordance with the Gregorian calendar, a Leap year that started on Tuesday of the Common ^[1] Wikipedia's articles have been written collaboratively by volunteers around the world, and nearly all of its articles can be edited by anyone with access to the Internet. Collaboration is a recursive process where two or more people or organizations work together toward an intersection of common goals — for example an intellectual A volunteer is someone who works for a community or for the benefit of environment primarily because they choose to do so Having steadily risen in popularity since its inception,^[8] it currently ranks among the top ten most-visited web sites worldwide. ^[9]

Critics of Wikipedia target its systemic bias and inconsistencies^[10] and its policy of favoring consensus over credentials in its editorial process. Wikipedia is the largest Free content Encyclopedia project written by volunteers, as a result of which it has attracted criticism Systemic bias is the inherent tendency of a process to favour particular outcomes Consensus has two common meanings One is a general agreement among the members of a given group or Community, each of which exercises some discretion in A credential is an attestation of qualification competence or authority issued to an individual by a third party with a relevant de jure or de facto authority or ^[11] As a result, contemporary popular icons with relatively low overall significance (TV hosts, pop singers etc. ) are often more prominently featured than historical figures with high global importance. Wikipedia's reliability and accuracy are also an issue. The reliability of Wikipedia, compared to both other Encyclopedias and more specialized sources is often assessed in several ways including statistically, by comparative ^[12] Other criticisms are centered on its susceptibility to vandalism and the addition of spurious or unverified information. Vandalism is the behaviour attributed to the Vandals in respect of Culture: ruthless Destruction or spoiling of anything beautiful or Venerable ^[13] Scholarly work suggests that vandalism is generally short-lived. ^[14][15]

In addition to being an encyclopedic reference, Wikipedia has received major media attention as an online source of breaking news as it is constantly updated. ^[16][17] When Time Magazine recognized "You" as its Person of the Year 2006, praising the accelerating success of on-line collaboration and interaction by millions of users around the world, Wikipedia was the first particular "Web 2.0" service mentioned, followed by YouTube and MySpace. Time (trademarked in capitals as TIME) is a weekly American Newsmagazine, similar to Newsweek and In 2006 Time Magazine chose the millions of anonymous contributors of User-generated content to Wikipedia, YouTube, MySpace, Person of the Year (formerly Man of the Year) is an annual issue of the United States Newsmagazine Time that features and profiles Web 20 is a term describing changing trends in the use of World Wide Web technology and Web design that aims to enhance Creativity, secure YouTube is a video sharing website where users can upload view and share Video clips YouTube was created in February 2005 by three former PayPal employees MySpace is a popular social networking Website offering an interactive user-submitted network of friends personal profiles blogs groups photos music and ^[18]

History

Main article: History of Wikipedia

Wikipedia originally developed from another encyclopedia project, Nupedia. Nupedia was an English-language Web-based Encyclopedia whose articles were written by experts and licensed as Free content.

Wikipedia began as a complementary project for Nupedia, a free online English-language encyclopedia project whose articles were written by experts and reviewed under a formal process. Nupedia was an English-language Web-based Encyclopedia whose articles were written by experts and licensed as Free content. English is a West Germanic language originating in England and is the First language for most people in the United Kingdom, the United States Nupedia was founded on March 9, 2000, under the ownership of Bomis, Inc, a web portal company. Events 590 - Bahram Chobin is crowned as king Barham VI of Persia. 2000 ( MM) was a Leap year that started on Saturday of the Common Era, in accordance with the Gregorian calendar. Bomis (ˈbɑməs is a Dot-com company founded in 1996 Its primary business is the sale of Advertising on the Bomis A web portal is a site that provides a single function via a web page or site Its main figures were Jimmy Wales, Bomis CEO, and Larry Sanger, editor-in-chief for Nupedia and later Wikipedia. Jimmy Donal "Jimbo" Wales (born August 7 1966 is an American Internet entrepreneur known A chief executive officer ( CEO) or chief executive is typically the highest-ranking corporate officer ( executive) or administrator Lawrence Mark "Larry" Sanger (born July 16, 1968) is an American Philosopher, co-founder of Wikipedia, and the creator Editing Language, Images or Sound through correction condensation organization and other modifications in various media Nupedia was licensed initially under its own Nupedia Open Content License, switching to the GNU Free Documentation License before Wikipedia's founding at the urging of Richard Stallman. Nupedia was an English-language Web-based Encyclopedia whose articles were written by experts and licensed as Free content. The GNU Free Documentation License ( GNU FDL or simply GFDL) is a Copyleft License for free documentation designed by the Free Software Richard Matthew Stallman (born March 16 1953 often abbreviated " rms " is an American software freedom activist ^[19]

Larry Sanger

Jimmy Wales

Graph of the article count for the English Wikipedia, from January 10, 2001, to September 9, 2007 (the date of the two-millionth article)

Visitors to wikipedia. org in 2008

Larry Sanger and Jimmy Wales are the founders of Wikipedia. ^[2][20] While Wales is credited with defining the goal of making a publicly editable encyclopedia,^[21] Sanger is usually credited with the counter-intuitive strategy of using a wiki to reach that goal. Intuition is apparent ability to acquire knowledge without a clear inference or the use of reason A Strategy is a long term plan of action designed to achieve a particular goal, most often "winning A wiki is a page or collection of Web pages designed to enable anyone who accesses it to contribute or modify content using a simplified Markup language. ^[22] On January 10, 2001, Larry Sanger proposed on the Nupedia mailing list to create a wiki as a "feeder" project for Nupedia. Events 49 BC - Julius Caesar crosses the Rubicon, signaling the start of civil war. Year 2001 ( MMI) was a Common year starting on Monday according to the Gregorian calendar. Lawrence Mark "Larry" Sanger (born July 16, 1968) is an American Philosopher, co-founder of Wikipedia, and the creator A mailing list is a collection of names and addresses used by an individual or an organization to send material to multiple recipients ^[23] Wikipedia was formally launched on January 15, 2001, as a single English-language edition at www. Events 588 BC - Nebuchadrezzar II of Babylon lays siege to Jerusalem under Zedekiah 's reign Year 2001 ( MMI) was a Common year starting on Monday according to the Gregorian calendar. wikipedia. com,^[24] and announced by Sanger on the Nupedia mailing list. ^[25] Wikipedia's policy of "neutral point-of-view"^[26] was codified in its initial months, and was similar to Nupedia's earlier "nonbiased" policy. Otherwise, there were relatively few rules initially and Wikipedia operated independently of Nupedia. ^[21]

Wikipedia gained early contributors from Nupedia, Slashdot postings, and search engine indexing. Slashdot, often abbreviated as /, is a technology-related news Website owned by SourceForge Inc It grew to approximately 20,000 articles, and 18 language editions, by the end of 2001. By late 2002 it had reached 26 language editions, 46 by the end of 2003, and 161 by the closing stages 2004. ^[27] Nupedia and Wikipedia coexisted until the former's servers went down permanently in 2003, and its text was incorporated into Wikipedia. As of December 2007, English Wikipedia had over 2 million articles, making it the largest encyclopedia ever assembled, eclipsing even the Yongle Encyclopedia (1407), which had held the record for exactly 600 years. The Yongle Dadian Encyclopedia ( literally “The Great Canon or Vast Documents of the Yongle Era” was a Chinese compilation commissioned by the Chinese ^[28]

Citing fears of commercial advertising and lack of control in a perceived English-centric Wikipedia, users of the Spanish Wikipedia forked from Wikipedia to create the Enciclopedia Libre in February 2002. The Spanish Wikipedia ( Spanish: Wikipedia en español) is a Spanish-language edition of Wikipedia, a free online Encyclopedia. Later that year, Wales announced that Wikipedia would not display advertisements, and its website was moved to wikipedia. org. ^[29] Various other projects have since forked from Wikipedia for editorial reasons. Wikinfo does not require neutral point of view and allows original research. New Wikipedia-inspired projects — such as Citizendium, Scholarpedia, Amapedia and Google's Knol — have been started to address perceived limitations of Wikipedia, such as its policies on peer review, original research and commercial advertising. Citizendium (ˌsɪtɪˈzɛndiəm "the Citizens Compendium of everything" is an English-language Wiki -based free Scholarpedia is an English-language online Wiki -based Encyclopedia in which articles are written by invited expert authors and are subject to Amapedia is a Wiki where individuals can edit articles about products that they like Knol is a Google project which aims to include user-written articles on a range of topics Peer review (also known as refereeing) is the process of subjecting an author's scholarly work research or Ideas to the scrutiny of others who are Original research is Research that is not exclusively based on a summary review or synthesis of earlier publications on the subject of research Advertising is a form of Communication that typically attempts to persuade potential Customers to Purchase or to consume more of a particular Brand

The Wikimedia Foundation was created from Wikipedia and Nupedia on June 20, 2003. The Wikimedia Foundation Inc is a Non-profit charitable organization headquartered in San Francisco, California, United States, Events 451 - Battle of Chalons: Flavius Aetius ' defeats Attila the Hun. Year 2003 ( MMIII) was a Common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ^[30] It applied to the United States Patent and Trademark Office to trademark Wikipedia on September 17, 2004. The United States Patent and Trademark Office ( PTO or USPTO) is an agency in the United States Department of Commerce that issues Patents to A trademark or trade mark, represented by the symbols ™ and ®, or mark is a distinctive sign or indicator used by an individual Events 1176 - The Battle of Myriokephalon is fought 1462 - The Battle of Świecino (or Battle of Żarnowiec "MMIV" redirects here For the Modest Mouse album see " Baron von Bullshit Rides Again " The mark was granted registration status on January 10, 2006. Events 49 BC - Julius Caesar crosses the Rubicon, signaling the start of civil war. Year 2006 ( MMVI) was a Common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. Trademark protection was accorded by Japan on December 16, 2004, and in the European Union on January 20, 2005. For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Japan topics. Events 755 - An Lushan revolts against Chancellor Yang Guozhong at Fanyang, initiating the An Shi Rebellion "MMIV" redirects here For the Modest Mouse album see " Baron von Bullshit Rides Again " The European Union ( EU) is a political and economic union of twenty-seven member states, located primarily in Events 250 - Emperor Decius begins a widespread persecution of Christians in Rome. Year 2005 ( MMV) was a Common year starting on Saturday (link displays full calendar of the Gregorian calendar. Technically a service mark, the scope of the mark is for: "Provision of information in the field of general encyclopedic knowledge via the Internet". In some countries notably the United States, a Trademark used to identify a service rather than a product is called a service mark or servicemark Information as a concept has a diversity of meanings from everyday usage to technical settings The Internet is a global system of interconnected Computer networks There are plans to license the use of the Wikipedia trademark for some products, such as books or DVDs. ^[31]

Editing model and community

Almost every article in Wikipedia may be edited anonymously or with a user account, while only registered users may create a new article. The "History" page attached to each article contains every single past revision of the article, though a revision with libelous content, criminal threats or copyright infringements may be removed afterwards. ^[32][33] Unlike traditional encyclopedias such as Encyclopædia Britannica, no article in Wikipedia undergoes formal peer-review process and changes to articles are made available immediately. The Encyclopædia Britannica is a general English-language encyclopaedia published by Encyclopædia Britannica Inc Consequently, Wikipedia "makes no guarantee of validity" of its content. ^[34] Wikipedia also does not censor itself, and it contains materials that a certain group of people may find objectionable or offensive. ^[35] For instance, in 2008, Wikipedia rejected an online petition against the inclusion of Muhammad's depictions in English Wikipedia, citing this policy. The permissibility of depictions of Muhammad, the founder of Islam, has long been a concern in Islam's history The presence of politically sensitive materials in Wikipedia had also led China to block the access to the site. Talk People's Republic of China) PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA ARTICLE GUIDELINES On several occasions the government and Internet service providers of the People's Republic of China (PRC have blocked access to Wikipedia in Mainland China

Content in Wikipedia is, however, subject to the law in Florida, United States, where Wikipedia servers are hosted, and several internal policies and guidelines;^[36] they need to be on "notable"^[37] topics, contain "no original research"^[38] and only "verifiable"^[39] material and must be written from a "neutral point of view. Florida ( is a state located in the southeastern region of the United States, bordering Alabama to the northwest and Georgia to the "^[40] The project relies on its community members, called Wikipedians,^[41] to ensure the articles adhere to those policies and guidelines and to delete or modify those failing to meet them. Deletionism and inclusionism are two editor philosophies on the extent of these modifications and deletions. Deletionism and inclusionism are opposing philosophies held by editors of the online encyclopedia Wikipedia, regarding the criteria for including or deleting content ^[42][43] The vandalism to articles is dealt with by Wikipedians or, more increasingly, by computer programs called bots. Internet bots, also known as web robots, WWW robots or simply bots, are software applications that run automated tasks over the Internet ^[15]

Wikipedia tries to address the problem of systemic bias, and to deal with zealous editors who seek to influence the presentation of an article in a biased way, by insisting on a neutral point of view. Systemic bias is the inherent tendency of a process to favour particular outcomes ^[44] The English-language Wikipedia has introduced an assessment scale against which the quality of articles is judged;^[45] other editions have also adopted this. Roughly 1,500 articles have passed a rigorous set of criteria to reach the highest rank, "featured article" status; such articles are intended to provide thorough, well-written coverage of their topic, supported by many references to peer-reviewed publications. ^[46]

In a 2003 study of Wikipedia as a community, economics Ph.D. student Andrea Ciffolilli argued that the low transaction costs of participating in wiki software create a catalyst for collaborative development, and that a "creative construction" approach encourages participation. "PhD" redirects here for other uses see PhD (disambiguation. In Economics and related disciplines a transaction cost is a Cost incurred in making an economic exchange A wiki is a page or collection of Web pages designed to enable anyone who accesses it to contribute or modify content using a simplified Markup language. ^[47]

Wikimania, an annual conference for users of Wikipedia and other projects operated by the Wikimedia Foundation. Wikimania is a conference for users of the Wiki projects operated by the Wikimedia Foundation.

The community has a power structure. ^[48][49] Wikipedia's community has also been described as "cult-like,"^[50] although not always with entirely negative connotations,^[51] and criticized for failing to accommodate inexperienced users. This article does not discuss "cult" in the original sense of "veneration" or "religious practice" for that usage see Cult (religious practice ^[52]

While they are welcomed by the community,^[53] authors new to Wikipedia are encouraged to read policies to help them learn the ways of Wikipedia. ^[32] Editors in good standing in the community can run for one of many of levels of volunteer stewardship; this begins with "administrator"^[54] and goes up with "steward" and "bureaucrat". Sysop (ˈsɪsɒp is short for " System operator " It is a commonly used term for an administrator of a multi-user website such as a Bulletin board system ^[55] Administrators, the largest group of privileged users (1,503 Wikipedians for the English edition on February 23, 2008), have the ability to delete pages, lock articles from being changed in case of vandalism or editorial disputes, and block users from editing. Events 1455 - Traditional date for the publication of the Gutenberg Bible, the first Western Book printed from Movable 2008 ( MMVIII) is the current year in accordance with the Gregorian calendar, a Leap year that started on Tuesday of the Common

As Wikipedia grows with an unconventional model of encyclopedia building, "Who writes Wikipedia?" has become one of the questions frequently asked on the project, often with a reference to other Web 2. 0 projects such as Digg. Digg is a Website made for people to discover and share content from anywhere on the Internet, by submitting links and stories and voting and commenting on submitted ^[56] Jimmy Wales once argued that only "a community . . . a dedicated group of a few hundred volunteers" makes a bulk of contributions to Wikipedia and that the project is therefore "much like any traditional organization". This was later disputed by Aaron Swartz, who noted that several articles he sampled had large portion of their content contributed by a user with low edit count. Aaron Swartz (born 1986) is a writer web developer and entrepreneur ^[57] A 2007 study by researchers from Dartmouth College found that anonymous and infrequent contributors to Wikipedia are as reliable a source of knowledge as those contributors who register with the site. Dartmouth College ( is a private, Coeducational University located in Hanover, New Hampshire, U ^[58] Although some contributors are authorities in their field, Wikipedia requires that even their contributions be supported by published and verifiable sources. The project's preference for consensus over credentials has been labeled "anti-elitism". Consensus has two common meanings One is a general agreement among the members of a given group or Community, each of which exercises some discretion in A credential is an attestation of qualification competence or authority issued to an individual by a third party with a relevant de jure or de facto authority or ^[10]

While praising many aspects of Wikipedia, historian Roy Rosenzweig noted: "Overall, writing is the Achilles' heel of Wikipedia. Roy Alan Rosenzweig ( August 6 1950 &ndash October 11 2007) was an American Historian at George Mason University This article deals with the phrase For other uses see Achilles Heel. Committees rarely write well, and Wikipedia entries often have a choppy quality that results from the stringing together of sentences or paragraphs written by different people. "^[59]

In August 2007, a website developed by computer science graduate student Virgil Griffith named WikiScanner made its public debut. Virgil Griffith (born 1983 also known as Romanpoet, is an American hacker, known for his involvement with a 2003 lawsuit with the Blackboard Inc WikiScanner (also known as Wikipedia Scanner) is a tool created by Virgil Griffith and released on August 14, 2007, which consists of a publicly WikiScanner traces the source of millions of changes made to Wikipedia by editors who are not logged in, which reveals that many of these edits come from corporations or sovereign government agencies about articles related to them, their personnel or their work, and were attempts to remove criticism. ^[60] Wales called WikiScanner "a very clever idea," and said that he was considering some changes to Wikipedia to help visitors better understand what information is recorded about them. "When someone clicks on 'edit,' it would be interesting if we could say, 'Hi, thank you for editing. We see you're logged in from The New York Times. Keep in mind that we know that, and it's public information,'" he said. "That might make them stop and think. "^[60]

Reliability and bias

Main article: Reliability of Wikipedia

See also: Criticism of Wikipedia

Wikipedia has been accused of exhibiting systemic bias and inconsistency;^[12] critics argue that Wikipedia's open nature and a lack of proper sources for much of the information makes it unreliable. The reliability of Wikipedia, compared to both other Encyclopedias and more specialized sources is often assessed in several ways including statistically, by comparative Wikipedia is the largest Free content Encyclopedia project written by volunteers, as a result of which it has attracted criticism Systemic bias is the inherent tendency of a process to favour particular outcomes ^[61] Some commentators suggest that Wikipedia is generally reliable, but that the reliability of any given article is not always clear. ^[11] Editors of traditional reference works such as the Encyclopædia Britannica have questioned the project's utility and status as an encyclopedia. This article is about a kind of publication Reference work may also refer to the work that librarians perform at a Library reference desk. The Encyclopædia Britannica is a general English-language encyclopaedia published by Encyclopædia Britannica Inc ^[62] Many university lecturers discourage students from citing any encyclopedia in academic work, preferring primary sources;^[63] some specifically prohibit Wikipedia citations. A university is an institution of Higher education and Research, which grants Academic degrees in a variety of subjects Lecturer is a term of Academic rank. In the United Kingdom lecturer is the name given to University Teachers in their first permanent Primary source is a term used in a number of disciplines In Historiography, a primary source (also called original source) is a Document, Recording ^[64] Co-founder Jimmy Wales stresses that encyclopedias of any type are not usually appropriate as primary sources, and should not be relied upon as authoritative. Jimmy Donal "Jimbo" Wales (born August 7 1966 is an American Internet entrepreneur known ^[65] Technology writer Bill Thompson commented that the debate was possibly "symptomatic of much learning about information which is happening in society today. Bill Thompson (born 1960) is an English Technology writer best known for his weekly column in the Technology section of BBC News Online, his appearances "^[66]

John Seigenthaler Sr. has described Wikipedia as "a flawed and irresponsible research tool. "^[67]

Concerns have also been raised regarding the lack of accountability that results from users' anonymity,^[68] and that it is vulnerable to vandalism, the insertion of spurious information and similar problems. Accountability is a concept in Ethics with several meanings It is often used synonymously with such concepts as answerability enforcement responsibility, blameworthiness Vandalism is the behaviour attributed to the Vandals in respect of Culture: ruthless Destruction or spoiling of anything beautiful or Venerable In one particularly well-publicized incident, false information was introduced into the biography of John Seigenthaler, Sr. and remained undetected for four months. In the History of Wikipedia, the Seigenthaler incident refers to a series of events that began in May 2005 when Brian Chase anonymously posted a hoax article in Wikipedia John Lawrence Seigenthaler (ˈsiːgɛnˌθɔːlɚ born July 27 1927 is an American journalist, writer and political figure. ^[67] Some critics claim that Wikipedia's open structure makes it an easy target for Internet trolls, advertisers, and those with an agenda to push. An Internet troll, or simply troll in Internet slang, is someone who posts controversial and irrelevant or off-topic messages in an online community such as an Spamming is the abuse of electronic messaging systems to indiscriminately send unsolicited bulk messages ^[69][32] The addition of political spin to articles by organizations including the U.S. House of Representatives and special interest groups^[13] has been noted,^[70] and organizations such as Microsoft have offered financial incentives to work on certain articles. In Public relations, spin is a usually Pejorative term signifying a heavily biased portrayal in one's own favor of an event or situation it is a Euphemism The United States House of Representatives is one of the two chambers of the United States Congress; the other is the Senate. Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational Computer technology Corporation, which rose to dominate the Home computer ^[71] These issues have been parodied, notably by Stephen Colbert in The Colbert Report. Stephen Tyrone Colbert ( born May 13 1964 is an American Comedian, satirist, Actor and Writer, known for his ironic style The Colbert Report (/kolˈbɛr rəˈpɔr/&mdashthe t is silent in "Colbert" is a Peabody Award and Emmy Award winning American ^[72]

Economist Tyler Cowen writes, "If I had to guess whether Wikipedia or the median refereed journal article on economics was more likely to be true, after a not so long think I would opt for Wikipedia. Tyler Cowen (pronounced /ˈkaʊˌɛn/) (b January 21, 1962) occupies the Holbert C " He comments that many traditional sources of non-fiction suffer from systemic biases. Novel results are over-reported in journal articles, and relevant information is omitted from news reports. But he also cautions that errors are frequently found in Internet sites, and that academics and experts must be vigilant in correcting them. ^[73]

In February 2007, an article in The Harvard Crimson newspaper reported that some of the professors at Harvard University include Wikipedia in their syllabus, but that there is a split in their perception of using Wikipedia. The Harvard Crimson, the daily Student newspaper of Harvard University, was founded in 1873 A syllabus is an Outline and Summary of topics to be covered in a course. ^[74] In June 2007, former president of the American Library Association Michael Gorman condemned Wikipedia, along with Google,^[75] stating that academics who endorse the use of Wikipedia are "the intellectual equivalent of a dietitian who recommends a steady diet of Big Macs with everything. The American Library Association ( ALA) is a group based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally Michael Gorman (born 1941 is a British Librarian. He grew up in London, England and gained an interest in libraries in part through his Google Inc is an American public corporation, earning revenue from advertising related to its Internet search, e-mail, online A dietitian (also 'dietician' though 'dietitian' is used consistently by professionals is an expert in Food and Nutrition. The Big Mac is a hamburger sold by the international Fast-food chain McDonald's. " He also said that "a generation of intellectual sluggards incapable of moving beyond the Internet” was being produced at universities. He complains that the web-based sources are discouraging students from learning from the more rare texts which either are found only on paper or are on subscription-only web sites. In the same article Jenny Fry (a research fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute) commented on the academics who cite Wikipedia that: “You cannot say children are intellectually lazy because they are using the Internet when academics are using search engines in their research," she said. The Oxford Internet Institute ( OII) is a multi-disciplinary institute based at the University of Oxford, England, and housed in Balliol College Oxford "The difference is that they have more experience of being critical about what is retrieved and whether it is authoritative. Children need to be told how to use the Internet in a critical and appropriate way. "^[75]

In order to improve reliability, some editors have called for "stable versions" of articles, or articles that have been reviewed by the community and locked from further editing – but the community has been unable to form a consensus in favor of such changes, partly because they would require a major software overhaul. ^[76][77] However a similar system is being tested on the German Wikipedia, and there is an expectation that some form of that system will make its way onto the English version at some future time. ^[78] Software created by Luca de Alfaro and colleagues at the University of California, Santa Cruz is now being tested that will assign "trust ratings" to individual Wikipedia contributors, with the intention that eventually only edits made by those who have established themselves as "trusted editors" will be made immediately visible. ^[79]

Operation

Wikimedia Foundation and Wikia

Wikipedia is funded and operated by the Wikimedia Foundation, a non-profit organization which also operates Wikipedia-related projects such as Wikibooks. Wikibooks (previously called Wikimedia Free Textbook Project and Wikimedia-Textbooks) is a Wikimedia Foundation Wiki for the creation of In a 2008 interview, Jimmy Wales said that the foundation spent $2 million of donor money in 2007 toward site maintenance costs. ^[80] The foundation shares hosting and bandwidth costs with Wikia, a for-profit company founded by Jimmy Wales and Angela Beesley. Wikia (originally Wikicities) is a selective Free web hosting service for Wikis (or Wiki farm) operated by Wikia Inc Jimmy Donal "Jimbo" Wales (born August 7 1966 is an American Internet entrepreneur known Angela Ruth Beesley (born 1977 in Norwich England) is a British Internet Entrepreneur. The Wikimedia Foundation received some donated office space from Wikia Inc. during the fiscal year ending June 30, 2006. Events 350 - Roman usurper Nepotianus, of the Constantinian dynasty, is defeated and killed by troops of the Usurper Year 2006 ( MMVI) was a Common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ^[81]

In The New York Times in March 2008, Wales discussed a possible trivia game based on Wikipedia. ^[82]

Software and hardware

The operation of Wikipedia depends on MediaWiki, a custom-made, free and open source wiki software platform written in PHP and built upon the MySQL database. MediaWiki is a web-based Wiki software application used by all projects of the Wikimedia Foundation, all wikis hosted by Wikia, and Free software or software libre is Software that can be used studied and modified without restriction and which can be copied and redistributed in modified or unmodified Open source software (OSS began as a marketing campaign for Free software. Wiki software is a type of Collaborative software that runs a Wiki system PHP is a computer Scripting language. Originally designed for producing Dynamic web pages it has evolved to include a Command line interface capability MySQL is a Relational database management system (RDBMS which has more than 11 million installations The software incorporates programming features such as a macro language, variables, a transclusion system for templates, and URL redirection. A macro (from the Greek 'μάκρο' for long or far in Computer science is a rule or Pattern that specifies how a certain input sequence (often a sequence A variable (ˈvɛərɪəbl is an Attribute of a physical or an abstract System which may change its Value while it is under Observation. In Computer science, transclusion is the inclusion of part of a document into another document by reference A web template is a tool used to separate content from presentation in Web design, and for mass-production of Web documents It is a basic component of a URL redirection, also called URL forwarding, domain redirection and domain forwarding, is a technique on the World Wide Web for making a MediaWiki is licensed under the GNU General Public License and used by all Wikimedia projects, as well as many other wiki projects. Originally, Wikipedia ran on UseModWiki written in Perl by Clifford Adams (Phase I), which initially required CamelCase for article hyperlinks; the present double bracket style was incorporated later. UseModWiki is a wiki engine in the Perl programming language It is licensed under the GNU General Public License. NOTES FOR EDITORS "Perl" is not an acronym (read the "Name" section below CamelCase (also spelled " camel case " and sometimes known as medial capitals) is the practice of writing compound words or phrases in which the Starting in January 2002 (Phase II), Wikipedia began running on a PHP wiki engine with a MySQL database; this software was custom-made for Wikipedia by Magnus Manske. PhpWiki is Wiki software written in PHP. The first version by Steve Wainstead was in December 1999 and was the first Wiki written in PHP to be publicly released The Phase II software was repeatedly modified to accommodate the exponentially increasing demand. Exponential growth (including Exponential decay) occurs when the growth rate of a mathematical function is proportional to the function's current value In July 2002 (Phase III), Wikipedia shifted to the third-generation software, MediaWiki, originally written by Lee Daniel Crocker.

Overview of system architecture, May 2006. See server layout diagrams on Meta-Wiki.

Wikipedia currently runs on dedicated clusters of GNU/Linux servers, 300 in Florida, 26 in Amsterdam and 23 in Yahoo!'s Korean hosting facility in Seoul. Linux (commonly pronounced ˈlɪnəks Florida ( is a state located in the southeastern region of the United States, bordering Alabama to the northwest and Georgia to the Amsterdam (pronounced) is the capital and largest city of the Netherlands, located in the province of North Holland in the west Seoul ( soʊl is the Capital and largest City of South Korea. ^[83] Wikipedia employed a single server until 2004, when the server setup was expanded into a distributed multitier architecture. In Software engineering, multi-tier architecture (often referred to as n-tier architecture) is a Client-server architecture in which an application In January 2005, the project ran on 39 dedicated servers located in Florida. This configuration included a single master database server running MySQL, multiple slave database servers, 21 web servers running the Apache HTTP Server, and seven Squid cache servers. A database server is a Computer program that provides Database services to other computer programs or Computers as defined by the Client-server MySQL is a Relational database management system (RDBMS which has more than 11 million installations The term web server can mean one of two things A Computer program that is responsible for accepting HTTP requests from web clients which are Squid is a Proxy server and Web cache daemon. It has a wide variety of uses from speeding up a Web server by caching repeated requests

Wikipedia receives between 20,000 and 45,000 page requests per second, depending on time of day. ^[84] Page requests are first passed to a front-end layer of Squid caching servers. Squid is a Proxy server and Web cache daemon. It has a wide variety of uses from speeding up a Web server by caching repeated requests Requests that cannot be served from the Squid cache are sent to load-balancing servers running the Linux Virtual Server software, which in turn pass the request to one of the Apache web servers for page rendering from the database. Linux Virtual Server ( LVS) is an advanced load balancing solution for Linux systems The web servers deliver pages as requested, performing page rendering for all the language editions of Wikipedia. To increase speed further, rendered pages for anonymous users are cached in a distributed memory cache until invalidated, allowing page rendering to be skipped entirely for most common page accesses. Two larger clusters in the Netherlands and Korea now handle much of Wikipedia's traffic load.

License and language editions

All text in Wikipedia is covered by GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL), a copyleft license permitting the redistribution, creation of derivative works, and commercial use of content while authors retain copyright of their work. The GNU Free Documentation License ( GNU FDL or simply GFDL) is a Copyleft License for free documentation designed by the Free Software Copyleft is a play on the word Copyright and describes the practice of using copyright law to remove restrictions on distributing copies and modified versions ^[85] The position that Wikipedia is merely a hosting service has been successfully used as a defense in court. ^[86][87] Wikipedia has been working on the switch to Creative Commons licenses because the GFDL, initially designed for software manuals, is not suitable for online reference works and because the two licenses are currently incompatible. Creative Commons licenses are several Copyright licenses released on December 16, 2002 by Creative Commons, a U ^[88]

Contributors for English Wikipedia by country as of September 2006^[89].

The handling of media files (e. g. , image files) varies across language editions. Some language editions, such as the English Wikipedia, include non-free image files under fair use doctrine, while the others have opted not to. Fair use is a doctrine in United States copyright law that allows limited use of copyrighted material without requiring permission from the rights holders such as use for This is in part because of the difference in copyright laws between countries; for example, the notion of fair use does not exist in Japanese copyright law. Japanese copyright laws consist of two parts "Author's Rights" and "Neighboring Rights" and as such "copyright" is a convenient collective term rather Media files covered by free content licenses (e. _____ __ / ___/ / /_ ____ ____ \__ \ / __/ / __ \ / __ \ ___/ / / /_ g. , Creative Commons' cc-by-sa) are shared across language editions via Wikimedia Commons repository, a project operated by the Wikimedia Foundation. Wikimedia Commons (or simply Commons) is a repository of Free content images sound and other multimedia files

There are currently 253 language editions of Wikipedia; of these, 16 have over 100,000 articles and 145 have over 1,000 articles. ^[1] (See List of Wikipedias for the full list. This is a list of many of the different language editions of Wikipedia. ) According to Alexa, the English subdomain (en. In the Domain Name System (DNS hierarchy a subdomain is a domain that is part of a larger domain wikipedia. org; English Wikipedia) receives approximately 55% of Wikipedia's cumulative traffic, with the remaining split among the other languages (Spanish: 17%, Japanese 4%, German: 4%, Polish: 3%, French: 3%, Portuguese: 2%). The English Wikipedia is the English language edition of Wikipedia. ^[8] As of December 2007, the five largest language editions are (in order of article count) English, German, French, Polish and Japanese Wikipedias. The English Wikipedia is the English language edition of Wikipedia. The German Wikipedia (Deutschsprachige Wikipedia is the German-language edition of Wikipedia, a free and publicly editable online Encyclopedia. The French Wikipedia (Wikipédia francophone Wikipédia en français is the French language edition of Wikipedia, spelled Wikipédia. Polish Wikipedia (polska Wikipedia is the Polish edition of Wikipedia. The is the Japanese-language edition of Wikipedia, a free open-content encyclopedia ^[90]

Since Wikipedia is web-based and therefore worldwide, contributors of a same language edition may use different dialects or may come from different countries (as is the case for the English edition). The English Wikipedia is the English language edition of Wikipedia. These differences may lead to some conflicts over spelling differences, (e. American and British English spelling differences are one aspect of American and British English differences. g. color vs. colour)^[91] or points of view. ^[92] Though the various language editions are held to global policies such as "neutral point of view," they diverge on some points of policy and practice, most notably on whether images that are not licensed freely may be used under a claim of fair use. _____ __ / ___/ / /_ ____ ____ \__ \ / __/ / __ \ / __ \ ___/ / / /_ Fair use is a doctrine in United States copyright law that allows limited use of copyrighted material without requiring permission from the rights holders such as use for ^[93][94][95]

Percentage of all Wikipedia articles in English (red) and top ten largest language editions (blue). As of November 2007, less than 25% of Wikipedia articles are in English.

Jimmy Wales has described Wikipedia as "an effort to create and distribute a free encyclopedia of the highest possible quality to every single person on the planet in their own language". ^[96] Though each language edition functions more or less independently, some efforts are made to supervise them all. They are coordinated in part by Meta-Wiki, the Wikimedia Foundation's wiki devoted to maintaining all of its projects (Wikipedia and others). For instance, Meta-Wiki provides important statistics on all language editions of Wikipedia and maintain a list of articles every Wikipedia should have. The list concerns basic content by subject: biography, history, geography, society, culture, science, technology, foodstuffs, and mathematics. As for the rest, it is not rare for articles strongly related to a particular language not to have counterparts in another edition. For example, articles about small towns in the United States might only be available in English.

Translated articles represent only a small portion of articles in most editions,^[97] in part because automated translation of articles is disallowed. ^[98] Articles available in more than one language may offer "InterWiki" links, which link to the counterpart articles in other editions. InterWiki is a facility for creating Links to the many wiki wiki webs on the World Wide Web.

Several language versions have published a selection of Wikipedia articles on an optical disk version. An English version 2006 Wikipedia CD Selection contained about 2000 articles. The 2006 Wikipedia CD Selection was a selection of articles taken from Wikipedia, a free online encyclopedia and was produced in April 2006 Another English version ^[99] developed by Linterweb contains "1988 + articles". ^[100][101] The Polish version contains nearly 240000 articles. ^[102] There are also a few German versions. ^[103]

Cultural significance

See also: Wikipedia:Wikipedia in the media

An xkcd strip entitled "Wikipedian Protester. xkcd is a Webcomic created by Randall Munroe, a former contractor for NASA. "

In addition to logistic growth in the number of its articles,^[104] Wikipedia has steadily gained status as a general reference website since its inception in 2001. A logistic function or logistic curve is the most common Sigmoid curve. ^[105] According to Alexa and comScore, Wikipedia is among the ten most visited websites world-wide. Alexa Internet Inc is a California -based Subsidiary company of Amazon comScore is an internet Marketing research company that provides marketing data and services to many of the Internet's largest businesses ^[9][106] Of the top ten, Wikipedia is the only non-profit website. The growth of Wikipedia has been fueled by its dominant position in Google search results;^[107] about 50% of search engine traffic to Wikipedia comes from Google,^[108] a good portion of which is related to academic research. ^[109] In April 2007 the Pew Internet and American Life project found that one third of US Internet users consulted Wikipedia. The Pew Research Center is a Think tank based in Washington D ^[110] In October 2006, the site was estimated to have a hypothetical market value of $580 million if it ran ads. ^[111] On January 26, 2007, Wikipedia was also awarded the fourth highest brand ranking by the readers of brandchannel. Events 1340 - King Edward III of England is declared King of France. Year 2007 ( MMVII) was a Common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. com, receiving 15% of the votes in answer to the question "Which brand had the most impact on our lives in 2006?"^[112]

Wikipedia's content has also been used in academic studies, books, conferences, and court cases. ^[113][114] The Parliament of Canada's website refers to Wikipedia's article on same-sex marriage in the "related links" section of its "further reading" list for the Civil Marriage Act. The Parliament of Canada (Parlement du Canada is Canada 's legislative branch, seated at Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Ontario. Same-sex marriage (also referred to as gay marriage) is a term for a legally or Socially recognized Marriage between two people of the same The Civil Marriage Act (full title " An Act respecting certain aspects of legal capacity for marriage for civil purposes " was Legislation legalizing ^[115] The encyclopedia's assertions are increasingly used as a source by organizations such as the U. S. Federal Courts and the World Intellectual Property Organization^[116] – though mainly for supporting information rather than information decisive to a case. The World Intellectual Property Organization ( WIPO) is one of the 16 specialized agencies of the United Nations. ^[117] Content appearing on Wikipedia has also been cited as a source and referenced in some U.S. intelligence agency reports. The United States Intelligence Community (IC is a cooperative federation of 16 separate United States government agencies that work together to conduct intelligence ^[118]

Wikipedia has also been used as a source in journalism,^[119] sometimes without attribution, and several reporters have been dismissed for plagiarizing from Wikipedia. Journalism is the profession of writing or communicating formally employed by publications and broadcasters for the benefit of a particular Community of people ^{[120][121][122]} In July 2007, Wikipedia was the focus of a 30-minute documentary on BBC Radio 4^[123] which argued that, with increased usage and awareness, the number of references to Wikipedia in popular culture is such that the term is one of a select band of 21st-century nouns that are so familiar (Google, Facebook, YouTube) that they no longer need explanation and are on a par with such 20th-century terms as Hoovering or Coke. Google Inc is an American public corporation, earning revenue from advertising related to its Internet search, e-mail, online Facebook is a social networking Website launched on February 4 2004 YouTube is a video sharing website where users can upload view and share Video clips YouTube was created in February 2005 by three former PayPal employees The Hoover Company started out as an American floor care manufacturer based in North Canton, Ohio. Coca-Cola is a carbonated Soft drink sold in stores restaurants and Vending machines in more than 200 countries Many parody Wikipedia's openness, with characters vandalizing or modifying the online encyclopedia project's articles. Notably, comedian Stephen Colbert has parodied or referenced Wikipedia on numerous episodes of his show The Colbert Report and coined the related term "wikiality". Stephen Tyrone Colbert ( born May 13 1964 is an American Comedian, satirist, Actor and Writer, known for his ironic style The Colbert Report (/kolˈbɛr rəˈpɔr/&mdashthe t is silent in "Colbert" is a Peabody Award and Emmy Award winning American The Colbert Report (/kolˈbɛr rəˈpɔr/&mdashthe t is silent in "Colbert" is a Peabody Award and Emmy Award winning American ^[72]

Wikipedia has also created an impact upon forms of media. Some media sources satirize Wikipedia's susceptibility to inserted inaccuracies, such as a front-page article in The Onion in July 2006 with the title "Wikipedia Celebrates 750 Years of American Independence",^[124] while others may draw upon Wikipedia's statement that anyone can edit, such as "The Negotiation", an episode of The Office, where character Michael Scott said that "Wikipedia is the best thing ever. For the vegetable see Onion. The Onion is an American " fake news " organization "The Negotiation" (also referred to as "Labor Negotiation") is the eighteenth episode of the third season of the U Michael Gary Scott (born March 15, 1964) is a Fictional character on NBC 's The Office portrayed by Steve Carell Anyone in the world can write anything they want about any subject, so you know you are getting the best possible information", and a select few parody Wikipedia's policies, such as the xkcd strip named "Wikipedian Protester", that also included the joke "Semi-protect the Constitution!"

The first documentary film about Wikipedia, entitled Truth in Numbers: The Wikipedia Story, is scheduled for 2009 release. Truth in Numbers – The World According to Wikipedia is an independent American Documentary film now in post-production being produced by Glen Shot on several continents, the film will cover the history of Wikipedia and feature interviews with Wikipedia editors around the world. ^[125][126] Dutch filmmaker IJsbrand van Veelen premiered his 45-minute documentary The Truth According to Wikipedia in April, 2008. Tegenlicht is a television programme of the VPRO, a Dutch public broadcasting organization, its aim is to practice critical journalism ^[127]

On September 16, 2007, The Washington Post reported that Wikipedia had become a focal point in the 2008 election campaign, saying, "Type a candidate's name into Google, and among the first results is a Wikipedia page, making those entries arguably as important as any ad in defining a candidate. Events 1400 - Owain Glyndŵr is declared Prince of Wales by his followers Year 2007 ( MMVII) was a Common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. The Washington Post is the largest and most circulated Newspaper in Washington D Already, the presidential entries are being edited, dissected and debated countless times each day. "^[128] An October 2007 Reuters article, entitled "Wikipedia page the latest status symbol", reported the recent phenomenon of how having a Wikipedia article vindicates one's notability. This article is primarily about Reuters prior to its 2008 merger with Thomson ^[129]

Wikipedia won two major awards in May 2004. ^[130] The first was a Golden Nica for Digital Communities of the annual Prix Ars Electronica contest; this came with a €10,000 (£6,588; $12,700) grant and an invitation to present at the PAE Cyberarts Festival in Austria later that year. The Prix Ars Electronica is one of the most important yearly prizes in the field of electronic and Interactive art, Computer animation, digital culture Austria (Österreich ( officially the Republic of Austria (Republik Österreich The second was a Judges' Webby Award for the "community" category. ^[131] Wikipedia was also nominated for a "Best Practices" Webby.

Related projects

A number of interactive multimedia encyclopedias incorporating entries written by the public existed long before Wikipedia was founded. The first of these was the 1986 BBC Domesday Project, which included text (entered on BBC Micro computers) and photographs from over 1 million contributors in the UK, and covering the geography, art and culture of the UK. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom, the UK or Britain,is a Sovereign state located This was the first interactive multimedia encyclopedia (and was also the first major multimedia document connected through internal links), with the majority of articles being accessible through an interactive map of the UK. The user-interface and part of the content of the Domesday Project have now been emulated on a website. ^[132] One of the most successful early online encyclopedias incorporating entries by the public was h2g2, which was also created by the BBC. h2g2 is a collaborative online encyclopedia project engaged in the construction of in its own words "an unconventional guide to life the universe and everything" The h2g2 encyclopedia was relatively light-hearted, focusing on articles which were both witty and informative. Both of these projects had similarities with Wikipedia, but neither gave full editorial freedom to public users.

Wikipedia has also spawned several sister projects. The first, "In Memoriam: September 11 Wiki",^[133] created in October 2002,^[134] detailed the September 11, 2001 attacks; this project was closed in October 2006. Wiktionary, a dictionary project, was launched in December 2002;^[135] Wikiquote, a collection of quotations, a week after Wikimedia launched, and Wikibooks, a collection of collaboratively written free books. Wiktionary (a Portmanteau of Wiki and Dictionary) is a multilingual, Web -based project to create a Free Wikiquote is one of a family of Wiki -based projects run by the Wikimedia Foundation, running on MediaWiki software Wikibooks (previously called Wikimedia Free Textbook Project and Wikimedia-Textbooks) is a Wikimedia Foundation Wiki for the creation of Wikimedia has since started a number of other projects. ^[136]

A similar non-wiki project, the GNUPedia project, co-existed with Nupedia early in its history; however, it has been retired and its creator, free software figure Richard Stallman, has lent his support to Wikipedia. GNUPedia (later renamed GNE) was a project to create a Free content Encyclopedia (licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License) under the Free software or software libre is Software that can be used studied and modified without restriction and which can be copied and redistributed in modified or unmodified Richard Matthew Stallman (born March 16 1953 often abbreviated " rms " is an American software freedom activist ^[19]

Other websites centered on collaborative knowledge base development have drawn inspiration from or inspired Wikipedia. A knowledge base (or knowledgebase; abbreviated KB, kb or Δ is a special kind of Database for Knowledge management. Some, such as Susning.nu, Enciclopedia Libre, and WikiZnanie likewise employ no formal review process, whereas others use more traditional peer review, such as Encyclopedia of Life, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Scholarpedia, h2g2 and Everything2. Susningnu was/is a Swedish language Wiki, started in October 2001 by Lars Aronsson (also the founder of Project Runeberg) and it ran for three WikiZnanie (ВикиЗнание is a Russian language WikiWiki Encyclopedia released under the FreeBSD Documentation License license and Peer review (also known as refereeing) is the process of subjecting an author's scholarly work research or Ideas to the scrutiny of others who are Encyclopedia of Life ( EOL) is a free online collaborative encyclopedia intended to document all of the 1 The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (SEP is a freely-accessible Online encyclopedia of Philosophy maintained by Stanford University. Scholarpedia is an English-language online Wiki -based Encyclopedia in which articles are written by invited expert authors and are subject to h2g2 is a collaborative online encyclopedia project engaged in the construction of in its own words "an unconventional guide to life the universe and everything" Everything2, Everything2, or E2 for short is a collaborative Web -based community consisting of a database of interlinked user-submitted written

Jimmy Wales, the de facto leader of Wikipedia,^[137] said in an interview in regard to the online encyclopedia Citizendium which is overviewed by experts in their respective fields:^[138] "We welcome a diversity of efforts. Citizendium (ˌsɪtɪˈzɛndiəm "the Citizens Compendium of everything" is an English-language Wiki -based free If Larry's project is able to produce good work, we will benefit from it by copying it back into Wikipedia. "^[139]

See also

• List of encyclopedias
• List of wikis
• Open content
• USA Congressional staff edits to Wikipedia
• User-generated content
• Wikipedia:About
• Wikipedia:Press coverage

Further reading

Press coverage

• "The free-knowledge fundamentalist", The Economist, 2008-06-05. This article contains a list of Encyclopedias, including projects to create new works Open content, a Neologism coined by analogy with " Open source " describes any kind of Creative work published in a format that explicitly allows Some Congressional staff edits to Wikipedia (that is changes to Wikipedia by staff of the United States Congress that directly involved their employees or their User generated content ( UGC, often hyphenated also known as Consumer Generated Media ( CGM) or User created Content ( UCC) refers 2008 ( MMVIII) is the current year in accordance with the Gregorian calendar, a Leap year that started on Tuesday of the Common Events 70 - Titus and his Roman Legions breach the middle wall of Jerusalem in the Siege of Jerusalem Retrieved on 2008-06-05. 2008 ( MMVIII) is the current year in accordance with the Gregorian calendar, a Leap year that started on Tuesday of the Common Events 70 - Titus and his Roman Legions breach the middle wall of Jerusalem in the Siege of Jerusalem  
• Dee, Jonathan. "All the News That's Fit to Print Out", The New York Times Magazine, 2007-07-01. Year 2007 ( MMVII) was a Common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. "July 1st" redirects here For the Ayumi Hamasaki song see H (song. Retrieved on 2008-02-22. 2008 ( MMVIII) is the current year in accordance with the Gregorian calendar, a Leap year that started on Tuesday of the Common Events 1495 - King Charles VIII of France enters Naples to claim the city's throne  
• Giles, Jim. "Wikipedia 2.0 - now with added trust", New Scientist, 2007-09-20. Year 2007 ( MMVII) was a Common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. Events 451 - The Battle of Chalons takes place in North Eastern France. Retrieved on 2008-02-22. 2008 ( MMVIII) is the current year in accordance with the Gregorian calendar, a Leap year that started on Tuesday of the Common Events 1495 - King Charles VIII of France enters Naples to claim the city's throne  
• Miliard, Mike. "Wikipedia Rules", The Phoenix, 2007-12-02. The Phoenix is the name of several Alternative weekly Newspapers published by Phoenix Media/Communications Group of Boston Year 2007 ( MMVII) was a Common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. Events 1409 - The University of Leipzig opens 1755 - The second Eddystone Lighthouse is destroyed by fire Retrieved on 2008-02-22. 2008 ( MMVIII) is the current year in accordance with the Gregorian calendar, a Leap year that started on Tuesday of the Common Events 1495 - King Charles VIII of France enters Naples to claim the city's throne  
• Taylor, Chris. "It's a Wiki, Wiki World", Time, 2005-05-29. Year 2005 ( MMV) was a Common year starting on Saturday (link displays full calendar of the Gregorian calendar. Events 363 - Roman Emperor Julian defeats the Sassanid army in the Battle of Ctesiphon, under the walls of the Retrieved on 2008-02-22. 2008 ( MMVIII) is the current year in accordance with the Gregorian calendar, a Leap year that started on Tuesday of the Common Events 1495 - King Charles VIII of France enters Naples to claim the city's throne  
• Poe, Marshall. Marshall Tillbrook Poe (born December 29, 1961) is an American writer and historian "The Hive", The Atlantic Monthly, 2006-09. The Atlantic (formerly known as The Atlantic Monthly) is an American Magazine founded in Boston in 1857 Retrieved on 2008-03-22. 2008 ( MMVIII) is the current year in accordance with the Gregorian calendar, a Leap year that started on Tuesday of the Common Events 238 - Gordian I and his son Gordian II are proclaimed Roman emperor.  
• Balke, Jeff. For Music Fans: Wikipedia > MySpace Houston Chronicle

Academic studies

• Ulrike Pfeil, Panayiotis Zaphiris, and Chee Siang Ang (2006). The Houston Chronicle is the largest daily Newspaper in Texas, USA. "Cultural differences in collaborative authoring of Wikipedia". Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 12 (1).  
• Joseph M. Reagle Jr. (2005). Do as I do: leadership in the Wikipedia. Wikipedia Drafts.
• Wilkinson, Dennis M. (April 2007). "Assessing the value of cooperation in Wikipedia". First Monday 12 (4).  
• Nielsen, Finn Årup (August 2007). "Scientific citations in Wikipedia". First Monday 12 (8).  

References

External links

• Wikipedia – multilingual portal (contains links to all language editions of the project)
• Wikipedia at the Open Directory Project
• CBC News: I, editor
• Help Edit Wikipedia A wikiHow article. The Open Directory Project ( ODP) also known as dmoz (from directory wikiHow is a wiki-based community with a database of How-to guides
• Class assignment: Write an original Wikipedia article
• Essay about wikipedia
• The Charms of Wikipedia Nicholson Baker article on Wikipedia from The New York Review of Books
• #wikipedia on freenode