Wikimedia Foundation

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"WikiMedia" and "Wikimedia" redirect here. For the software used by the foundation, see MediaWiki.
For the Wikimedia Foundation's wiki-based web site devoted to the coordination of all its projects, see Wikipedia:Meta.
Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.

Logo of the Wikimedia Foundation
Type 501(c)(3) charitable organization
Founded 20 June 2003
Headquarters San Francisco, California, USA Flag of the United States
Key people Florence Nibart-Devouard, Chair of the Board
Jimmy Wales, Chairman Emeritus[1]
Area served Worldwide
Focus Free, open content, wiki-based internet projects
Method Wikipedia, Wiktionary, Wikiquote, Wikibooks (including Wikijunior), Wikisource, Wikimedia Commons, Wikispecies, Wikinews, Wikiversity and Meta-Wiki
Revenue $2,734,909 (2007)[2]
Employees 19 paid employee positions
Website wikimediafoundation.org

The Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. is a non-profit charitable organization headquartered at Stillman Street, San Francisco, California, USA,[3] and organized under the laws of the state of Florida. It operates several online collaborative projects including Wikipedia, Wiktionary, Wikiquote, Wikibooks (including Wikijunior), Wikisource, Wikimedia Commons, Wikispecies, Wikinews, Wikiversity, and Meta-Wiki.

The Foundation's creation was officially announced by Wikipedia co-founder[4][5] Jimmy Wales, who was running Wikipedia within his company Bomis, on June 20, 2003.

Contents

[edit] Foundation goals

The Wikimedia Foundation falls under section 501(c)(3) of the United States Internal Revenue Code as a public charity. Its National Taxonomy of Exempt Entities (NTEE) code is B60 (Adult, Continuing Education).[6][7] The Foundation's by-laws declare a statement of purpose of collecting and developing educational content and to disseminate it effectively and globally.[8]

The Wikimedia Foundation's stated goal is to develop and maintain open content, wiki-based projects and to provide the full contents of those projects to the public free of charge.[9]

In addition to the multilingual general encyclopedia Wikipedia, the Foundation manages a multi-language dictionary and thesaurus named Wiktionary, an encyclopedia of quotations named Wikiquote, a repository of source texts in any language named Wikisource, and a collection of e-book texts for students (such as textbooks and annotated public domain books) named Wikibooks. Wikijunior is a subproject of Wikibooks that specializes in books for children.

[edit] Foundation operations

The continued growth of each of the Wikimedia projects is dependent mostly on donations but the Wikimedia Foundation also increases its revenue by alternative means of funding such as grants, sponsorship, services (datafeed) and brand merchandising.

[edit] Foundation history and growth

The name "Wikimedia" was coined by Sheldon Rampton in a post to the English Wikipedia's mailing list in March 2003.[10] The name has been criticized for its similarity to the name of Wikipedia and the software it runs on, MediaWiki; this sometimes leads to confusion among people new to the project.

With the Foundation's announcement, Wales also transferred ownership of all Wikipedia, Wiktionary and Nupedia domain names to Wikimedia along with the copyrights for all materials related to these projects that were created by Bomis employees or Wales himself. The computer equipment used to run all the Wikimedia projects was also donated by Wales to the Foundation. The Foundation also acquired the domain names wikimedia.org and wikimediafoundation.org.

In April 2005, the U.S. Internal Revenue Service approved (by letter) the Foundation as an educational foundation in the category "Adult, Continuing Education" means all contributions to the Wikimedia Foundation are tax deductible for U.S. federal income tax purposes.

On December 11, 2006 the Wikimedia Foundation board acknowledged that the corporation could not become the membership organization initially planned but never implemented due to an inability to meet the registration requirements of Florida Statute. Accordingly the bylaws were amended to remove all reference to membership rights and activities. The decision to change the bylaws was passed by the Board unanimously.

On September 25, 2007 the Wikimedia Foundation board acknowledged that the operations would be moving to the San Francisco Bay Area in late 2007. Major considerations cited for choosing San Francisco were proximity to like-minded organizations and potential partners as well as cheaper and more convenient international travel than is available from St. Petersburg.[11][12][13]

[edit] Board of Trustees

In January 2004, Jimmy Wales appointed his business partners Tim Shell and Michael Davis to the Board of the Wikimedia Foundation. In June 2004, an election was held for two user representative Board members. Following one month of campaigning and two weeks of online voting, Angela Beesley and Florence Nibart-Devouard were elected to join the board. In late 2004, Wales and Beesley launched a startup company, Wikia, affiliated with neither Wikimedia nor Bomis. In July 2005, Beesley and Nibart-Devouard were re-elected to the Board.

On July 1, 2006, Beesley resigned from the board effective upon election of her successor, expressing concern about "certain events and tendencies that have arisen within the organization since the start of this year," but stating her intent to continue to participate in the Wikimedia projects, and in the formation of an Australian chapter. After her resignation, a special election was held in September, to finish Beesley's term, ending with the mid-2007 election. The election was won by Erik Möller.

In October 2006, Nibart-Devouard replaced Wales as chairwoman of the Foundation. On December 8, 2006, the board expanded to seven people with the appointments of Kat Walsh and Oscar van Dillen. Effective December 15, 2006, Jan-Bart de Vreede was appointed to replace Shell.

In the June 2007 election, Möller and Walsh were reelected; van Dillen, who ran for re-election, was narrowly edged by Frieda Brioschi.

The appointed terms for Wales, Davis, and de Vreede all expire in December 2007. Nibart-Devouard's elected term expires in June 2008; the other three Board members have terms that expire in June 2009.

In December 2007, Möller resigned from the Board of Trustees, and was hired as Deputy Director by the Executive Director.

In February 2008, Florence Devouard announced the addition to the board of two new members for a term which will expire at next board elections (june-july 2008): (1) American lawyer and Chair of the Commmunication Committee, Michael Snow; (2) Lithuanian computer software engineer, MySQl employee, and longtime member of the core tech team, Domas Mituzas[14]

[edit] Volunteer committees and positions

In 2004, the Foundation appointed Tim Starling as Developer Liaison to help improve the organization of the development of the MediaWiki software, Daniel Mayer as Chief Financial Officer (finance, budgeting and coordination of fund drives), and Erik Möller as the Content Partnership Coordinator.

In May 2005, the Foundation announced the appointment of seven people to official positions:[15]

  • Brion Vibber as Chief Technical Officer (Vibber was also an employee of the Foundation, with other duties)
  • Domas Mituzas as Hardware Officer
  • Jens Frank as Developer Liaison
  • Möller as Chief Research Officer
  • Danny Wool as Grants Coordinator
  • Elisabeth Bauer as Press Officer
  • Jean-Baptiste Soufron as Lead Legal Coordinator

Möller resigned in August 2005 due to differences with the board, and was replaced by James Forrester. In February 2007, Forrester resigned and the Board appointed Gregory Maxwell to the position, renamed "Chief Research Coordinator".[16]

In January 2006, the Foundation created several committees, including the Communication Committee, in an attempt to further organize the activities of the Foundation, essentially handled by volunteers at that time.[17] Starling resigned that month to spend more time on his PhD program.

[edit] Employees

January 2008 Wikimedia Organization employee chartPDF (28.7 KiB)
January 2008 Wikimedia Organization employee descriptions

The functions of the Wikimedia Foundation were, for the first few years, executed almost entirely by volunteers. In the Spring of 2005, the Foundation only had two employees, Danny Wool, a co-ordinator, and Brion Vibber, a software manager. Though the number of employees has grown, the bulk of Foundation work continues to be done by volunteers, with the Foundation having very few employees.

As of October 4, 2006, the Wikimedia Foundation had five paid employees:[18] two programmers, an administrative assistant, a co-ordinator handling fundraising and grants, and interim executive director[19] Brad Patrick, previously the Foundation's general counsel. Brad Patrick ceased his activity as interim director in January 2007, and then resigned from his position as legal counsel, effective April 1, 2007, replaced by Mike Godwin as general counsel and legal coordinator in July 2007.[20] Three further technical contractors were also appointed in December 2006: part-time hardware manager Kyle Anderson in Tampa, full-time MediaWiki software developer Tim Starling, and part-time networking coordinator Mark Bergsma.

In January 2007, Carolyn Doran was named Chief Operating Officer and Sandy Ordonez came on board as Communication Manager.[21] Doran had begun working as a part-time bookkeeper for the Foundation in 2006 after being sent by a temporary agency. Doran later left the foundation in July 2007, and Sue Gardner was hired as Consultant and Special Advisor (later CEO). Some months after Doran's departure it was identified[22] that she had been a convicted felon, with a DUI arrest during her tenure at the Foundation and a substantial criminal history, including shooting her boyfriend and charges of complicity in credit card forgery.[23] After internal examination it was stated that no losses had taken place in this respect.[citation needed]

Danny Wool, officially the grant coordinator but also largely involved in fundraising and business development, resigned in March 2007. In April 2007, the Foundation added a new position, Chapter Coordinator, and appointed Delphine Ménard, then in the position of Volunteer Coordinator, to fill it, with Cary Bass appointed to replace Ménard in co-ordinating of volunteer services. In May 2007, Vishal Patel was hired to assist in business development.[24]

As of December 18, 2007, the number of employees had grown to twelve.[25]

[edit] Advisory Board

The Advisory Board is an international network of experts who have agreed to give the Foundation meaningful help on a regular basis in many different areas, including law, organizational development, technology, policy, and outreach.[26] The current members are:

[edit] Wikimedia coordination and projects

[edit] Wikimedia projects

 It has been suggested that List of Wikimedia projects be merged into this article or section. (Discuss)

The launch dates shown below are when official domains were established for the projects and/or beta versions were launched; preliminary test versions at other domains are not considered.

Name URL Launching date Description
Wikipedia www.wikipedia.org 2001-01-15 Encyclopedia containing more than 9 million articles in 252 languages.
Wiktionary www.wiktionary.org 2002-12-12 Dictionary cataloging meanings, synonyms, etymologies and translations.
Wikibooks www.wikibooks.org 2003-07-10 Collection of free educational textbooks and learning materials.
Wikiquote www.wikiquote.org 2003-07-10 Collection of quotations structured in numerous ways.
Wikisource www.wikisource.org 2003-11-24 Project to provide and translate free source documents, such as public domain texts.
Wikimedia Commons commons.wikimedia.org 2004-09-07 Repository of images, sounds, videos and general media, containing more than 1,500,000 files.
Wikimedia Incubator incubator.wikimedia.org 2006-06-02 Used to test possible new Wikimedia projects and new languages for existing projects.
Wikispecies species.wikimedia.org 2004-09-13 Directory of species data on animalia, plantae, fungi, bacteria, archaea, protista and all other forms of life.
Wikinews www.wikinews.org 2004-12-03 News source containing original reporting by citizen journalists from many countries.
Wikiversity www.wikiversity.org 2006-08-15 Educational and research materials and activities - in beta phase.

[edit] Board of Trustees (current list)

The foundation maintains a current list online.[1]

[edit] Economy

Wikimedia Foundation operates with predominantly volunteer staff and relies on public contributions and grants to fund its mission of providing free knowledge to every person in the world.[27] It is exempt from federal income tax[27][28] and from state income tax.[27][29] It is not a private foundation and contributions to it qualify as charitable contribution deductions.[27]

At the beginning of 2006, the net assets were $270,000. During the year, the organization received a total support and revenue of $1,510,000, with concurrent expenses of $790,000. The increase in net assets was $720,000, making it reach a total of one million dollars.[27] (See also foundation:Finance report)

[edit] Local chapters

World map showing countries that have local chapters in blue.
World map showing countries that have local chapters in blue.

The Wikimedia projects have an international scope, and their outreach has already made a significant impact throughout the world. To continue this success on an organizational level, Wikimedia is building an international network of associated organizations.

Local chapters are self-dependent organizations that share the goals of the Wikimedia Foundation and support them within a specified geographical region. They support the Wikimedia Foundation, the Wikimedia community and the Wikimedia projects in different ways - by collecting donations, organizing local events and projects and spreading the word of Wikimedia, Free Content and Wiki culture. They also provide the community and potential partners with a point of contact capable of fulfilling specific local needs.

The local chapters are self-dependent associations with no legal control of or responsibility for the websites of the Wikimedia Foundation and vice versa.

Country Title URL Since
Flag of Argentina Argentina Wikimedia Argentina www.wikimedia.org.ar 02007-09-01 1 September 2007
Flag of France France Wikimédia France www.wikimedia.fr 02004-10-23 23 October 2004
Flag of Germany Germany Wikimedia Deutschland www.wikimedia.de 02004-06-13 13 June 2004
Flag of Israel Israel Wikimedia Israel il.wikimedia.org 02007-06-26 26 June 2007
Flag of Italy Italy Wikimedia Italia www.wikimedia.it 02005-06-17 17 June 2005
Flag of the Netherlands Netherlands Wikimedia Nederland nl.wikimedia.org 02006-03-27 27 March 2006
Flag of Poland Poland Wikimedia Polska pl.wikimedia.org 02005-11-18 18 November 2005
Flag of Serbia Serbia Wikimedia Србије rs.wikimedia.org 02005-12-03 3 December 2005
Flag of Sweden Sweden Wikimedia Sverige meta.wikimedia.org 02007-12-11 11 December 2007
Flag of Switzerland Switzerland Wikimedia CH www.wikimedia.ch 02006-05-14 14 May 2006
Flag of the Republic of China Taiwan 中華民國維基媒體協會 www.wikimedia.tw 02007-07-04 4 July 2007
Flag of the United Kingdom United Kingdom Wikimedia UK www.wikimedia.org.uk 02006-02-14 14 February 2006

[edit] Wikimedia Deutschland

The German Wikipedians were the first to form a chapter of Wikimedia outside the United States. Wikimedia Deutschland was formed as Eingetragener Verein (e. V.) (registered association) on June 13, 2004. The chapter organized several Wikipedia presentations, among others at the computer fairs Cebit in 2005, the Systems in Munich 2005 and the bookfair in Leipzig 2005.

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b Cbrown1023. Board of Trustees. Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on 2008-01-15. Retrieved on 2008-01-19.
  2. ^ Cbrown1023. Finance report. Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on 2008-02-08. Retrieved on 2008-02-08.
  3. ^ Walsh, Jay. Stillman Wiki Wall Photo Contest. Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on 2008-02-01. Retrieved on 2008-02-02. “As many of you probably know, the Wikimedia Foundation has relocated its main offices to San Francisco. Our new space on Stillman Street is still being organized.”
  4. ^ Meyers, Peter. "Fact-Driven? Collegial? This Site Wants You", New York Times, 2001-09-20. Retrieved on 2007-07-31. "It's kind of surprising that you could just open up a site and let people work," said Jimmy Wales, Wikipedia's co-founder and the chief executive of Bomis, a San Diego search engine company that donates the computer resources for the project." 
  5. ^ Bergstein, Brian. "Sanger says he co-started Wikipedia", ABC News, Associated Press, 2007-03-25. Retrieved on 2007-07-31. "The nascent Web encyclopedia Citizendium springs from Larry Sanger, a philosophy Ph.D. who counts himself as a co-founder of Wikipedia, the site he now hopes to usurp. The claim doesn't seem particularly controversial - Sanger has long been cited as a co-founder. Yet the other founder, Jimmy Wales, isn't happy about it." 
  6. ^ NTEE Classification System. Retrieved on 2008-01-28.
  7. ^ NCCS definition for Adult Education. Retrieved on 2008-01-28.
  8. ^ Jd. Wikimedia Foundation bylaws. Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on 2007-04-20. Retrieved on 2008-01-28.
  9. ^ Devouard, Florence. Mission statement. Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on 2007-09-01. Retrieved on 2008-01-28.
  10. ^ Rampton, Sheldon (2003-03-16). Wikipedia English mailing list message.
  11. ^ Carlos Moncada (2007-09-25). Wikimedia Foundation Moving To Another Bay Area. The Tampa Tribune.
  12. ^ Richard Mullins (2007-09-26). Online Encyclopedia To Leave St. Petersburg For San Francisco. The Tampa Tribune.
  13. ^ Kim, Ryan (2007-10-10). Wikipedia team plans move to San Francisco. San Francisco Chronicle.
  14. ^ Devouard, Florence (2008-02-13). [Foundation-l] [Announcement] Welcome to our two new board members. Retrieved on 2008-02-13.
  15. ^ Snow, Michael. Wikimedia names seven to official positions. The Wikipedia Signpost. Wikipedia. Archived from the original on 2005-05-30. Retrieved on 2005-05-30.
  16. ^ Naoko, Kizu. Resolution:Chief Research Coordinator. Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on 2007-03-01. Retrieved on 2007-03-01.
  17. ^ Devouard, Florence. Resolutions. Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on 2008-01-21. Retrieved on 2008-02-04.
  18. ^ Jimmy Wales. Charlie Rose (46:22) (internet video) [TV-Series]. Google Video: Charlie Rose. Retrieved on 2006-12-08.
  19. ^ Korg. Wikimedia Foundation Announces Interim Executive Director. Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on 2006-06-12. Retrieved on 2006-06-12.
  20. ^ Mailing list post by the Chair of the Wikimedia Foundation's Board of Trustees announcing the appointment.
  21. ^ Danny. Current staff. Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on 2007-02-01. Retrieved on 2007-02-01.
  22. ^ Metz, Cade. "Wikipedia COO was convicted felon", 2007-12-13. Retrieved on 2007-12-27. 
  23. ^ Bergstein, Brian. "Felon Became COO of Wikipedia Foundation", 2007-12-21. Retrieved on 2007-12-27. 
  24. ^ Bass, Cary. Current staff. Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on 2007-05-18. Retrieved on 2007-05-18.
  25. ^ Patrick, Brad. Current staff. Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on 2007-12-18. Retrieved on 2007-12-18.
  26. ^ Garsided. Advisory Board. Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on 2008-02-01. Retrieved on 2008-02-12.
  27. ^ a b c d e Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. - Financial Statements - June 30, 2006, 2005, and 2004 (PDF). Wikimedia Foundation (2006-12-06). Retrieved on 2006-12-06.
  28. ^ See also Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code of the Florida Statutes
  29. ^ See also Chapter 220.13 of the Florida Statutes

[edit] External links

Wikinews
Wikinews has related news:
Wikimedia Commons has media related to:
v • d • e
Projects of the Wikimedia Foundation
Wikibooks (Wikijunior) · Wikimedia Commons · Wikinews · Wikipedia · Wikiquote · Wikisource · Wikispecies · Wikiversity · Wiktionary · Meta-Wiki
v • d • e
History of Wikipedia
Main articles Bomis · Nupedia · Wikipedia · Wikimedia Foundation · Wikimania · MediaWiki
People Jimmy Wales · Larry Sanger · Tim Shell · Florence Devouard · Angela Beesley
Events and individuals Blocking of Wikipedia in mainland China · Congressional staffer edits to Wikipedia · Essjay controversy · Seigenthaler controversy · WikiScanner  · Chris Benoit controversy  · Truth in Numbers: The Wikipedia Story
Wikimedia projects Wikibooks · Wikimedia Commons · Wiktionary · Wikisource · Wikiquote · Wikinews · Wikiversity
Related projects and forks Citizendium · Enciclopedia Libre · Interpedia · Veropedia · Wikia · WikiZnanie · Wikinfo · Wikiweise
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation"
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