Wikimedia Foundation

Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.
AbbreviationWMF
FoundedJune 20, 2003; 23 years ago (2003-06-20)
FounderJimmy Wales
Founded atSt. Petersburg, Florida, U.S.
Type501(c)(3), charitable organization
20-0049703
FocusFree, open-content, wiki-based Internet projects
Location
Area served
Worldwide
ProductsWikipedia, Wiktionary, Wikimedia Commons, Wikidata, Wikifunctions, Wikiquote, Wikibooks, Wikisource, Wikispecies, Wikinews, Wikiversity, Wikivoyage, MediaWiki
Membership
Board-only
Key people
Revenue
Expenses
  • Increase US$81.4 million (2018)
  • 69.1 million (2017)
Endowment (2019)US $35 million
Employees
~301 staff/contractors (as of August 8, 2018)
Volunteers
Wikimedia community
WebsiteWikimediaFoundation.org

The Wikimedia Foundation is an American non-profit foundation. Their main headquarters is located in San Francisco, United States. The Foundation runs many projects with the Wiki idea and MediaWiki software with Wikipedia being the most famous.

Other sites include Wiktionary, Wikiquote, Wikisource, Wikinews, Wikibooks, Wikiversity, Wikimedia Commons, Wikifunctions, Wikidata, Wikivoyage and Meta-Wiki. The Foundation runs other Wikis that are more closely related to the operations of the Foundation itself. They include the Wikimedia Foundation wiki, the MediaWiki wiki, the Test Wikipedia, the Wikimedia Incubator, Bugzilla, and the Wikimania wiki.

History

Founding

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

Operation

The foundation gets most of its funds from donations, as it is non-profit. It also looks for grants. Some companies[clarification needed] have helped Wikimedia by giving free computer hardwares and by hosting its servers. Since people can write the wikis, Wikimedia projects are free to use. Funds are used to run computer servers and to pay staff. The Foundation had 700 employees in 2023.

2010s

2020s

Projects

Content projects

As of 2021, Wikimedia has many content projects. These include:

Infrastructure projects

There are other projects that help the Wikimedia movement's infrastructure and interface. They do this by making them work smoothly. These include:

Public Opinions

The United States Congressional Oversight and Government Reform Committee opened an investigation into the operation of Wikipedia in September 2025. The initiative was initiated by two Republican representatives, who explained their actions in a letter from Congress to the Wikimedia Foundation. The commission's investigation is charged with examining "efforts by foreign entities and individuals within academic institutions funded by U.S. taxpayer dollars to influence American public opinion".

Boards

Board of Trustees

Board members at Wikimania 2009 in Buenos Aires

The Board of Trustees in charge of the affairs of the Foundation has 10 members:

The Signpost reported that two new trustees were elected in 2019:

Advisory Board

The Foundation also has an Advisory Board, 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.

Other websites

References

  1. ↑ "2014 Return of Organization Exempt From Income Tax (form 990)" (PDF). WMF (Public Inspection Copy). September 14, 2016.
  2. ↑ "Contact us - Wikimedia Foundation". Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on June 25, 2017. Retrieved 8 June 2017.
  3. 1 2 Wikimedia Foundation (20 July 2018). "Wikimedia Foundation announces Tanya Capuano as new Trustee, alongside leadership appointments at 14th annual Wikimania". Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on July 20, 2018. Retrieved July 21, 2018.
  4. 1 2 "Wikimedia Foundation, Inc, Financial Statements, June 30, 2018 and 2017" (PDF). Wikimedia Foundation. September 26, 2018. Archived (PDF) from the original on March 9, 2021. Retrieved September 29, 2019.
  5. ↑ Brent, Marc (24 April 2019). "Peter Baldwin, Lisbet Rausing give an additional $3.5 million to the Wikimedia Endowment". Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on April 25, 2019. Retrieved April 25, 2019. With their gifts, the Endowment has now increased to more than $35 million and have moved us that much closer to our goal of $100 million.
  6. ↑ "Staff and contractors page (Wikimedia Foundation website)". Wikimedia Foundation. September 21, 2017. Archived from the original on June 2, 2016. Retrieved August 8, 2018.
  7. ↑ "List of Wikimedia wikis on Meta". Archived from the original on 2012-01-23. Retrieved 2010-11-22.
  8. ↑ Meyers, Peter (2001-09-20). "Fact-Driven? Collegial? This Site Wants You". New York Times. Archived from the original on 2022-05-27. Retrieved 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.
  9. ↑ Bergstein, Brian (2007-03-25). "Sanger says he co-started Wikipedia". ABC News. Associated Press. Archived from the original on 2009-02-06. Retrieved 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.
  10. ↑ Chozick, Amy (27 June 2013). "Jimmy Wales is Not an Internet Billionaire". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 2013-06-30. Retrieved 2019-07-05.
  11. ↑ Cbrown1023. "Board of Trustees". Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on August 19, 2017. Retrieved July 22, 2015.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  12. ↑ "Wikipedia". Britannica. Retrieved 2023-06-09.
  13. ↑ Reed, Betsy (26 April 2013). "Welcome to Wikidata! Now what?". The Guardian. Retrieved 2023-06-09.
  14. ↑ Sutherland, Joe. Emmanuel Engelhart, Inventor of Kiwix: the Offline Wikipedia Browser. In: Wikimedia Blog. 12 September 2014. Accessed on 26 November 2014.
  15. ↑ Barrett, Daniel J. (October 2008). MediaWiki. O'Reilly Media. ISBN 978-0-596-51979-7. Retrieved April 23, 2010.
  16. ↑ Republicans investigate Wikipedia over allegations of organized bias, The_Hill, 2025-08-27
  17. ↑ "Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2019-06-30/Op-Ed". Archived from the original on 2019-06-30. Retrieved 2019-07-16.
  18. ↑ "Advisory Board". Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on 2018-01-31. Retrieved 2009-10-07.