About www.Wikipedia.org:
Emphasis:
- Online community sourced encyclopedia
Coverage:
- The known world
- Guidelines include
- must be "encyclopedic" in nature - not just a word definition
- "notable" - something covered in mainstream media or scholarship sources independent of subject
- established knowledge - no original research
Methodology:
- "Five Pillars": Wikipedia is
- Wikipedia is an encyclopedia
- Wikipedia is written from a neutral point of view
- Wikipedia free content
- Editors should treat each other with respect
- Wikipedia has no firm rules
- Anyone can sign up to be an editor to create or edit content
- An editor can move on to different administration levels with different responsibilities (arbitration, special editing rights)
- No one "owns" an article; anyone can edit or suggest changes
- Articles can be flagged as not meeting standards but is up to community to change them
- Events in the news and hot topics are edited in a very timely fashion
- Articles of less interest may be untouched for years
- Mantra is "verifiable, not truth"
Personnel:
- Volunteers - About 70,000 editors!
- Can be anyone
- Areas may have experts who volunteer to keep an area updated
- Lots of documentation to
- Some paid administrative personnel
Independent (Funding, bias?):
- No ads
- Wikimedia Foundation is funding arm
- Mostly by donations; also some institutional grants and gifts
- Donation policy based on keeping clear of influence and includes right to refuse