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Wikimedia Foundation – Answers

June 2014

Foundation: How does the Wikimedia Foundation support diversity?

What is the Wikimedia Foundation's policy on "affirmative action", in both hiring and editing practices? How does it promote diversity?

The Wikimedia Foundation is committed to equality. Its non discrimination policy prohibits discrimination against prospective users or employees on the basis of race, color, gender, religion, national origin, age, disability, sexual orientation, or any other legally protected characteristics. In accordance, in keeping with its policy on pluralism, internationalism, and diversity, it solicits employees and contractors from around the world and takes proactive steps to create from the resulting diverse community of employees and contractors a cohesive, functioning team.

In terms of volunteer contributions, that non discrimination policy is built into the way our website works. Reading and editing our projects is open to people without any regard to their race, color, gender, religion, or other personal factors; because we do not require demographic information from volunteer contributors, we do not know this information about the people who choose to edit. That doesn't mean that the Wikimedia Foundation is uninterested in this information. We do conduct surveys of editors which explore in part the diversity of the editing community. The first such study was conducted in April 2011; the results can be read here. Demographic information begins on page 18. A second survey was conducted later in 2011, with results here. Demographic data begins on page 5. Reporting on the 2012 editor survey is currently ongoing; we will have a better idea of the demographic trends of our volunteer contributors after this is complete. (You can read more about this, and also see the results when posted, here.)

One of the ways we are working to encourage diversity is in raising our profile around the world, making sure that as many people as possible are aware of and have access to our projects. For instance, with Wikipedia Zero we seek to reduce barriers to accessing and contributing to free knowledge in developing countries by helping to coordinate mobile access to Wikipedia free of data charges. For many readers in developing countries, their primary (and often only) access to the internet is via mobile. You can read more information about this program at Mobile partnerships. --Maggie Dennis (talk) 10:34, 13 June 2014 (UTC)