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From Wikipedia user Akshaya Iyengar I can confidently say that over 50% of the knowledge I have gained in the last 5 years has come from Wikipedia. Growing up in a small city in India, not all books were available there, and the libraries not always too well equipped. Later, when I was working on a technical degree, it was almost impossible to get all the information I needed from standard textbooks alone. For people everywhere, it’s indispensably useful to have a site like Wikipedia. Wikipedia is run by the not-for-profit Wikimedia Foundation. It has real-world costs to pay for: servers, technology and a small staff. Every year, on my birthday, I make a small but earnest donation, to give back to the community that substantially enriched my life and helped me pursue a career as a software developer. Last year, I submitted a note with my $25 donation and the staff asked me to write an appeal of my own. Will you donate $5, $20, $50 or whatever you can to support Wikipedia this year? It is each of our donations that help to keep Wikipedia free for all. I hope that Wikipedia continues to grow, and remain free. I believe it is the best gift from this generation to the future ones. Thank you, Akshaya Iyengar Software Developer and Wikipedia user

Select your gift amount: $10 $20 $25 $35 $50 $100 $250 Other: Why your donation is needed: Wikipedia is non-profit, but it's the #5 website in the world -- serving 470 million people every month with billions of page views. We work hard to keep our operation lean. Google might have close to a million servers. Yahoo has something like 13,000 staff. We have 679 servers and 95 staff. We will never run ads. Commerce is fine. Advertising is not evil. But it doesn't belong in Wikipedia. If everyone reading this made a small donation, we would only have to fundraise for a few hours. Not everyone can or will donate, but each year just enough people decide to give. We only raise what we need. When we've raised our budget, we stop fundraising for the year. This year, please consider making a donation of $5, $20, $50 or whatever you can to protect and sustain Wikipedia.

By donating, you are sharing your information with the Wikimedia Foundation, the nonprofit organization that hosts Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects, and its service providers in the U.S. and elsewhere pursuant to our donor privacy policy. We do not sell or trade your information to anyone. For more information, please read our donor policy. Make a monthly donation Other ways to give Frequently asked questions Tax deductibility information