L12 0601 FactsBlue/en

Five Facts about Wikipedia: Google might have 1,000,000 servers. Yahoo has something like 13,000 staff. We have 679 servers and 131 staff. We’re the fifth most visited website in the world, providing free knowledge to half a billion people every month. Volunteers create Wikipedia, but we have the same costs of any big website: servers, connection, power, rent, and technical staff. We’re funded by our readers, not by ads or corporate sponsors. Wikipedia is offered in 284 languages, with more than 15 million total articles. If everyone reading this donated $5, we’d have enough to cover Wikipedia's expenses. Not everyone donates. But each year enough people decide to give $5, $20, $50 or whatever they can to protect and sustain Wikipedia.

Select your gift amount: $5 $10 $20 $25 $50 $100 $250 Other: A personal appeal from Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales: Google might have close to a million servers. Yahoo has something like 13,000 staff. We have 679 servers and 131 employees. Wikipedia is the #5 site on the web and serves 482 million different people every month – with billions of page views. Commerce is fine. Advertising is not evil. But it doesn't belong here. Not in Wikipedia. Wikipedia is something special. It is like a library or a public park. It is like a temple for the mind. It is a place we can all go to think, to learn, to share our knowledge with others. When I founded Wikipedia, I could have made it into a for-profit company with advertising banners, but I decided to do something different. We’ve worked hard over the years to keep it lean and tight. We fulfill our mission, and leave waste to others. If everyone reading this donated $5, we would only have to fundraise for one day a year. But not everyone can or will donate. And that's fine. Each year just enough people decide to give. This year, please consider making a donation of $5, $20, $50 or whatever you can to protect and sustain Wikipedia. Thanks, Jimmy Wales Wikipedia Founder

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