Scribd
Upload
23 views

Wikipedia Jimmy Wales Larry Sanger Rick Gates Free-As-In-Freedom Distinct Open Source Richard Stallman

Wikipedia was formally launched in 2001 by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger, though the concept of a free online encyclopedia was first proposed in 1993 and 2000. Originally intended to complement Nupedia, an expert-edited online encyclopedia, Wikipedia quickly overtook it using wiki technology and became a global, multilingual project. Wikipedia is now one of the most popular websites in the world, receiving over 18 billion page views per month globally and over 117 million monthly unique visitors from the United States alone.

Uploaded by

Chanikya Kamini
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
23 views

Wikipedia Jimmy Wales Larry Sanger Rick Gates Free-As-In-Freedom Distinct Open Source Richard Stallman

Wikipedia was formally launched in 2001 by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger, though the concept of a free online encyclopedia was first proposed in 1993 and 2000. Originally intended to complement Nupedia, an expert-edited online encyclopedia, Wikipedia quickly overtook it using wiki technology and became a global, multilingual project. Wikipedia is now one of the most popular websites in the world, receiving over 18 billion page views per month globally and over 117 million monthly unique visitors from the United States alone.

Uploaded by

Chanikya Kamini
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 1

The history of Wikipedia formally began with the launch of Wikipedia on 15 January 2001 two days

after registering the domain[2] by Jimmy Wales andLarry Sanger. Its technological and conceptual
underpinnings predate this; the earliest known proposal for an online encyclopedia was made
by Rick Gates in 1993,[3] but the concept of a free-as-in-freedom online encyclopedia (as distinctfrom
mere open source)[4] was proposed by Richard Stallman in December 2000.[5]
Crucially, Stallman's concept specifically included the idea that no central organization should control
editing. This characteristic was in stark contrast to contemporary digital encyclopedias such
as Microsoft Encarta, Encyclopdia Britannica, and even Bomis's Nupedia, which was Wikipedia's
direct predecessor. In 2001, the license for Nupedia was changed to GFDL, and Wales and Sanger
launched Wikipedia using the concept and technology of awiki pioneered in 1995 by Ward
Cunningham.[6] Initially, Wikipedia was intended to complement Nupedia, an online encyclopedia
project edited solely by experts, by providing additional draft articles and ideas for it. In practice,
Wikipedia quickly overtook Nupedia, becoming a global project in multiple languages and inspiring a
wide range of other online reference projects.
According to Alexa Internet, Wikipedia is the world's sixth-most-popular website in terms of overall
visitor traffic.[7] Wikipedia's total worldwide monthly readership is approximately 495 million.
[8]

Worldwide in August 2015, WMF Labs tallied 18 billion page views for the month.[9] According

to comScore, Wikipedia receives over 117 million monthly unique visitors from the United States
alone.

You might also like