Wikipedia

Wikipedia is a Web-based free content encyclopedia that may be read and edited by anyone. It has 195 independent language editions sponsored by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. Entries on traditional encyclopedic topics exist alongside those on almanac, gazetteer and current events topics. It is "an effort to create and distribute a free encyclopedia of the highest possible quality to every single person on the planet in their own language."

Wikipedia contains approximately 1.5 million articles, over 500,000 of which are in its English language edition, over 200,000 in the German language and over 100,000 in the Japanese language. It began as a complement to the expert-written Nupedia on 15 January 2001. Its name is a portmanteau of Wiki, a Hawaiian word meaning "quick" adopted to describe a kind of collaborative software, and encyclopedia. Having steadily gained in popularity,[3] ((Extern link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia#fn_Popularity) it has spawned numerous conceptually related sister projects such as Wiktionary, Wikibooks and Wikinews.

Its articles are edited by volunteers in wiki fashion, meaning articles are constantly subject to change by anyone. Wikipedia's volunteers enforce a policy of "neutral point of view". Under this, the views presented by notable persons or literature are summarised without attempting to determine an objective truth. By its open nature, vandalism is a persistent problem in Wikipedia. Wikipedia's articles are available under the GNU Free Documentation License.

Wikipedia's status as a reference work has been controversial. It has received praise for being free, editable, and covering a wide range of topics. It has been criticized for lack of authority versus a traditional encyclopedia, systemic bias, and for deficiencies in traditional encyclopedic topics. Its articles have been cited by the mass media and academia, and mirrored or forked by websites. Wikipedia's content has not been distributed officially or on a large scale in any physical form.

The text above is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License (GNU FDL).
It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Wikipedia".