Jimmy Wales (founder of Wikipedia) Interview on CSPAN's Q&A

Q: What is Wikipedia? A: A freely licensed encyclopedia written by thousands of volunteers on the internet.

Idea came from the free software movement (e.g., Apache).

Realized that the principle of collaboration on software could be expanded on to the internet

WikiWiki is a Hawaiin word meaning quick.

January 2001 first started.

Received support from Yahoo and likely Google in the future. Yahoo donated servers. “Google and Yahoo depend upon the internet not sucking and we help the internet not suck.”

Wikipedia is what people thought the Internet was going to be.

Alexa has them rated as 40th for traffic. More reach or unique users than NY Times, USA Today and Washington Post combined.

One employee.

90 servers mostly in Florida. 150 soon. Really overloaded now.

Discusses WikiNews and debates within the community - not necessarily right and left.

Trying to build a healthy collaborative community.

Q: Can anyone take material in Wikipedia and put it in a book?

A: Yes. They have to be careful with the name and attribution, but yes. In fact we are encouraging educational uses of this material, particularly in 3rd World countries.

Looking at ways to validate content (e.g., approved, version, 1.0) for level of publishing.

Emphasis on neutrality.