Answers/Wikimedia Foundation

Introduction Content questions How to report a problem with content, request new content, or find out more information. Volunteering How to create or contribute content, translate content, or help develop MediaWiki software. Licensing How to copy content on Wikimedia Foundation's sites, donate your own, or report unlicensed use of your information. About the Wikimedia Foundation Information about the Wikimedia Foundation and the Wikimedia movement or business proposals for the Wikimedia Foundation. Donors Find out how to donate and information about how your money is spent, as well as what to do in case of problems. Press If you're a member of the press looking to contact Wikipedia. Local Chapters For information about Wikimedia's international network of associated organizations or how to contact them.

If the answer to the question you seek or information on where to get it is not below or provided in the links to the left, please see our frequently asked questions as well as the Answers/Index for older responses to general interest questions. Otherwise, please feel free to email us at answerswikimediaorg (See Answers/Process for information and terms.) If you are interested in general discussion about Wikimedia and its projects with the community, please join one of our public mailing lists or IRC channels. If you would like to know if a particular website belongs to us (click to expand or collapse) Because "wiki" is a generic term that may be used by anyone, there is sometimes confusion about which websites the Wikimedia Foundation hosts. Beyond this, other sites may use MediaWiki software—which is free and open for anyone—and therefore look similar to our projects. The only projects which are part of the Wikimedia Foundation are those listed at wmf:Our projects. If you're trying to identify who owns a website that does not belong to us, you may need to look for a link on the site that indicates it is "About" the site or use a WHOIS tool. If you should happen upon a website that uses the Wikimedia Foundation's marks or indicates it is hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation but that is not on the list, we would appreciate you letting us know at answerswikimediaorg. If you would like to tell us an idea you have for a new project or to improve an existing project (click to expand or collapse) We appreciate that you're spending time thinking about ways to improve Wikimedia. Because the Wikimedia Foundation does not create or curate the contents on Wikipedia or the other sites we manage —this work is done by a vast community of volunteers—we are not able to implement most suggestions directly by email request. Changes to existing projects, like Wikipedia, and new project approval (like new languages for existing projects or entirely new concepts for sites) come from this community of volunteers. If you want to propose an entirely new project, please visit Project proposals. If you'd like to propose that we create a new language version of an existing project, please visit Requests for new languages. If what you'd like to propose is a new feature for one of our existing projects, please share your thoughts with the volunteers at that project. There are community forums for ideas and suggestions. Most of our projects have a link on the right hand side to community discussion points, sometimes given titles like "village pump" or "cafe" or "travelers pub." For example, the English Wikipedia discusses ideas and proposals here. Just as article pages can be edited by anyone, so can these discussion pages. If you're not already familiar with how to edit our pages, the MediaWiki guide on editing can be useful. If you need further assistance, either with editing or with finding a proper home for your discussion, the community maintains a volunteer email response team who should be able to assist. They can be reached at infowikimediaorg. Please be sure to tell them specifically which project and in what language you are working on; if you are more comfortable corresponding in languages other than English, they can in many cases communicate with you in your native tongue. We hope that the community will be receptive to your idea. If you have a business proposal that is not a new project, a new language version of an existing project, or a modification of practices on an existing project, please contact businesswikimediaorg Disclaimer: Emails to infowikimediaorg are reviewed and responded to by volunteers from our user community. Please understand that the Wikimedia Foundation cannot guarantee confidential treatment of any sensitive information you include in your message. If you would like to translate documents for us (click to expand or collapse) Thank you for your interest in assisting! Wikipedia relies on volunteers who generate and maintain all content as well as creating policies and guidelines to govern the site. It is a collaborative project, with people from all over the world bringing their skills and interests to join in the compilation and dissemination of knowledge to everyone, everywhere, free of charge. The other projects we maintain are also collaborative, crowd-sourced projects that rely on volunteers. Translation is a volunteer-driven activity on our websites, just like content creation. If you want to translate content from one of our projects to another, a general approach to translation from English Wikipedia to other projects is provided at w:Wikipedia:Translate us. This approach is likely to succeed on most projects with most languages, but it's a good idea to check on whichever project you wish to work to see if there are different local processes. You can reach out to the "help" or community discussion forum on the project where you want to place the translation. These are generally linked from the side of every page. If you can't find it, you can write to infowikimediaorg for more information. Please, in that case, specify the language project where you want to work (for instance, Italian Wiktionary; French Wikipedia). If you are interested in helping to translate official documents used for management of Wikimedia projects, this work is also done by volunteers. Meta:Babylon is a good place to begin. There is a section there on getting started which includes some important links, and there is also a section on communication that tells you some of the best places to get in touch with other translators, who may be able to give you specifics about the work. We'd recommend reading the tutorial linked from the "getting started" section before beginning, if you choose to pitch in. Thanks for your interest, and we hope you will decide to join us. Disclaimer: Emails to infowikimediaorg are reviewed and responded to by volunteers from our user community. Please understand that the Wikimedia Foundation cannot guarantee confidential treatment of any sensitive information you include in your message. If you would like to volunteer on our projects (click to expand or collapse) First, we want to thank you for your interest in joining our mission! Wikipedia and its sister sites rely on volunteers who generate and maintain all content as well as creating almost all of the policies and guidelines that govern the sites. They are collaborative projects, with people from all over the world bringing their skills and interests to join in the compilation and dissemination of knowledge to everyone, everywhere, free of charge. There are a number of ways you can join in. Do you like to research or write? Did you know that you can contribute content to Wikipedia and its sister sites directly? Each language project has information about contributing in the links on the side, sometimes under a pull-down title like "Interactions". Many of them have advanced tutorials. The English Wikipedia's tutorial is en:Wikipedia:Tutorial, for instance. Are you fluent in more than one language and willing to translate? See our page on translation for more specific information. Do you like to take photographs? Draw pictures? Design charts, maps or put together audio files? There is a place for you, too! Media files that you have created which have encyclopedic value and which you're willing to donate can be uploaded to Wikimedia Commons, where they can be used on Wikipedia and other Wikimedia Foundation projects, as well as elsewhere! See Commons:Project scope/Summary for some more information on the kinds of media files that we are looking for and Upload Wizard to begin. Are you a programmer or web developer or interested in becoming one? Did you know that even the software Wikipedia uses is largely developed by volunteers? If you're interested in pitching in there, please see How to become a MediaWiki hacker. As mentioned above, most of our projects' policies and practices are created by volunteers, who can best help if you have questions about the volunteering experience. If you would like more information, you may want to visit the "help" forums linked on the left hand side of each page on our websites to learn where questions can be addressed to the community of that particular project. If you cannot find the information you seek or have other questions for or about the projects, you might want to write to the volunteer email response team at infowikimediaorg. Volunteers are available to offer guidance in many different languages. We hope you will decide to join us! If you would like to request a donation to your charity (click to expand or collapse) As you may already know, the Wikimedia Foundation is a nonprofit charitable organization with a very specific goal, which is to develop and maintain our suite of online open-content educational resources in all the languages of the world, to be distributed free of charge to the public. As we are a nonprofit organization incorporated in Florida, United States, local and national laws prohibit us from using our funds for anything but this purpose. If your request is related to our mission, you may wish to review Grants:Start for more information on requesting support. If you would like to work for the Wikimedia Foundation (click to expand or collapse) Thank you for your interest in working for the Wikimedia Foundation! Job openings are listed on the Foundation website. If you see a job that looks like a good match for you, please click on it to read a more complete description. Information on where to send your resume will be included in the description. Usually, there is a link at the bottom that says "Apply Now." If none of the jobs currently listed there seem suitable to you, please keep an eye on that page. New job openings are listed there routinely as they become available. If you are interested in volunteer opportunities, please see Answers/Contribute. If you would like to advertise on our websites (click to expand or collapse) The Wikimedia Foundation does not accept advertisement. The Wikimedia Foundation is not against the world of online advertising or against other organizations that host ads, but it does not believe that advertising belongs in a project devoted to education, particularly one that is driven by the values consistent with a balanced, neutral encyclopedia. The global volunteer community has always felt that advertising would have a major effect on our ability to stay neutral and that ultimately ads would weaken the readers' overall confidence in the articles they are reading. Even if advertisers put no pressure on us to slant articles to their favor, readers may fear that they exert an influence, consciously or otherwise. In addition, the Foundation has strong views about reader privacy. Current models for web advertising are inconsistent with these, particularly contextual advertising, which reads the content you are viewing. The Foundation also thinks it intrusive to deliver ads to readers based on their geography. If you'd like to read more about the history of discussions about advertising Wikipedia - including both pros and cons - the volunteer community has written a page about it at w:Wikipedia:Advertisements. If you would like to post something on the Wikimedia blog (click to expand or collapse) Thank you for your interest in Wikimedia. The Wikimedia Foundation accepts relevant guest blogs from anyone, for instance http://blog.wikimedia.org/author/rubin16/ and http://blog.wikimedia.org/2014/03/13/celebrating-womens-day-the-wiki-way/. Posts must be on topics of wide interest to the Wikimedia movement. You can find the blog guidelines, including how to submit a draft for review at Wikimedia Blog. If you would like to know more about the Wikimedia Foundation's values and beliefs (click to expand or collapse) The Wikimedia Foundation believes that all people everywhere should be afforded equal access to information. It supports network neutrality and the free culture movement. It believes in the need to conquer the digital divide, which results in the economic or cultural marginalization of individuals with limited access to technology. It respects the rights of human beings to basic privacy and dignity. The Wikimedia Foundation also believes that the environment is important; it strives for sustainable business practices. The Foundation holds that censorship is incompatible with its mission. In May 2011, when the Board of Trustees passed its resolution on dealing with controversial content, it affirmed that "Wikimedia projects are not censored." Curating knowledge for an international community of all ages will certainly mean the display of materials that some may find offensive or upsetting. The Board supported the principle that users should be able to choose what content to access and encouraged the responsible curating of content so users might reasonably expect what they will encounter when viewing a page or using a feature, but continued in its explicit support of access to information for all.