$US8 million donated to Wikimedia

Stephen Withers
Wednesday, 06 January 2010 08:42

Your IT - Home IT

The Wikimedia Foundation, the organisation behind Wikipedia, comfortably beat its $US7.5 million fundraising target for 2009. Donations exceeded $US8 million.

More than $US8 million has been received by the Wikimedia Foundation from 230,000 donors. The 2009/2010 fundraising campaign began on November 10.

"I am deeply grateful to our donors," said Sue Gardner, executive director of the Wikimedia Foundation.

"Most of them are not rich. They are students and teachers and parents -- people who use Wikipedia regularly, and people who are willing to help pay to keep it going. Their generosity is what keeps Wikipedia available for people around the world, free of charge and free of advertising," she added.

The corresponding campaign in 2008/2009, raised $US6 million from 105,000 donors. Although the average donation fell, that was more than compensated by the greater number of donors to the latest campaign.

The foundation intends to spend the money on people (it has a staff of 33) and on servers, bandwidth and other technology costs including contractors.