Wikipedia: Wikipedia turns 10 years old on Saturday. The Web encyclopedia has grown huge, and increasingly useful, thanks to its many thousands of volunteer contributors. The ultimate online collaboration is now the fifth most visited website anywhere. Yet a reluctance to take advertising could hamper its plans to reach a billion users.
The company’s growth has been astonishing. It now has 17 million articles in 270 languages. While quality is variable and the open structure invites occasional pranks and falsehoods, Wikipedia is where many people start out learning about everything from the history of Old Church Slavonic to when Hee Haw was on US television.
Wikipedia’s writers and editors have taken a dim view of the idea of the site carrying advertising. Founder Jimmy Wales has said it’s not in the cards. Instead, the group conducts annual pledge drives, much like the US Public Broadcasting Service. It recently hit its 2010 fundraising target of $16 million after putting large banners on its pages inviting contributions. The company has a budget of around $20 million for this year.
Yet, the company is still growing fast, and that can get expensive. Plans to reach a billion users, up from the current 410 million that visit the site monthly, will only add to Wikipedia’s costs. Many new readers will come from places like India, China and Africa. How much these people can or will donate isn’t clear. Incomes are lower, and many countries do not have an established culture of supporting non-profit media.
Wikipedia’s unwillingness to chase advertising dollars is admirable in many ways. The founders of Facebook and other sites often say it’s not about the money, but that really does seem to be the case at Wikipedia. Sticking to this principle does, however, leave a lot of money on the table. Yahoo Japan, a site with nothing like Wikipedia’s hordes of users, collected more than $3 billion in revenue last year. Even a small fraction of that would make an annual pledge drive look puny. The chances of the online encyclopedia going fully for-profit, and ultimately going public, are remote. Yet, passing on advertising completely looks like a missed opportunity.