Background

Wikipedia is an online, web-based multilingual open-access encyclopedia which is written and edited in a collaborative environment supported by the Wikimedia software. The project began in 2001 as part of the web-based development of the "Nupedia", the predecessor of the Wikipedia, which was a peer-reviewed initiative. Before it went defunct, Nupedia had 24 peer-reviewed articles. To date, Wikipedia has over 1.6 Million articles in English. It has editions in over 200 languages and is growing rapidly. The beauty of Wikipedia is the ability for anyone to edit and improve articles on topics of their interest and expertise. Consequently, the reliability and accuracy of Wikipedia has been questioned repeatedly. Wikipedia has developed policies on content management that cover, among other things, problems of editorial bias, vandalism, inconsistency of information.

Web 2.0 and free content

Wikipedia is one of the best examples of the Web 2.0 era. The Web2.0 refers to the second generation of the Web where online collaboration and sharing on information with each other takes a center stage. The Web 2.0 movement fosters sharing of information, may it be your personal photos, personal links or personal thoughts. Some of the other examples of Web 2.0 tools are de.lici.ous, flickR, etc. Wikipedia uses software which allows anyone to edit the content of the encyclopedia. The software manages issues such as concurrent editing and versioning. The use of very simple syntax to create the content has allowed anyone to create content. Relevant links can be made between articles within the Wikipedia as well as to pages external to it. All the contributions to Wikipedia are covered by the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) which permits the redistribution, creation of derivative works, and commercial use of content. The license also ensures that Wikipedia can be edited freely as backups of all changes are stored in a database for future use.