Someone forgot to tell Wikipedia there's an economic crisis afoot.
Conventional thinking says that in times of economic turmoil, consumers sit on their wallets and spend cash only on essentials.
Free online encyclopedias don't generally enter their consideration.
This year, the Wikimedia Foundation -- a non-profit organization that operates the Wikipedia family of websites -- set a goal of $6-million in donations, enough to cover its 2009 expenses, while hoping to buck the global financial slowdown.
At first, it appeared the fundraising drive that began on Nov. 3 would fall short of its goal, even though the group was running banner ads soliciting donations at the top of each of Wikipedia's 11 million pages.
Then, on Dec. 23, Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales wrote an impassioned plea to the site's users, imploring them to put their faith in the foundation and to "imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge."
In the next 24 hours, the number of donations rose 892 per cent, from about 800 the day before Wales's letter went public to 8,186 the day it began appearing on Wikipedia pages.
Before his appeal to users, the foundation was receiving about $30,000 a day in donations. Now the foundation is averaging more than $215,000 in donations every day.
The explosion of support is further proof of how important Wikipedia has become to the 275 million people who visit it every month, and it underscores the power of the Internet to quickly raise money through small increments and grassroots initiatives.
"We're really thrilled that people have come out in force and made a clear statement that they care about this cause and they care about Wikipedia, even though we were kind of nervous after the economic news became really clear," said Jay Walsh, a spokesman for the Wikimedia Foundation.
Last year the site brought in just over $1.5-million in its year-end fundraising drive. Wikimedia has already collected more than $5.5-million, placing it on track to reach its goal two weeks before the end of the campaign, Jan. 15, the site's eighth birthday.
The foundation -- which has only 23 paid staff members -- relies on an army of 150,000 volunteers to keep the site running and as accurate as possible.
Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia that can be edited and updated by anyone, is the eighth most popular website in the world and is also the most visited non-profit site on the Web.
Unlike other high-flying Web 2.0 success stories such as Facebook and MySpace, Wikipedia has eschewed the millions of dollars in advertising revenue pouring onto the Internet, instead relying on the financial support of its ever-expanding user base.
Although the foundation has received a handful of "major gifts" of between $5,000 and $10,000, most of the donations coming in are from individuals pledging an average of just $30.
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)
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