Poick

The MacArthur Foundation supports creative people and effective institutions committed to building a more just, verdant, and peaceful world. In addition to selecting the MacArthur Fellows, we work to defend human rights, advance global conservation and security, make cities better places, and understand how technology is affecting children and society.

Account Login Login into your grantee account, reset your password, or submit an idea to the MacArthur Foundation. Login or Submit Idea The Wikimedia Foundation Powering reliable information on the internet in all languages Our Problem A shared, reliable fact base is essential to tackle global challenges like climate change and health crises. Yet threats to our knowledge ecosystem, including misinformation, are accelerated by emerging technologies like AI when they are not built in the public interest. The result: polarization, strife, and erosion of trust in institutions. In its third decade, Wikipedia is a trusted knowledge source for people everywhere. Wikipedia’s information is used across the web in search engines and generative AI tools. Wikipedia’s content is created and maintained by global volunteers who have different perspectives but work together, so articles are well-sourced and neutral. Wikipedia is at the forefront of addressing misinformation—if its articles are available in your language. With 300+ languages, Wikipedia is the internet’s most multilingual platform—but its volunteers need more tools to populate content across more languages. Advancing this at scale gives the world a stronger, shared knowledge base. Our Solution Today, each language version of Wikipedia is distinct, meaning that some articles may not be available at all in certain languages. This means the best and most comprehensive information from other language versions is not universally available. On Wikipedia, volunteers manually translate an article from one language to another. While content translation tools are certainly available and growing, translating articles from digitally-dominant languages like English into others can be time consuming. Abstract Wikipedia is a major innovation in how people can create, edit, and store articles as “abstract content” that is language-neutral, rather than written text that is language-specific. It uses mathematical-like “functions” to display text, facts, and references. For example, a Wikipedia contributor can create an article in Urdu, and the knowledge it contains is immediately turned into this “abstract” form. Someone across the world can then access that same knowledge in a different language, and build from it, add to it, and even collaborate with the original contributor, without needing to speak the same language. This matters because we know that the more people contribute to Wikipedia, the more diverse, trustworthy, and complete the information becomes. The breakthrough: within a short timeframe, Abstract Wikipedia will give every language version of Wikipedia a strong base of articles to help strengthen this shared and trusted knowledge base, globally. Team & Project Resources About our Team The Wikimedia Foundation team includes over 650 individuals working across 50+ countries with a shared understanding that knowledge is a human right. Over half of our staff works across engineering, technology, product, and security, alongside lawyers, communications strategists, linguists, researchers, educators, and more. Team Leads Maryana Iskander, Chief Executive Officer, Wikimedia Foundation Jimmy Wales, Founder, Wikipedia. Trustee, Wikimedia Foundation Selena Deckelmann, Chief Product and Technology Officer, Wikimedia Foundation Denny Vrandečić, Head of Special Projects at the Wikimedia Foundation Project Contact Lauren Dickinson, Senior Manager, Communications415-839-6885 Project Websites Abstract Wikipedia Meta page The Wikimedia Foundation Abstract Wikipedia (on the Wikimedia Foundation website) Social Media Wikimedia Foundation Bluesky Facebook Instagram Linkedin X Wikipedia Bluesky Facebook Instagram LinkedIn Threads TikTok X YouTube Related Reading “Abstract Wikipedia and the Dream of a Universal Language”Galder Gonzalez Larrañaga “Building a Multilingual Wikipedia” Denny Vrandečić, Communications of the ACM “Collaborating on the Sum of All Knowledge Across Languages” Denny Vrandečić, MIT Press “Keynote: Abstract Wikipedia (Arctic Knot Conference 2021)”Denny Vrandečić Latest News & Related Content Load More VIEW ALL LATEST NEWS Related Finalists View All Award Recipients

The Wikimedia Foundation - MacArthur Foundation