Wikipedia raises 6 million dollar fund

The Web’s most comprehensive open encyclopaeida, the Wikipedia has reached its  fund raising goal.  The Wikimedia foundation, which is the non profit foundation behind Wikipedia has raised 6.2 Million US dollars as funds from contributors.

Jimmy Wales, the founder of this foundation had appealed for support in late December.  The foundation said that about 50,000 contributors have poured in a total of $2 million in the span of eight days, bringing the total number of donors to more than 125,000.

Reports have said that the raised fund money will go towards  improving the software the Wikipedia runs on as well as upgrading the servers and Internet bandwidth that accommodate the site’s traffic. Wikipedia has been consistently ranked among the 10 most visited Web sites in the world.

The thanking statement issued by Jimmy Wales clarified that any donations beyond the $6 million goal will be put in a reserve fund, which will help them to offset operating costs beyond the current fiscal year.

Jimmy Wales thanked all the contributors by saying “You have proven that Wikipedia matters to you, and that you support our mission: to bring free knowledge to the planet, free of charge and free of advertising. You’ve helped make and keep Wikipedia available for the whole world.”