Google Commits $3.1 Million and Free Cloud APIs To Wikimedia

Google is expanding its support of Wikimedia, the parent company of Wikipedia, as the search giant chases the next billion users. From a report: At World Economic Forum this week, Google committed to offer Wikipedia an additional $3.1 million, along with providing several of its machine learning tools to the editors of Wikipedia at no cost, the companies said. Google.org, thanks in part to contributions from employees, will be giving $1.1 million to the Wikimedia Foundation and $2 million to the Wikimedia Endowment, an independent fund that supports Wikipedia and other long-term Wikimedia projects.

As part of the announcement, the companies said they will be expanding Project Tiger, a joint initiative they launched in 2017 to increase the number of articles in underrepresented languages in India. They intend to provide editors with resources and insights to create new Wikipedia articles across 10 languages in India, Indonesia, Mexico, Nigeria, and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. The initiative is being rebranded as GLOW, which is supposed to stand for Growing Local Language Content on Wikipedia.

Re:Good

[Penguinisto]

Worse - it means that Google is taking a bigger interest in Wikipedia.

Now whether it's just to get a fat tax write-off somewhere, or if there a strategic plan to slowly consume Wikipedia (by becoming its sole monetary/financial support), remains to be seen.

Okay, that was all tinfoil-like, but the possibilities still exist. But, like it or lump it, Wikipedia is the first place people go to get info about something, and Google goes out of its way to prominently display the Wikipedia page for whatever subject you're searching for. The growing 'integration' is becoming more of a thing between the two entities.

Now whether this is a good thing or bad, I leave to the reader... would it give Google control over what people learn? A little perhaps, but perhaps keeping Wikipedia independent enough to resist any such attempts isn't a bad thing, folks.

Re:

[bill_mcgonigle]

Do we want the people who deplatformed Scott Horton and fired James Damore to control Wikipedia? Supposedly Google employees share internal blacklists of other employees who don't have Right Think and keep them away from projects of influence.

https://youtu.be/uQ1JeII0eGo [youtu.be]

On the other hand, I think I've donated a higher percentage of my net worth to Wikimedia than Google is doing here, so it's probably just a token.

Re: Good

[backslashdot]

No woman felt comfortable working around James Damore after he wrote what he wrote so they fired him. Makes sense to me unless he was more skilled than all of them combined. Itâ(TM)s just business sense. He stupidly brought it on himself, by his own actions he made women get creeped out by him.

This has nothing to do with whether what he wrote was right or wrong. It made zero sense from a productivity standpoint to keep him hired.

What did he expect Google to do? They had no choice. Keeping him as an emp

Re:

[azcoyote]

... would it give Google control over what people learn?

I don't know what you're talking about. I just asked Google Home, "Hey Google, Is Google taking over Wikipedia?" and it said, "My apologies, I don't understand." Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go see what articles Google suggests for me on Google News.

How generous!

[Anonymous Coward]

So Google commits .0028% of their 2018 revenue. And we're supposed to be impressed?

How about Google stop raping people's privacy?

Machine Learning

[phantomfive]

Why does Wikipedia need machine learning?

Bots

[JBMcB]

They already use bots to do basic housekeeping - looking out for vandalism, updating links, flagging dead links, applying style templates, stuff like that. I could see where some basic machine learning algorithms might come in handy looking for vandalism - IE loads of unsigned edits coming from a particular IP address, copypasta, etc...

Re:

[Desler]

Who doesn't need machine learning?

Google subverting Wikimedia/Wikipedia?

[Rick Schumann]

Subject line says it all. Is this Googles' plan? Take over Wikimedia/Wikipedia through 'donations'? Why not, Special Interest Groups have been doing it with politicians since time immemorial..

Re:

[rtb61]

There has been a distinct shift in Wikipedia, there are a lot more 'PAID' contributors than there used to be as in paid by government and corporations to creatively contribute to articles for marketing and political purposes. It can definitely feel that tilt in many articles, propaganda replacing truth. I would guess there are now thousands of paid Wikipedia contributors, not paid by them of course, simply squatting and spreading their propaganda poop there.

Need any more proof of insourcing?

[Shaitan]

"As part of the announcement, the companies said they will be expanding Project Tiger, a joint initiative they launched in 2017 to increase the number of articles in underrepresented languages in India. They intend to provide editors with resources and insights to create new Wikipedia articles across 10 languages in India, Indonesia, Mexico, Nigeria, and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region."

Not trying to look a gift horse in the mouth

[slack_justyb]

This should be the norm for service providers that utilize a service not in house. Google, Apple, and Amazon among others routinely query Wikipedia for all kinds of things and then provide the results of the query as part of their service. Google, Apple, and Amazon need to step up to providing meaningful support to third parties that they use for their service, just not the most visible one, in this case Wikipedia. IMHO tossing a million here and a million there to Wikipedia is definitely a step, but Goo

Itâ(TM)s a trap

[Midnight Thunder]

Theyâ(TM)ll lure Wikipedia in and the decide they donâ(TM)t want to support those APIs anymore. What LTS plan?