User:R6MaY89/One million articles

This is an article I wrote for my blog on 2006-03-01. You may comment on my talk page or my blog (see link below).

Today, the english wikipedia surpasses all previous expectations by acheiving 1,000,000 articles! And that's excluding redirects and is only in the main namespace. It is truly impressive to think that any organization that is run off donations alone, working with the help of a million volunteers can pass such a milestone. These kinds of projects are relatively new and will continue to surpass paid projects in the future. Take GNU/Linux for example. The main reason that it is so successful is because it is free. And not just in terms of price, but in freedom as well. When a project or organization opens its doors to critique and edits, good things happen! The days of companies hiding secrets and trying to sabotage each other are over. As we move into the future, organizations of cooperation, standard, and friendliness will take center stage. I can foresee a time when we pay only for the infrastructure for our goods and everything else (mainly the technology) comes for free. I can imagine buying a cell phone and instantly being able to be my own provider, simply paying for bandwidth. I can imagine turning on the radio and not only listening for free, but being able to suggest songs per my opinions. These transitions have already begun, and open projects with open standards will allow them to continue.

Perhaps the most important aspect of Wikipedia's unofficial birthday is that it shows that goodwill does prevail over evil. Humans really can work together to do something great, and I am proud to stand amongst those making a difference. More and more people are doing it too. Today, the number of Wikipedians surpassed 1,000,000, seemingly in honor of the number of articles. PermaLink