It’s that time of year where Wikipedia is making its pledge for people to donate and I’m here to admit something:

I’m a person that does.

Normally I donate and then broadcast a message to English teachers, generating their ire, but my slow recession from social media keeps me from doing so. While irritating the academics who can’t stand the site is a devious motivation of mine, my purpose for doing so is more than that.

The Internet was supposed to be the great democratizer of information. It was the place where nothing would be hidden and would offer free access to anybody on the globe who is able to access it. Wikipedia’s mission of providing that information as an open source concept (with a global peer review) seems to fit that mission better than any place right now.

It’s not behind a paywall.

It’s not run by algorithms that recommend articles based on malicious tracking and paid for advertizers.

It doesn’t hide articles based on browsing habits.

As an encyclopedia, it’s remarkable—worldwide collaboration and constant updates.

If you think about the encyclopedias of the past, they were great reference points. They were places you can go to get a gist of a subject and see if it sparked any further interest. It was a starting point for further curiosity and could lead you down many wonderful paths.

But they were limited in scope (you can only bind so many pages), heavy and expensive… especially if you tried to keep up with every edition.

And now we have it online, unlimited pages, for free.

That’s something I’m willing to support.