Wikimedia Foundation Board noticeboard/mapping/Context

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Section 1: External Context

SUMMARY

Introduction

As we look to the future of the Wikimedia movement, we must start with a question about “what does the world need from us now.” What does the world need from the Wikimedia projects and the global movement? How can we remain relevant amidst changing trends in who is looking for knowledge, how people are accessing and creating knowledge, and what knowledge is most needed and is missing?

In this section, we will identify the technological, social, regulatory and other external trends that are most relevant to the Wikimedia movement. In future conversations, we can evaluate how a charter can help the movement respond to these trends.

Movement analyses of external trends

Groups across the movement have identified external trends that will impact their work and planning:

Wikimedia Australia
Wikimedia and Democracy - Wikimedia UK report 2021
Select Wikimedia Europe publications:
- Essays on knowledge equity (including on public policy)
- Europe needs digital public spaces
Documentation from Wikimedia Future Congress by Wikimedia Deutschland
Wikimedia Community in the changing world: Wikimedia Poland
Open Future Foundation on AI and the Commons

Foundation analysis of external trends

The Wikimedia Foundation begins our planning for the fiscal year with a review of major external trends and the impact they may have on the work of the Wikimedia projects. In March 2024, we identified the following major trends as impacting our work:

Search: Consumers are inundated with information, and want it aggregated by trusted people.
Content: Contributors have many rewarding, potent ways to share knowledge online
Disinformation: Content veracity is more contested than ever before, and AI will be weaponized.
Regulation: Poses challenges, threats, and opportunities that vary by jurisdiction

Note: there will be an updated analysis of external trends published in 2025 as part of the Foundation’s annual planning.

Trend: Search

Consumers are inundated with information, and want it aggregated by trusted people. The preference of younger audiences for short-form, summarized information from “authentic” personalities continues to grow. More platforms offer this than ever before (e.g., Bluesky, Twitter/X, Substack, TikTok). TikTok continues to dominate, growing in global usage and offering more search capabilities. Web search engines are piloting new AI offerings to stay competitive, but the success of these features is still uncertain.

In 2024, we’re seeing that more people prefer to get information from apps that offer not just rich media content, but highly personalized, algorithmically-pushed content in a variety of entertaining, easy-to-consume formats.

To continue engaging users, search engines are releasing new AI-assisted search features that summarize results. These may become a new paradigm for web search, more severely impacting traffic to publishers’ content – or they may continue to fail to catch on.

Trend: Content

Contributors have many choices for how and where to share knowledge seamlessly to millions of consumers, while also reaping financial and personal rewards.

Sharing knowledge is easier and more fun than ever before. New tools for creating social media content such as video and audio production tools and generative AI, formerly only available and accessible to professionals, are now available to anyone. New media types – short video, podcasts, memes, viral trends, etc. – allow for more creativity and serve different learning modes.

Trend: Disinformation

Content veracity is more contested than ever before, and we are already seeing the weaponization of AI. During the course of the largest election year in world history in 2024, we saw an unprecedented rise in AI tools to spread disinformation, to influence election outcomes, and sway global public opinion about military conflict and social movements.

Human rights threats are growing. Physical and legal threats against volunteers and staff who fight disinformation continue to grow. Accusations of bias and inaction by those whose preferred narratives do not prevail on Wikipedia may be encouraged and amplified by purveyors of disinformation.

Trend: Regulation

We face increasing regulatory and legal challenges to our mission of free knowledge. In the EU and the UK, major new platform regulation has led to unprecedented compliance requirements, especially around child safety and responsible use of AI. Law is weaponized in important jurisdictions. Bad-faith lawsuits, by people who don’t like the verified information appearing on Wikipedia pages, are succeeding in some European countries, and we have witnessed significant legal challenges in South Asia. Some incumbent leaders are abusing their powers to silence and intimidate political opponents.

Some policymakers are interested in how Wikimedia advances the public interest and sustainable development. In the European Union, some politicians see Wikipedia as digital public infrastructure deserving support, becoming a model platform for using technology to promote a social good without unwarranted regulatory burden. UN bodies are asking how our projects can advance Sustainable Development Goals.

Links to additional conversations happening across the movement:

2024/25 Annual Plan Talk page
Future Audiences Meta page (and Talk page)
Bellagio 2024 Meta page (and Talk page)
General AI Meta page (and Talk page)

References: