Wikipedia is a free encyclopedia website which bases its model on an open and editable internet platform accessable to anyone worldwide. The website is based on a concept called crowdsourcing which is a collaborative tool which allows the website to gather information by essentially outsourcing a task to an outside crowd of people. In Wikipedia´s case the crowd of people being outsourced happens to be anyone who has internet access and desires to contribute valuable information to the website. The advantage to contributing information on Wikipedia is that the user doesn´t require any type of academic or professional background to contribute information. The company believes that the most important thing is the actual content being posted and doesn´t put importance on the personal background of the contributor.The reason behind this is the very concept of crowdsourcing and outsourcing information from the general public. This very model created by Wikipedia has dramatically changed the traditional concept of an encyclopedia. It is clear that the company understood from the beginning that typical encyclopedias have the tendency to become outdated and obsolete and the need for a new model was necessary. It is clear that in the internet age we live in a world that is constantly changing and the need to constantly update information on the internet has become a reality. In the case of Wikipedia information becoming obsolete is not a problem because the information can be added or edited at anytime.
The fact that Wikipedia relies on input from crowdsourcing it is important to leverage the quality and validility of the information provided by the general public. In order to provide an open encyclopedia which provides reliable and accurate information it is necessary to oversee and have some type of control over the information being posted. In order to leverage crowdsourcing Wikipedia uses a number of editors which frequently scan information making sure the information is accurate, up-to-date and most of all abides by the company´s policies and guidlines. The policies and guidlines are a set of five pillars that the company has created which are expected to be followed by the users and contributors. The five pillars were created to help control the type of information provided from the public and also serve as a way to guide contributors in determing what Wikipedia stands for and the type of service they want to provide to users. The five pillars include policies such as: 1) Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia. 2) Wikipedia has a nuetral point of view. 3) Wikipedia is free content that anyone can edit or contribute. 4) Wikipedians should interact in a respectful and civil manner. 5) Wikipedia does not have firm rules.
The five pillars are an important way that Wikipedia leverages crowdsoucing because by outling a set of policies and pillars which are required by the contributors and users helps prevent a loss of control of the website. This concept is clearly an effective way to communicate the company´s business model and strategy to its users which is fundamental when a company relies on crowdsourcing. If the company fails to effectively communicate its pillars to users it becomes difficult for users to trust the website and to really understand what the company stands for. It is clear that crowdsourcing has been leveraged very well by Wikipedia and for this reason they have been so successful. An important aspect that has contributed to their success is that the compnay has effectively aligned its strategy with the concept of crowdsourcing. For example, the number five pillar states: "Wikipedia does not have firm rules" and this is very important in regards to leveraging crowdsourcing because it is important to remain flexible and allow a certain amount of autonominity of the user whithout damaging the five pillars and the foundation of the company.
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