Hot on the heels of the recent milestone of 3,000,000 articles on English Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons has just lodged its own major milestone: passing the 5,000,000 binary mark. Wikimedia Commons is the vast image, video, sound, illustration (and more) repository of works that can be freely reused by anyone, and perhaps most notably to users is the space where all of Wikipedia’s images are stored. Few would dispute that Wikimedia Commons is the largest single collection of freely reusable images on the internet.
And the 5,000,000th file? Although it’s tough to pinpoint, contributors on Commons seem to have agreed that a digital scan (at right) of the 1838 Danish news paper KjĂžbenhavnsposten, is the winner, uploaded by User:Saddhiyama.
Wikimedia UK, the international chapter based in the United Kingdom, marked the occasion with an announcement and other chapters and volunteers around the world are celebrating this major milestone. News also came from the Dutch chapter.
Commons is made possible by the work of tens of thousands of contributors from around the world, in over 250 languages. Contributors upload free or public domain images, enhance and improve older scanned files, provide detailed illustrations, and increasingly upload free video and sound files.
The Foundation is looking forward to expanding usability of the Commons projects, thanks in large part to a recent grant from the Ford Foundation.
Congratulations to the Commoners on the Commons!
Jay Walsh, Head of Communications
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