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Type of site | Internet encyclopedia project |
---|---|
Available in | Turkish |
Headquarters | San Francisco, California |
Owner | Wikimedia Foundation |
URL | tr.wikipedia.org |
Commercial | No |
Registration | Optional |
Launched | 5 December 2002 |
Current status | Active. Regional block lifted on 15 January 2020 |
The Turkish Wikipedia (Turkish: Türkçe Vikipedi) is the Turkish language edition of Wikipedia, spelled Vikipedi. Started on 5 December 2002, as of 17 November 2024, this edition has 624,183 articles and is the 25th largest Wikipedia edition, and ranks 16th in terms of depth among Wikipedias.[1] Turkish Wikipedia has around 3 billion pageviews each year.[2]
In March 2017, before the block of Wikipedia in Turkey, 90% of pageviews of Turkish Wikipedia were from within the country. Germany was second with 2% share, as there are many Turks in Germany. Azerbaijan was the third country with 1.4% share, as Turkish and Azerbaijani are mutually intelligible Oghuz languages.[3] Although the block was lifted in 2020, statistics for pageviews in Turkey and most other Turkic speaking countries are no longer published; but those for some countries; such as Kyrgyzstan, Germany and the United States are.[4]
In 2006, the Turkish Wikipedia was nominated under the Science category for Altın Örümcek Web Ödülleri (Golden Spider Web Awards), which are commonly known as the "Web Oscars" for Turkey.[5] In January 2007, the Turkish Wikipedia was given the award for "Best Content" in this competition. The award was given in a ceremony on 25 January 2007 at Istanbul Technical University.[6][7]
In 2015, its banner drawing attention to the gender bias on Wikipedia drew the attention of the Turkish media.[8]
On 29 April 2017, the Turkish government blocked access to Wikipedia.[9] While the reasons for the blockage were unrevealed, some believe that the encyclopedia had been blocked due to the Turkish government's concerns about articles critical of its actions regarding Turkey–ISIL cooperation.[10][11] In December 2019, the Constitutional Court of Turkey ruled that the ban violated freedom of expression. On 15 January 2020, the ban was lifted after 991 days.[12]
As of 2024[update], the Wikimedia Foundation says about Türkiye and Turkmenistan:
“These countries and territories are at higher risk of action being taken against Wikimedia community members for on-platform activities.”
so it:
“can publish aggregated data about [Türkiye] only using differential privacy such that any consumer of the data will be (in the worst case) at most 2.5% more certain about a data subject's presence or absence in the dataset.”[13]