Wikipedia unveils new AI licensing deals as it marks 25th birthday

LONDON (AP) — Wikipedia unveiled new business deals with a slew of artificial intelligence companies on Thursday as it marked its 25th anniversary.

The online crowdsourced encyclopedia revealed that it has signed licensing deals with AI companies including Amazon, Meta Platforms, Perplexity, Microsoft and France's Mistral AI.

Wikipedia is one of the last bastions of the early internet, but that original vision of a free online space has been clouded by the dominance of Big Tech platforms and the rise of generative AI chatbots trained on content scraped from the web.

Aggressive data collection methods by AI developers, including from Wikipedia's vast repository of free knowledge, has raised questions about who ultimately pays for the artificial intelligence boom.

The nonprofit that runs the site signed Google as one of its first customers in 2022 and announced other agreements last year with smaller AI players like search engine Ecosia.

The new deals will help one of the world's most popular websites monetize heavy traffic from AI companies. They're paying to access Wikipedia content “at a volume and speed designed specifically for their needs,” the Wikimedia Foundation said. It did not provide financial or other details.

While AI training has sparked legal battles elsewhere over copyright and other issues, Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales said he welcomes it.

“I'm very happy personally that AI models are training on Wikipedia data because it’s human curated," Wales told The Associated Press in an interview. "I wouldn’t really want to use an AI that’s trained only on X, you know, like a very angry AI,” Wales said, referring to billionaire Elon Musk's social media platform.

Wales said the site wants to work with AI companies, not block them. But "you should probably chip in and pay for your fair share of the cost that you’re putting on us."

The Wikimedia Foundation, a nonprofit group that runs Wikipedia, last year urged AI developers to pay for access through its enterprise platform and said human traffic had fallen 8%. Meanwhile, visits from bots, sometimes disguised to evade detection, were heavily taxing its servers as they scrape masses of content to feed AI large language models.

The findings highlighted shifting online trends as search engine AI overviews and chatbots summarize information instead of sending users to sites by showing them links.

Wikipedia is the ninth most visited site on the internet. It has more than 65 million articles in 300 languages that are edited by some 250,000 volunteers.

The site has become so popular in part because its free for anyone to use.

“But our infrastructure is not free, right?" Wikimedia Foundation CEO Maryana Iskander said in a separate interview in Johannesburg, South Africa.

It costs money to maintain servers and other infrastructure that allows both individuals and tech companies to “draw data from Wikipedia,” said Iskander, who's stepping down on Jan. 20, and will be replaced by Bernadette Meehan.

The bulk of Wikipedia's funding comes from 8 million donors, most of them individuals.

“They're not donating in order to subsidize these huge AI companies,” Wales said. They're saying, "You know what, actually you can’t just smash our website. You have to sort of come in the right way.”

Editors and users could benefit from AI in other ways. The Wikimedia Foundation has outlined an AI strategy that Wales said could result in tools that reduce tedious work for editors.

While AI isn’t good enough to write Wikipedia entries from scratch, it could, for example, be used to update dead links by scanning the surrounding text and then searching online to find other sources.

“We don’t have that yet but that’s the kind of thing that I think we will see in the future.”

Artificial intelligence could also improve the Wikipedia search experience, by evolving from the traditional keyword method to more of a chatbot style, Wales said.

“You can imagine a world where you can ask the Wikipedia search box a question and it will quote to you from Wikipedia," he said. It could respond by saying "here’s the answer to your question from this article and here’s the actual paragraph. That sounds really useful to me and so I think we’ll move in that direction as well. ”

Reflecting on the early days, Wales said it was a thrilling time because many people were motivated to help build Wikipedia after he and co-founder Larry Sanger, who departed long ago, set it up as an experiment.

However, while some might look back wistfully on what seems now to be a more innocent time, Wales said those early days of the internet also had a dark side.

“People were pretty toxic back then as well. We didn’t need algorithms to be mean to each other,” he said. “But, you know, it was a time of great excitement and a real spirit of possibility.”

Wikipedia has lately found itself under fire from figures on the political right, who have dubbed the site “Wokepedia” and accused it of being biased in favor of the left.

Republican lawmakers in the U.S. Congress are investigating alleged “manipulation efforts” in Wikipedia’s editing process that they said could inject bias and undermine neutral points of view on its platform and the AI systems that rely on it.

A notable source of criticism is Musk, who last year launched his own AI-powered rival, Grokipedia. He has criticized Wikipedia for being filled with “propaganda” and urged people to stop donating to the site.

Wales said he doesn't consider Grokipedia a “real threat” to Wikipedia because it's based on large language models, which are the troves of online text that AI systems are trained on.

“Large language models aren’t good enough to write really quality reference material. So a lot of it is just regurgitated Wikipedia,” he said. “It often is quite rambling and sort of talks nonsense. And I think the more obscure topic you look into, the worse it is.”

He stressed that he wasn't singling out criticism of Grokipedia.

“It’s just the way large language models work.”

Wales say he's known Musk for years but they haven't been in touch since Grokipedia launched.

“I should probably ping him,” Wales said.

What would he say?

“'How’s your family?' I’m a nice person, I don’t really want to pick a fight with anybody.”

AP writer Mogomotsi Magome in Johannesburg contributed to this report

Outgoing Wikimedia Foundation CEO Maryana Iskander speaks in an interview with the Associated Press in Johannesburg, South Africa, Tuesday Jan. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Alfonso Nqunjana)

Emeline Brule, volunteer Wikipedia editor, sits below a Wikipedia logo displayed at the Wikimedia Foundation office in San Francisco, Monday, Jan. 12, 2026. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia, speaks during an interview with The Associated Press on the occasion of Wikipedia's 25th anniversary in London, Monday, Jan. 12, 2026. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein)

Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia, gestures during an interview with The Associated Press on the occasion of Wikipedia's 25th anniversary in London, Monday, Jan. 12, 2026. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein)

Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia, gestures during an interview with The Associated Press on the occasion of Wikipedia's 25th anniversary in London, Monday, Jan. 12, 2026. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein)

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — NASA’s Artemis II astronauts fired their engines and blazed toward the moon Thursday night, breaking free of the chains that have trapped humanity in shallow laps around Earth in the decades since Apollo.

The so-called translunar ignition came 25 hours after liftoff, putting the three Americans and a Canadian on course for a lunar fly-around early next week. Their Orion capsule bolted out of orbit around Earth right on cue and chased after the moon nearly 250,000 miles (400,000 kilometers) away.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I am so, so excited to be able to tell you that for the first time since 1972 during Apollo 17, human beings have left Earth orbit,” NASA’s Lori Glaze announced at a news conference.

The engine firing was flawless, she noted.

Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen said he and his crewmates were glued to the capsule's windows as they left Earth in the rearview mirror, taking in the “phenomenal” views. Their faces were pressed so tightly against the windows that they had to wipe them clean.

“Humanity has once again shown what we are capable of, and it’s your hopes for the future that carry us now on this journey around the moon,” Hansen said.

NASA had the Artemis II crew stick close to home for a day to test their capsule’s life-support systems before clearing them for lunar departure.

Now committed to the moon, the Artemis II test flight is the opening act for NASA’s grand plans for a moon base and sustained lunar living.

Commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Hansen will dash past the moon then hang a U-turn and zip straight home without stopping on land. In the process, they will go the farthest humans have ever traveled from Earth, breaking the Apollo 13 distance record set in 1970. They also may become the fastest during their reentry at flight’s end on April 10.

Glover, Koch and Hansen already have made history as the first Black person, the first woman and the first non-U.S. citizen to launch to the moon. Apollo’s 24 lunar travelers were all white men.

“Trust us, you look amazing. You look beautiful," Glover said in a TV interview after beholding the globe from pole to pole. "And from up here you also look like one thing: homo sapiens as all of us no matter where you’re from or what you look like, we’re all one people.”

To set the mood for the day’s main event, Mission Control woke up the crew with John Legend’s “Green Light” featuring Andre 3000 and a medley of NASA teams cheering them.

“We are ready to go,” Glover said.

Mission Control gave the final go-ahead minutes before the critical engine firing, telling the astronauts that they were embarking on “humanity’s lunar homecoming arc” to bring them back to Earth. The capsule is relying on the gravity of Earth and the moon — termed a free-return lunar trajectory — to complete the round-trip figure-eight loop. The engine accelerated their capsule to more than 24,000 mph (38,000 kph) to shove them out of Earth's orbit.

“I’ve got to tell you, there is nothing normal about this," Wiseman said. "Sending four humans 250,000 miles away is a herculean effort, and we are now just realizing the gravity of that.”

Flight director Judd Frieling said he and his team were all business while on duty but will likely reflect on the momentousness of it all once they go home.

“I suspect everybody understands that this is a once-in-a-lifetime moment," he told reporters.

The next major milestone will be Monday’s lunar flyby.

Orion will zoom 4,000 miles (6,400 kilometers) beyond the moon before turning back, providing unprecedented and illuminated views of the lunar far side, at least for human eyes. The cosmos will even treat the Artemis II astronauts to a total solar eclipse as the moon temporarily blocks the sun from their perspective.

While awaiting their orbital departure earlier Thursday, the astronauts savored the views of Earth from tens of thousands of miles high. Koch told Mission Control that they can make out the entire coastlines of continents and even the South Pole, her old stomping ground.

NASA is counting on the test flight to kickstart the entire Artemis program and lead to a moon landing by two astronauts in 2028.

The so-called lunar loo may need some design tweaks, however.

Orion's toilet malfunctioned as soon as the Artemis crew reached orbit Wednesday evening. Mission Control guided astronaut Koch through some plumbing tricks and she finally got it going, but not before having to resort to using contingency urine storage bags.

The urine pouches are serving double duty. Mission Control ordered the crew to fill a bunch of the empty bags with water from the capsule’s dispenser on Thursday. A valve issue arose with the dispenser following liftoff, and NASA wanted plenty of drinking water on hand for the crew in case the problem recurred. The astronauts used straws and syringes to fill the pouches with more than 2 gallons (7 liters) worth before pivoting to the moon.

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

This image taken from video provided by NASA shows the Artemis II crew, from left, Canadien astronaut and mission specialist Jeremy Hansen, Commander Reid Wiseman, mission specialist Christina Koch and pilot Victor Glover as they speak with NASA Mission Control via video conference from the moon's orbit Thursday, April 2, 2026. (NASA via AP)

This image released by NASA on Thursday, April 2, 2026, shows NASA’s Orion spacecraft with Earth in the background. (NASA via AP)

This image taken from video provided by NASA shows the Earth, left, from NASA's Orion spacecraft as it fired its engines heading toward the moon Thursday, April 2, 2026. (NASA via AP)

In this photo provided by NASA, a view of the Earth from NASA's Orion spacecraft as it orbits above the planet during the Artemis II test flight, on Thursday, April 2, 2026. (NASA via AP)

In this photo provided by NASA, an Artemis program patch floating in the International Space Station's cupola, on March 30, 2026. (Jessica Meir/NASA via AP)

Spectators view NASA's Artemis II moon rocket launch from the A. Max Brewer Bridge, Wednesday, April 1, 2026, in Titusville, Fla. (AP Photo/Phelan M. Ebenhack)

Spectators view NASA's Artemis II moon rocket launch from the A. Max Brewer Bridge, Wednesday, April 1, 2026, in Titusville, Fla. (AP Photo/Phelan M. Ebenhack)

NASA's Artemis II moon rocket lifts off from the Kennedy Space Center's Launch Pad 39-B Wednesday, April 1, 2026, in Cape Canaveral, Fla. (AP Photo/Chris O'Meara)

NASA's Artemis II moon rocket lifts off from the Kennedy Space Center's Launch Pad 39-B Wednesday, April 1, 2026, in Cape Canaveral, Fla. (AP Photo/Chris O'Meara)

NASA's Artemis II moon rocket lifts off from the Kennedy Space Center's Launch Pad 39-B Wednesday, April 1, 2026, in Cape Canaveral, Fla. (AP Photo/John Raoux)