This paper aims to explain why people are motivated to contribute to the Wikipedia project. A comprehensive analysis of the motivations of Wikipedians is conducted using the iterative methodology developed by Batya Friedman and Peter Kahn in Value Sensitive Design and Information Systems and co-developed by Nissenbaum and Friedman in Bias in Computer Systems. The Value Sensitive Design (VSD) approach consists of three stages: Empirical Investigation, Conceptual Investigation, and Technical Investigation. During the empirical phase, motivations of the contributors to Wikipedia are identified through analysis of data from two published surveys and a pilot survey conducted at New York University. The underlying values behind these motivations are then defined in the conceptual phase of the study. Finally, a technical investigation is conducted in order to determine how features of the Wiki technology support and facilitate these values.

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	1	Friedman, B., Kahn, P. and Borning, A. "Value Sensitive Design and Information Systems." Forthcoming in P. Zhang & D. Galletta (Eds.), Human-Computer Interaction in Management Information Systems: Foundations. New York: M.E. Sharpe.
	2	Batya Friedman , Helen Nissenbaum, Bias in computer systems, ACM Transactions on Information Systems (TOIS), v.14 n.3, p.330-347, July 1996  [doi>10.1145/230538.230561]
	3	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Statistics, visited April 20, 2006
	4	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedians, Visited April 22, 2006. Wikipedia defines Wikipedians as "the people who write and edit articles for Wikipedia."
	5	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedian, visited April 20, 2006
	6	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consensus_decision-making, "Consensus Decision Making", visited April 30, 2006.
	7	Friedman, pg. 15
	8	Friedman, pg. 15
	9	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NPOV, "Wikipedia: Neutral Point of View", visited April 30, 2006.
	10	http://www.infonomics.nl/FLOSS/report/Final4.htm, "Section 4: Motivations, Expectations, and Orientations of OS/FS Developers", in Free/Libre and Open Source Software: Survey and Study, Part IV: Survey of Developers, visited April 22, 2006.
	11	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seti_at_home, "SETI@home", visited April 22, 2006.
	12	http://seticlassic.ssl.berkeley.edu/polls.html "SETI@home Poll Results", SETI@home, visited April 23, 2006
	13	http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/motivation.html, "Why people are running SETI@home", accessed through waybackmachine.org because the SETI website was down, visited April 23, 2006. Some notable responses include: "One small step for Man. One giant leap for Mankind." "#1 {find ET for the good of humanity} and to be a part of the biggest collaborative project ever undertaken by mankind" "#1 {find ET for the good of humanity} of course, plus I am very interested in (co-operative) distributed processing" "A combination of keeping my computers productive, finding ET for the good of humanity and proving life thrives out there (the two latter has highest priority)" "A good example of distributed computing"
	14	Kuznetsov, Stacey, "An Informal Survey of New York University Students", April 2006, pg. 1.
	15	Kuznetsov, pg. 2.
	16	Kuznetsov, pg. 3.
	17	Kuznetsov, pg. 7.
	18	Kuznetsov, pg. 7.
	19	Benkler, Yochai and Nissenbaum, Helen. "Commons-Based Peer-Production and Virtue", http://www.nyu.edu/projects/nissenbaum/papers/Benk_Niss_Vir052905.doc, pg. 21, visited April 22, 2006.
	20	Paraphrased from Benkler and Nissenbaum, pg. 22.
	21	Trivers, Robert L. "The Evolution of Reciprocal Altruism", The Quarterly Review of Biology, Vol. 46, March 1971, pg. 45
	22	Trivers, pg. 37.
	23	Benkler and Nissenbaum, pg. 22.
	24	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Community_Portal, "Wikipedia:Community Portal", visited April 29, 2006.
	25	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Collaborations, "Wikipedia:Collaborations", visited April 29, 2006.
	26	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Featured_article_candidates, "Wikipedia: Featured Article Candidates", visited April 30, 2006.
	27	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:What_is_a_featured_portal%3F, "Wikipedia: What is a Featured Portal?", visited April 30, 2006.