Gov/en/Portal:Onboarding/About-History - Revision history

AI-Admin-Assistant: Donation vocabulary: remove 'back' (support/finance sense) in favour of donate (Theo 2026-08-03)

2026-08-03T07:27:43Z

Donation vocabulary: remove 'back' (support/finance sense) in favour of donate (Theo 2026-08-03)

← Older revision		Revision as of 09:27, 3 August 2026
Line 137:		Line 137:
	The model envisaged (prototype 1) reconciles two seemingly contradictory goals, attracting initial support '''and''' preserving a commons:		The model envisaged (prototype 1) reconciles two seemingly contradictory goals, attracting initial support '''and''' preserving a commons:

	* a share of '''each incoming franc''' (subscriptions and transactions) is intended to be redistributed as '''[[Gov/en/Portal:Economy/Rewards\|Rewards]]''': 25% to the '''Early Supporters''' (the first ~~backers~~), 25% to the donors, and 50% kept for the operation of WikiDeal, '''only''' within a sustainable mode of operation;		* a share of '''each incoming franc''' (subscriptions and transactions) is intended to be redistributed as '''[[Gov/en/Portal:Economy/Rewards\|Rewards]]''': 25% to the '''Early Supporters''' (the first funders), 25% to the donors, and 50% kept for the operation of WikiDeal, '''only''' within a sustainable mode of operation;
	* the financial attractiveness of early support follows a '''decreasing bonding curve (×100 → ×30)''': the larger the user community grows, the less the incentive needs to be high. The earliest supporters benefit from the strongest multiplier, which then decreases as newcomers arrive.		* the financial attractiveness of early support follows a '''decreasing bonding curve (×100 → ×30)''': the larger the user community grows, the less the incentive needs to be high. The earliest supporters benefit from the strongest multiplier, which then decreases as newcomers arrive.

AI-Admin-Assistant: Terminology purge + model alignment: Entry Ticket 10% -> Rewards 25/25/50 redistribution (Theo audio 2026-07-17 16:52 + morning directives)

2026-07-17T16:57:21Z

Terminology purge + model alignment: Entry Ticket 10% -> Rewards 25/25/50 redistribution (Theo audio 2026-07-17 16:52 + morning directives)

← Older revision		Revision as of 18:57, 17 July 2026
Line 137:		Line 137:
	The model envisaged (prototype 1) reconciles two seemingly contradictory goals, attracting initial support '''and''' preserving a commons:		The model envisaged (prototype 1) reconciles two seemingly contradictory goals, attracting initial support '''and''' preserving a commons:

	* '''~~10% of~~ each ~~Entry Ticket~~''' (~~CHF 10~~) is ~~reserved for~~ the '''Early Supporters''', the first backers, ~~as a '''reward'''~~, '''only''' within a sustainable mode of operation;		* a share of '''each incoming franc''' (subscriptions and transactions) is intended to be redistributed as '''[[Gov/en/Portal:Economy/Rewards\|Rewards]]''': 25% to the '''Early Supporters''' (the first backers), 25% to the donors, and 50% kept for the operation of WikiDeal, '''only''' within a sustainable mode of operation;
	* the financial attractiveness of early support follows a '''decreasing bonding curve (×100 → ×30)''': the larger the user community grows, the less the incentive needs to be high. The earliest supporters benefit from the strongest multiplier, which then decreases as newcomers arrive.		* the financial attractiveness of early support follows a '''decreasing bonding curve (×100 → ×30)''': the larger the user community grows, the less the incentive needs to be high. The earliest supporters benefit from the strongest multiplier, which then decreases as newcomers arrive.

AI-Admin-Assistant: Split link: Licensing and Credits are now two separate pages

2026-07-13T11:24:51Z

Split link: Licensing and Credits are now two separate pages

← Older revision		Revision as of 13:24, 13 July 2026
Line 147:		Line 147:
	-----		-----

	''Concept and sources: see [[Gov/en/Portal:Meta/Licensing-and-Credits\|~~Licensing and~~ credits]]. Created with AI assistance for the Ynternet.org Foundation.'' ''This content awaits more human validation.''		''Concept and sources: see [[Gov/en/Portal:Meta/Licensing\|Licensing]] and [[Gov/en/Portal:Meta/Credits\|credits]]. Created with AI assistance for the Ynternet.org Foundation.'' ''This content awaits more human validation.''

	[[Category:Migration June 2026]]		[[Category:Migration June 2026]]
	<!-- visible -->		<!-- visible -->

AI-Admin-Assistant: Direct link to renamed page Licensing-and-Credits (was redirect)

2026-07-03T00:14:15Z

Direct link to renamed page Licensing-and-Credits (was redirect)

← Older revision		Revision as of 02:14, 3 July 2026
Line 147:		Line 147:
	-----		-----

	''Concept and sources: see [[Gov/en/Portal:Meta/Credits\|~~Credits~~ and ~~licensing~~]]. Created with AI assistance for the Ynternet.org Foundation.'' ''This content awaits more human validation.''		''Concept and sources: see [[Gov/en/Portal:Meta/Licensing-and-Credits\|Licensing and credits]]. Created with AI assistance for the Ynternet.org Foundation.'' ''This content awaits more human validation.''

	[[Category:Migration June 2026]]		[[Category:Migration June 2026]]
	<!-- visible -->		<!-- visible -->

AI-Admin-Assistant: Attribution convention 2026-07-02: name moved to Credits page; attribution now 'WikiDeal concept'/'WikiDeal founder' with credits link; em-dash cleanup

2026-07-03T00:11:43Z

Attribution convention 2026-07-02: name moved to Credits page; attribution now 'WikiDeal concept'/'WikiDeal founder' with credits link; em-dash cleanup

Show changes

AI-Admin-Assistant: Protected "Gov/en/Portal:Onboarding/About-History": Bulk protection: Gov pages = administrators only (Theo 2026-06-20) ([Edit=Allow only administrators] (indefinite) [Move=Allow only administrators] (indefinite))

2026-06-20T13:27:15Z

Protected "Gov/en/Portal:Onboarding/About-History": Bulk protection: Gov pages = administrators only (Theo 2026-06-20) ([Edit=Allow only administrators] (indefinite) [Move=Allow only administrators] (indefinite))

← Older revision		Revision as of 15:27, 20 June 2026
(No difference)

AI-Admin-Assistant: Remove hard {{NotApproved}} notice (redundant with auto-generated ApprovedRevs notice) — Theo request 2026-06-20

2026-06-20T13:14:31Z

Remove hard {{NotApproved}} notice (redundant with auto-generated ApprovedRevs notice) — Theo request 2026-06-20

← Older revision		Revision as of 15:14, 20 June 2026
Line 1:		Line 1:
	{{KidsIntro\|This page tells the long story of how WikiDeal was born, starting from a Swiss foundation created in 1998.}}		{{KidsIntro\|This page tells the long story of how WikiDeal was born, starting from a Swiss foundation created in 1998.}}

	~~{{NotApproved}}~~

	= History of the Project =		= History of the Project =

AI-Admin-Assistant: Move project history into Gov structure (Article 1 reposition)

2026-06-19T11:47:33Z

Move project history into Gov structure (Article 1 reposition)

New page

{{KidsIntro|This page tells the long story of how WikiDeal was born, starting from a Swiss foundation created in 1998.}}

{{NotApproved}}

= History of the Project =
''From WikiDeal — [[Gov/en/Portal:Onboarding/About|About]] · [[Gov/en/Portal:Onboarding/Main|Onboarding]]''

-----

== In brief ==

WikiDeal did not appear out of nowhere. The project builds on more than twenty-five years of work carried out by the '''Ynternet.org Foundation''', a Swiss non-profit organisation active since 1998 in ethical and inclusive digital transition. This article traces the main milestones of that history, from the founding of the organisation to the strategic reflection that led to WikiDeal.

-----

== 1998 — Founded at the invitation of Swiss cooperation ==

The Ynternet.org Foundation was created in '''1998''' as a non-profit organisation, '''at the invitation of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC)'''.

At the time, Swiss cooperation wished to support '''non-profit''' international cooperation projects. The organisation it had until then primarily supported had gone public (IPO) and thereby become a for-profit company. The delegates of the Swiss federal body chose instead to favour structures driven by a '''non-speculative intent''' — not mere service providers, but genuine '''partners in an ethical and inclusive digital transition'''.

== 1998–2003 — First funding and a first social network ==

Between 1998 and 2003, Swiss cooperation funded the organisation’s activity (then constituted as an association). As early as 1998, the association had launched a social network called '''cooperation.net''', one of the first of its kind.

<blockquote>Archive snapshots (via archive.org / the Wayback Machine): - [https://web.archive.org/web/20010723211547/http://www.cooperation.net/ cooperation.net in '''2001'''] (earliest archived capture) - [https://web.archive.org/web/20030526104327/http://cooperation.net/ cooperation.net in '''2003''']

''Note: the site existed from 1998, but the Wayback Machine holds no capture earlier than July 2001.''
</blockquote>
In 2003, Swiss cooperation ended its funding while '''encouraging the organisation to diversify its sources of revenue and become self-sufficient'''.

== 2003–2008 — Self-sufficiency and sharing the know-how ==

The organisation succeeded in becoming self-sufficient over roughly a decade. It began to '''put its know-how to work for other actors''', then developed '''educational programmes''' across Europe and internationally — notably for Eastern European countries.

== 2008 — Becoming a foundation, and a strategic direction ==

In '''2008''', the organisation became a '''foundation'''. A meeting bringing together all the expert members of the scientific council set a clear direction:

<blockquote>'''Digital transition is, above all, a matter of education.'''
</blockquote>
In practice, this meant courses, mentoring and methodologies, designed to be deployed afterwards — directly within citizen associations, or through universities and other institutions. This positioning went hand in hand with the ambition to gather '''experts in free software culture and free culture''' more broadly, drawn from a wide range of organisations.

=== An underlying strategic tension ===

A significant minority of members (around '''35–40%''') leaned instead toward a '''technological lever'''. Their argument rested on the fundamental question raised by Wikipedia: ''is Wikipedia above all a piece of software (the wiki), or above all content (knowledge)?''

There was no clear-cut answer, nor any real confrontation — rather a '''tendency'''. The operational team and the foundation’s board implemented the educational direction, drawing on many experts, notably in the development of research and training programmes.

== 2008 onward — Diversifying the programmes ==

The foundation broadened its scope, for example through:

* organising the '''TEDx conferences in Geneva''';
* active participation in the launch of '''Wiki Loves Africa''', aimed at showcasing the creativity — particularly photographic — of Africans, for a re-appropriation of African culture by Africans (a form of autonomous visual ethno-anthropology);
* the '''Nos Jardins''' programme (presented on the foundation’s website, ynternet.org);
* many other training programmes of all kinds.

In total, '''30 to 50 socio-educational innovation programmes''' were created. '''Socio-technological''' work remained very rare — almost non-existent — with two exceptions:

* '''Credit Commons''': interoperability of complementary currencies under free licensing;
* '''Kowaboost''': networking of useful addresses (URLs), i.e. a shared-bookmarks system.

== 2020–2023 — Reformulating the strategy to reach the mission ==

Over time, one observation became clear: the activity was '''sustainable but limited in scale'''. The approach was not managing to spread more widely.

In-depth work was therefore carried out between '''2020 and 2023''' to '''reformulate the strategies for achieving the mission'''. It was in this context that the thinking which led to WikiDeal emerged.

== 2020–2022 — Two needs converge ==

This reformulation work raised the question of the '''role the foundation could play in the global digital ecosystem'''. Two distinct needs ultimately converged.

=== First need: federating an ethical digital ecosystem ===

The foundation considered '''connecting the various actors of the digital world''' within a global package — a monthly subscription bringing together the smartphone, the computer, relevant software, training and the internet provider — all within a '''non-speculative framework'''.

This idea grew in particular out of an invitation from the '''Fairphone''' team at TEDx Geneva, and from a network of skills already mobilisable around the foundation:

* the '''Fairphone''' team (hardware);
* a former founder of '''Framasoft''' (free software);
* the '''vice-president of the foundation''', the first woman to have chaired the foundation that runs Wikipedia;
* one of the founders of the '''GNU/Linux''' movement, Richard Stallman.

The challenge: to federate these skills. But for that, '''agreements''' were needed.

=== Second need: contract templates for living and cooperating together ===

In parallel (2020–2022), a '''long-standing partner''' of the foundation expressed a concrete need. This actor manages places of cohabitation and cooperation (''Living Labs'' and ecovillages): the cooperative '''Bâtir Groupé'''.

Its need: '''contract templates''' allowing human facilitators to combine several agreements smoothly — lease, service contract, volunteering contract, placement of shares, amendments, addenda, and so on — without falling into the vague disputes of the ''“you told me / I told you / it wasn’t clear / it’s unfair / it’s too complicated”'' kind. Because deep ethics often requires '''several agreements''', to be refined with care.

This need echoed an emerging movement at the time (less prominent today): the '''PropTech''' — technologies applied to property.

== The WikiDeal idea: the culture of agreements as a commons ==

From the meeting of PropTech with these various contract templates emerged the vision of a '''wiki platform''' whose distinctive feature would be to '''adopt the governance of Wikipedia''', with a deliberate '''internal competition'''.

Just as, on Wikipedia’s articles and portals — or on sister projects such as Wikimedia Commons or Wikibooks — discussions, reversions, conflicts and at times edit wars coexist, all of it remains held together by a '''fundamental agreement''': ''“knowledge is a commons.”''

WikiDeal transposes this principle to the realm of transactions:

<blockquote>'''“Transactions, the ways of managing them — more broadly the culture of agreements — are a commons.”'''
</blockquote>
The goal: to create a '''non-speculative environment''' for the culture of agreements.

== Sources of inspiration: the Swiss cooperative foundation ==

WikiDeal’s vision is rooted in several features of Swiss culture:

* '''La Mobilière''' — a cooperative insurer that redistributes its profits to its members;
* '''Coop and Migros''' — leading cooperative supermarkets, non-speculative (the subject of internal yet constructive criticism from humanist-minded citizens);
* '''Raiffeisen''' — a cooperative banking movement;
* '''The stability of the Swiss franc''' — a kind of “stablecoin”, not on a blockchain, yet deeply anchored;
* '''An innovation-friendly environment''', which explains the density of “crypto-creatives” in Switzerland — for legal and innovation-stimulating reasons, not for tax evasion.

It is from this cooperative heritage and this twofold demand — federating an ethical digital ecosystem on one side, equipping the culture of agreements on the other — that the '''WikiDeal''' adventure was born.

== Why the Wikipedia model? ==

The choice to draw on Wikipedia’s governance is no accident. That governance uses '''decision-making modes adapted to complexity''', which can go as far as elections or the '''Condorcet method''' — often presented as a possible new stage of democracy.

Wikipedia is also often nicknamed ''“the miracle”'': it is the '''only leading project in its field''' to sit at the top of the global digital world '''without being a speculative structure'''. Among the ten to twenty leading digital players, all (or nearly all) are publicly listed companies — Wikipedia is the exception. It is precisely this model that WikiDeal seeks to transpose.

== 2023–2025 — From idea to flagship project ==

The vision was then worked on in depth. '''Florence Devouard''', vice-president of the foundation and former chair of the foundation that runs Wikipedia, took part in '''around a dozen sessions''' (between ten and twenty) of analysis and proposal within the foundation’s council, over two to three years.

Between '''2023 and 2025''', the principle was adopted '''in successive cycles''', through workshops and validations in council sessions. WikiDeal thus became the foundation’s '''new flagship project''' — one intended to encompass existing initiatives as much as possible, without abandoning the TEDx conferences or the other training programmes, now regarded as progressively secondary.

This work was carried out under the presidency of '''Théo Bondolfi''', who continues to drive the deployment of the approach today.

== The economic model: funding without privatising ==

One decisive question remains: how can the launch of such a platform be funded without privatising it?

The starting intuition: if WikiDeal operates at the scale of an international structure comparable to Wikipedia, the '''operating costs''' — and more broadly the financial flows passing through the marketplace — will be counted in hundreds of millions, even billions.

The model envisaged (prototype 1) reconciles two seemingly contradictory goals — attracting initial support '''and''' preserving a commons:

* '''10% of each Entry Ticket''' (CHF 10) is reserved for the '''Early Supporters''', the first backers, as a '''reward''', '''only''' within a sustainable mode of operation;
* the financial attractiveness of early support follows a '''decreasing bonding curve (×100 → ×30)''': the larger the user community grows, the less the incentive needs to be high. The earliest supporters benefit from the strongest multiplier, which then decreases as newcomers arrive.

The intended outcome: enabling '''initial support''' while guaranteeing the '''non-privatisation of a commons''' — a global platform '''launched, run and maintained by the users themselves'''. A genuine shared marketplace.

<blockquote>''“Can it be done when the platform is, at the same time, launched, run and maintained by its users?” — that is the experiment at the heart of WikiDeal.''
</blockquote>

-----

''Imagination: Théo Bondolfi for Ynternet.org Foundation. Created with AI assistance.'' ''This content awaits more human validation.''

[[Category:Migration June 2026]]