Foundation issues

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Note: Over time, the opinion of the community does evolve slowly. As changes occur they will need to be negotiated and integrated into this document.

The Wikimedia projects as a community have certain foundation issues that are essentially considered to be beyond debate. People who strongly disagree with them sometimes end up leaving the project. These issues include:

Neutral point of view as the guiding editorial principle
Ability of anyone to edit articles without registering
The "wiki process" as the decision mechanism on content
Free licensing of content; in practice, defined by project, either GFDL or CC-BY.
The Board of Trustees has ultimate authority on all matters pertaining to the Wikimedia Foundation. By convention, Jimbo Wales retains some authority on certain projects. The Arbitration Committees of those projects which have one can also make binding, final decisions such as banning an editor.

Several other projects not managed by Wikimedia are notable in their use of different principles. For example, h2g2 and some other collaborative projects have editorial boards that review content. Fred Bauder's fork Wikinfo project uses a sympathetic point of view rather than NPOV. Larry Sanger's Citizendium differs because it doesn't allow a user to edit articles without registering and disclosing his/her identity.