Wikipedia is here to stay, or so it seems – this ever growing repository of knowledge also maintains vast libraries of images and other media – and up until now, they have not had sufficient resources to allow the growth in large multimedia files.

Video file sizes are quickly reaching the dozens and hundreds of megabytes, and the proliferation of high-megapixel cameras means even small photos can take up a few megabytes, says Brion Vibber, CTO at the Wikimedia Foundation, which operates Wikipedia. Until early 2008, the user-generated encyclopedia's primary media file server had just 2TB of total space, Vibber says.

Wikipedia has since scaled up from 2TB to 24TB and now 48TB of storage for its primary medial file server, and recently raised file upload limits from 20MB to 100MB. The amount of storage actually being used is about 5TB but that will grow quickly, Vibber says.

“There's no limit, and there's no practical limit,” Vibber says. “The limits will get bigger and bigger to where it will be relatively easy for someone who has a legitimate need to upload a two-hour video of good quality.”

Source: Wikipedia Beefs Up for Multimedia – PC World

Comments:



1. Mazen Says:
   January 18th, 2009 at 1:33 am

   Go Wikipedia