About WikiBlueprint
WikiBlueprint is a team of world-class Wikipedia consultants, advancing open knowledge, founded and led by Jake Orlowitz, a nineteen-year Wikipedia editor, English Wikipedia administrator, and founder of The Wikipedia Library at the Wikimedia Foundation. We work with companies, people, and institutions from Santa Cruz, California.
Jake Orlowitz
Jake began editing Wikipedia in 2007 under the account Ocaasi. He founded The Wikipedia Library in 2011 and ran it at the Wikimedia Foundation until 2019, building it into a program with a six-person team on four continents and partnerships with seventy scholarly publishers that give editors free access to 100,000 journals and reference works. He created the #1Lib1Ref citation campaign, which brings tens of thousands of new references from librarians to Wikipedia each year, and founded the Foundation's Knowledge Integrity program.
He started the Internet Archive collaboration that has repaired more than twenty million dead citation links, negotiated the Turnitin partnership that finds copyright violations, integrated OCLC's citation data into Wikipedia's reference tools, and built The Wikipedia Adventure, the interactive tutorial that has introduced thousands of newcomers to editing. He facilitated the first for-credit Wikipedia editing course at Stanford Medical School and is a primary author of Wikipedia's Plain and Simple Conflict of Interest Guide.
He has presented at six Wikimanias, Stanford, the American Library Association, the Coalition for Networked Information, the Digital Library Federation, OCLC, and IFLA, and convened the first Wikipedia and ARL summit for academic library leaders. He was featured with Jimmy Wales on NPR's TED Radio Hour, wrote a chapter of MIT Press's Wikipedia @ 20, and appears in Verified, from the University of Chicago Press, on what it means to make an edit that sticks. He is vice chair of the Smithsonian's Biodiversity Heritage Library working group and founder of the Wikimedia Consultants Network.
He is a graduate of Wesleyan University's College of Social Studies and lives in Santa Cruz with his wife, two kids, and two cats.
A note from Jake
Most people who write to me are a little unsure whether they should be asking at all. They have read that Wikipedia frowns on companies and public figures, and they are half expecting to be scolded. Nobody gets scolded here.
What you get instead is a straight answer about where you stand, in plain language, with every term explained the first time it comes up. If the answer is not yet, you leave knowing what would change it and with the door open. If the answer is yes, you get a plan you can follow and someone beside you while you do.
I have spent nineteen years inside this community, and I still edit as a volunteer. The thing I like most about the consulting work is watching someone stop dreading Wikipedia and start understanding it. That happens on nearly every engagement, and it is the part no invoice covers.
The team
WikiBlueprint is founder-led by design. Alongside Jake, the team consists of veteran English Wikipedia editors and administrators, an academic librarian who runs research on every article, and two engineers who build the monitoring and reporting behind retainers. Every engagement gets senior attention because there is no one else to hand it to.
For a project that needs a specialist in the arts, the sciences, technology, or history, we bring in editors from a network built over two decades in the open-knowledge movement, chosen for the engagement. Engagements run on a contractor basis, and residencies can be structured to fit your HR requirements.
What people say
The most striking thing about Jake is his ability to build a strategic vision and light a flame to see it made real. Jake has inspired faith at the highest levels, and has rewarded that faith by delivering tangible, impressive results. I trust his vision; I trust his drive; I trust his ability to execute. When Jake tells me something is a good idea, I listen.
Maggie Dennis, Wikimedia Foundation
Jake has extensive knowledge of Wikipedia's people, projects, practices, and pitfalls. He brings a positive and supportive attitude, brainstorming and strategizing, asking insightful questions, and identifying ways to increase effectiveness.
Mary Mark Ockerbloom, Annual Reviews
Jake propelled me to center Wikipedia in my library instruction. I've reached out to him multiple times seeking advice and always been met with kind enthusiasm.
Laurie Bridges, Oregon State University
After Jake created my Wikipedia article and put my image on Wikimedia Commons, I got so much visibility. It's a spotlight for me to show my activism. I'm using the Wikipedia article as my bio. It's like Jake gave an address to all of my activism, to all of my work.
Grace Banu, Dalit trans activist
The Wikimedia Consultants Network
Jake founded the Wikimedia Consultants Network, a directory and community of practitioners who work with institutions and companies inside Wikipedia's rules. If WikiBlueprint is not the right fit for your project, we will point you to someone who is.
Talk to Jake.
The first conversation is free and usually settles whether Wikipedia is worth your time right now.