Initiatives · since 2010
WikiBusines initiatives: community projects since 2010
WikiBusines comes out of the Ukrainian Wikipedia community. Part of our work was never for sale: a contest that closed coverage gaps, an anthology of Ukrainian futurism and a volunteer patrol against vandalism and disinformation. Here are those projects.
Founded in Kyiv
WikiBusines starts as a team of editors from the Ukrainian Wikipedia community.
About the team →Wikipatrol profiled
Rubryka publishes a long-form profile of the volunteer patrol co-founded by Roman Melnyk.
To the Wikipatrol section →«Zvyzdobolid» presented
The futurism anthology is presented at the Interfax-Ukraine press centre in Kyiv.
To the «Zvyzdobolid» section →Wikimarathon runs
The article contest closes a gap in Ukrainian Wikipedia's coverage of the world's entrepreneurs.
To the Wikimarathon section →The record continues
The same community work still shapes how we assess, write and defend client pages today.
Our guarantees →01Timeline
WikiBusines history: sixteen years in the Wikipedia ecosystem
The dates on the timeline come from the public record: our original website and independent press publications. If a date was never published, we leave it out rather than reconstruct it.
WikiBusines was founded in Kyiv in 2010 by editors from the Ukrainian Wikipedia community. Client work keeps the company going; the projects on this page are what the same people did for the ecosystem itself.
The team behind both strands is introduced on the about page.
02Initiative 01 · Wikimarathon
Wikimarathon: a Wikipedia article contest «Inspirational stories of entrepreneurs»
Ukrainian Wikipedia lacked quality articles about the world's outstanding entrepreneurs and innovators. Wikimarathon was our answer: a public contest for creating and translating such articles, to close a real coverage gap and encourage the Ukrainian business community to create encyclopedic content.
How the contest worked
- Participants created new Ukrainian Wikipedia articles about notable entrepreneurs and innovators, or expanded existing stubs, within the theme «Inspirational stories of entrepreneurs».
- Every article and edit had to comply with Wikipedia's own rules; entries based on machine translation were disqualified.
- A substance threshold applied: at least 4,000 bytes of contribution per article and at least 40 substantive articles on the worklist to qualify.
- A jury scored each article from 1 to 3 points on rule compliance, contribution volume, text structure and translation quality; the three highest totals won.
On the record
- When
- The 2025 edition.
- Who could take part
- Citizens of Ukraine aged 16 and over with a registered Ukrainian Wikipedia account.
- What the contest delivered
- New and improved Ukrainian-language articles about entrepreneurs worldwide; every qualifying worklist covered at least 40 substantive articles.
- Status
- Completed programme. The contest is closed; we keep its terms here as part of our record.
03Initiative 02 · «Zvyzdobolid»
«Zvyzdobolid»: an anthology of contemporary Ukrainian futurism
Part of our social responsibility, not of our commercial projects: «Zvyzdobolid» is an anthology of contemporary Ukrainian futurism, presented by Ukrainian Wikipedians in honour of Mazepa and Bandera.
What it was
The anthology was co-authored by WikiBusines founders Bohdan Dubylovskyi and Roman Melnyk; it was presented on 7 September 2021 at the Interfax-Ukraine press centre in Kyiv. The presentation set out the book's editorial line and announced plans for Chinese and Japanese translations.
For us this records a simple thing: the people behind WikiBusines write and publish as Wikipedians and authors in their own name, not only on behalf of clients.
On the record
- When
- Presented on 7 September 2021 at the Interfax-Ukraine press centre, Kyiv.
- Outcome
- A published anthology whose presentation was covered by the national news agency.
04Initiative 03 · «Wikipatrol»
Wikipatrol: volunteer defence of Wikipedia against vandalism and disinformation
A volunteer initiative defending Ukrainian Wikipedia and articles about Ukraine, co-founded by Roman Melnyk of WikiBusines: editors watch articles and contest vandalism and Russian disinformation, source by source, edit by edit.
Daily work
- Daily volunteer work countering Russian narratives across language editions, including English, German, Polish, French and Portuguese Wikipedia.
- Concrete editorial battles documented in the press profile, from the «DPR/LPR» articles to the page on the Cyborgs of Donetsk airport.
- The method is Wikipedia's own: sourced corrections under the project's rules, the same standards we apply in client work.
On the record
- Coverage
- A long-form Rubryka feature of 25 February 2021.
- Why it matters
- Wikipedia is where Ukraine's image is formed for millions of readers; the patrol keeps articles anchored to reliable sources.
More independent publications are collected on our press page.
05Why it matters to clients
Community authority on Wikipedia: it cannot be bought
None of these projects existed for sales, and none of them can be bought, which is why they carry weight. A contest run by Wikipedia's rules, Wikipedians' publications in their own name and patrolling articles against disinformation taught us editorial culture from the inside: what volunteer reviewers respect, what gets deleted and why. That understanding shapes every client project. Meet the team behind this work and see what we promise and what we don't in our guarantees.
Contact the Wikipedia editors who ran these projects
The same editors who ran these projects now assess, write and defend pages for clients. Meet them, or tell us what you need.