Wikipedia co-founder Larry Sanger launched 'Citizendium' in San Francisco, California, United States. This experimental online wiki project aimed to combine the open, collaborative editing speed of a public wiki with the strict accuracy checks of a traditional academic reference work by requiring real-name registration for all contributors and giving final editorial veto power to certified subject-matter experts.

Citizendium's public debate over crowdsourced openness versus professional academic authority mirrored contemporary poetic discussions regarding literary gatekeeping. It inspired digital poets to examine how algorithmic and institutional authority shapes the language and historical facts available to modern writers.