Justin Anthony Knapp (born November 18, 1982), also known by his online moniker Koavf, is an American Wikipedia user who was the first person to contribute more than one million edits to

Wikipedia Wikipedia is a free content, free Online content, online encyclopedia that is written and maintained by a community of volunteers, known as Wikipedians, through open collaboration and the wiki software MediaWiki. Founded by Jimmy Wales and La ...

. , Knapp has made over 2.1 million edits on the

English Wikipedia The English Wikipedia is the primary English-language edition of Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia. It was created by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger on 15 January 2001, as Wikipedia's first edition. English Wikipedia is hosted alongside o ...

. He was ranked No. 1 among the most active Wikipedia contributors of all time from April 18, 2012, to November 1, 2015, when he was surpassed by

Steven Pruitt Steven Pruitt ( ; born April 17, 1984), known online as Ser Amantio di Nicolao, is an American Wikipedia editor and administrator with the largest number of edits made to the English Wikipedia, at over 6 million, having made at least one ...

Education

Knapp attended Covenant Christian High School, where he enrolled in 1997. He holds degrees in philosophy and political science from

Indiana University–Purdue University Indianapolis Indiana University–Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) was a public university from 1969 to 2024 in Indianapolis, Indiana, United States. It was a collaboration between Indiana University and Purdue University system, Purdue University, of ...

Career

Wikipedia

Knapp announced his millionth edit to Wikipedia on April 19, 2012. At the time, he had been submitting on average 385 edits a day since signing up in March 2005; about his performance he said: "Being suddenly and involuntarily unemployed will do that to you." Margaret Ferguson, an associate professor of political science at Indiana University–Purdue University Indianapolis and one of Knapp's professors, said she was not surprised by his dedication to editing Wikipedia. In 2012, Wikipedia co-founder

Jimmy Wales Jimmy Donal Wales (born August 7, 1966), also known as Jimbo Wales, is an American List of Internet entrepreneurs, Internet entrepreneur and former Trader (finance), financial trader. He is a Founders of Wikipedia, co-founder of the non-profi ...

congratulated Knapp for his work and presented him with the site's highest award for his achievement by declaring that April 20 would be Justin Knapp Day. His Wikipedia username, Koavf, was chosen as an acronym for "King of all Vext Fans", a reference to a contest Knapp entered for ''

Vext V V'lana V'lana was an insurgent Queen of Xebel, an underwater kingdom located in Dimension Aqua. She opposed Queen Mera in a plot that resulted in her own death. Val-El Val-El is a fictional character appearing in American comic books publis ...

'' in the 1990s. Knapp was a significant contributor to Wikipedia's

bibliography of George Orwell The bibliography of George Orwell includes journalism, essays, novels, and non-fiction books written by the British writer Eric Blair (1903–1950), either under his own name or, more usually, under his pen name George Orwell. Orwell was a proli ...

, and he has also made many edits involving the categorization of albums through Wikipedia's category structure. In 2012, the ''

Indianapolis Star Indianapolis ( ), colloquially known as Indy, is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Indiana and the county seat of Marion County. Indianapolis is situated in the state's central till plain region along the west fork of ...

'' reported that Knapp sometimes edited Wikipedia for as many as 16 hours a day. In a 2014 interview with ''

Business Insider ''Business Insider'' (stylized in all caps: BUSINESS INSIDER; known from 2021 to 2023 as INSIDER) is a New York City–based multinational financial and business news website founded in 2007. Since 2015, a majority stake in ''Business Inside ...

'', Knapp said that "there is no typical day" with regard to his Wikipedia editing, and that his "go-to edits are small style and typo fixes". He also argued that the declining number of Wikipedia editors is "not necessarily a problem". Knapp, who has been the subject of multiple blocks/bans from editing Wikipedia, said in a 2015 interview with technology journalist Zachary Crockett that he "wouldn't be surprised if I've been banned more than anyone". As of November 2024, Knapp is serving a minimum one-year ban from editing Wikipedia imposed on July 24, 2024, for "persistent disruptive and combative behavior over a prolonged period, and exhausting the

community A community is a social unit (a group of people) with a shared socially-significant characteristic, such as place, set of norms, culture, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given g ...

's patience".

Activism

In 2005, at the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is the Earth, global intergovernmental organization established by the signing of the Charter of the United Nations, UN Charter on 26 June 1945 with the stated purpose of maintaining international peace and internationa ...

Sixtieth General Assembly, Knapp advocated for the

Sahrawi people The Sahrawis, or Sahrawi people ( '), are an ethnic group native to the western part of the Sahara desert, which includes the Western Sahara, southern Morocco, much of Mauritania, and along the southwestern border of Algeria. They are of mixed ...

and spoke about the situation in

Western Sahara Western Sahara is a territorial dispute, disputed territory in Maghreb, North-western Africa. It has a surface area of . Approximately 30% of the territory () is controlled by the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR); the remaining 70% is ...

. He has also been involved in

community organizing Community organizing is a process where people who live in proximity to each other or share some common problem come together into an organization that acts in their shared self-interest. Unlike those who promote more-consensual community buil ...

for a Restore the Fourth rally in 2013.

Other

Knapp has had several jobs, including delivering pizzas for the Indianapolis pizzeria Just Pizza, working at a grocery store, and working at a

crisis hotline A crisis hotline is a phone number people can call to get immediate emergency telephone counseling, usually by trained volunteers. The first such service was founded in England in 1951 and such hotlines have existed in most major cities of the E ...

References

External links

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"Seven Years, One Million Edits, Zero Dollars: Wikipedia's Flat Broke Superstar"

"Justin Knapp Becomes Wikipedia Legend With One Million Edits"

"Justin Knapp: One man, one million Wikipedia edits"

"Week in Wiki out: Hoosier is top contributor to online encyclopedia"

Meet The Guy Who's Made 1.4 Million Wikipedia Edits And Counting
{{DEFAULTSORT:Knapp, Justin 1982 births 21st-century American male writers 21st-century American writers American Wikimedians Indiana University–Purdue University Indianapolis alumni Living people Wikipedia people Writers from Indianapolis