In the first three months of 2009, online encyclopedia Wikipedia has lost 49,000 of its volunteer editors, compared to 4,900 in the same period last year.

The internet encyclopedia-style website is written collaboratively by volunteers and is based on page creation and editorial changes by anybody who visits the site.

Felipe Ortega from Rey Juan Carlos University, Madrid, used edit-tracking software to get more details on the matter.

The software revealed that thousands of Wikipedia editors had stopped contributing to the sixth most popular website in the world and that they were not being replaced.

In all, there are more than 85,000 active contributors working on over 14 million articles in more than 260 languages, according to an article on Wikipedia's web site.

"If the negative trend is maintained for too much time, say one or two years, eventually the project could enter a problematic phase," Ortega said.

The downward trend in the number of online volunteers does not mean the site is struggling; however, it needs more expert contributors, Internet analysts say.

NAT/MTM/AKM