Wikimedia is using RIPE Atlas to help it improve where it locates its data centers.

The Wikimedia Foundation is 'democratising' access to information through Wikipedia. However, with only two datacentres, some users have experienced latency issues and the Wikimedia Foundation needed to place a third data center to better serve the Oceania region.

The Wikimedia Foundation worked with the RIPE network co-data from RIPE Atlas, a global network of probes measuring Internet traffic data. By developing bespoke code for W2ikimedia, the RIPE NCC was able to use this unique network to demonstrate the best location for the new datacentre.

Probes located in India clearly have lower latency towards Amsterdam. Probes in China, South Korea, the Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore showed lower latency towards San Francisco. For other locations in South-East Asia the situation was less clear, but the Amsterdam and the San Francisco data center

They also found that all of Russia, including the two most eastern probes in Vladivostok had a lower latency thanAmsterdam. For the Vladivostok probes Amsterdam and San Francisco are almost the same distance. Nearby probes in China, South Korea and Japan have lowest latency towards San Francisco.

Wikimedia is gradually turning up Oceania, South Asian countries and US/Canada states where RIPE Atlas measurements showed minimal latency ,to be served by their San Francisco caching Po.
 

The Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. is a nonprofit charitable organization dedicated to encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free, multilingual, educational content, and to providing the full content of these wiki-based projects to the public free of charge. The Wikimedia Foundation operates some of the largest collaboratively edited reference projects in the world, including Wikipedia, a top-ten internet property.