The Internet Archive is absolutely essential to Wikipedia, whose articles are required to be verifiable to reliable sources. When pages go offline, the link rot makes it harder for articles to be verified. However, if the Wayback Machine has an archived copy, that copy can then be cited as the source and made available to readers and editors. The Wayback Machine now automatically archives every new external link added to the English Wikipedia.
The Wikimedia Foundation's budget is about 10 times that of the Internet Archive. If you see the fundraising banner on Wikipedia and want to help out the site, but don't think the Wikimedia Foundation needs the donation, consider donating to the Internet Archive instead.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Link_rot
The Wikimedia Foundation's budget is about 10 times that of the Internet Archive. If you see the fundraising banner on Wikipedia and want to help out the site, but don't think the Wikimedia Foundation needs the donation, consider donating to the Internet Archive instead.
https://archive.org/donate