diff --git a/MANIFEST b/MANIFEST
index d3791b34..4c60f8e4 100644
--- a/MANIFEST
+++ b/MANIFEST
@@ -1,6 +1,7 @@
 README
 ChangeLog
 TODO
+THANKS
 COPYING
 fail2ban-client
 fail2ban-server
diff --git a/README b/README
index beb55c59..e2431bfd 100644
--- a/README
+++ b/README
@@ -64,15 +64,7 @@ Cyril Jaquier: <cyril.jaquier@fail2ban.org>
 Thanks:
 -------
 
-Kévin Drapel, Marvin Rouge, Sireyessire, Robert Edeker, Tom Pike, Iain Lea,
-Andrey G. Grozin, Yaroslav Halchenko, Jonathan Kamens, Stephen Gildea, Markus
-Hoffmann, Mark Edgington, Patrick Börjesson, kojiro, zugeschmiert, Tyler, Nick
-Munger, Christoph Haas, Justin Shore, Joël Bertrand, René Berber, mEDI, Axel
-Thimm, Eric Gerbier, Christian Rauch, Michael C. Haller, Jonathan Underwood,
-Hanno 'Rince' Wagner, Daniel B. Cid, David Nutter, Raphaël Marichez, Guillaume
-Delvit, Vaclav Misek, Adrien Clerc, Michael Hanselmann, Vincent Deffontaines,
-Bill Heaton, Russell Odom, Christos Psonis, Arturo 'Buanzo' Busleiman, Yehuda
-Katz, and many others.
+See THANKS file.
 
 License:
 --------
diff --git a/THANKS b/THANKS
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..ff20d07d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/THANKS
@@ -0,0 +1,47 @@
+Fail2Ban is an open source project with many contributions from its
+users community. Below is an alphabetically sorted partial list of the
+contributors to the project.  If you have been left off, please let us
+know (preferably send a pull request on github with the "fix") and you
+will be added
+
+Adrien Clerc
+Andrey G. Grozin
+Arturo 'Buanzo' Busleiman
+Axel Thimm
+Bill Heaton
+Christian Rauch
+Christoph Haas
+Christos Psonis
+Daniel B. Cid
+David Nutter
+Eric Gerbier
+Guillaume Delvit
+Hanno 'Rince' Wagner
+Iain Lea
+Jonathan Kamens
+Jonathan Underwood
+Joël Bertrand
+Justin Shore
+Kévin Drapel
+kojiro
+Mark Edgington
+Markus Hoffmann
+Marvin Rouge
+mEDI
+Michael C. Haller
+Michael Hanselmann
+NickMunger
+Patrick Börjesson
+Raphaël Marichez
+René Berber
+Robert Edeker
+Russell Odom
+Sireyessire
+Stephen Gildea
+Tom Pike
+Tyler
+Vaclav Misek
+Vincent Deffontaines
+Yaroslav Halchenko
+Yehuda Katz
+zugeschmiert