From the NYT Magazine article
"Jimmy Wales Is Not an Internet Billionaire."
Wales... realized early on that the community would revolt if he were to monetize Wikipedia by selling ads. He may now travel the world giving speeches and even include Bono as a friend, but Wales’s celebrity relies largely on being the guy who made the sum of the world’s information free without making a penny himself. As such, his reputation remains inextricably linked to the noisy, online volunteers who got him there.
Much more at the link.
Wales likes to invoke the higher purpose of Wikipedia. He applies his libertarian worldview to the Internet and has taken on institutions like the United States government and Apple for threatening to curb the free exchange of information on the Web....
[His] proximity to famous people doesn’t sit well with some members of the Wikipedia community who assert that Wales’s new life is, in some ways, contradictory to the egalitarian online world he created.....
Wales... ensures he is not taken for a radical. He treads carefully when weighing in on more extreme members of the free-culture movement, like Julian Assange — who he has criticized for using the “wiki” name — and online hacking collectives like Anonymous. Wales and I met for lunch the day after the 26-year-old computer programmer and Internet activist Aaron Swartz killed himself. The community had erupted with calls for Wales to weigh in, but he was hesitant. “People have been pushing me to comment, but I didn’t know him,” Wales told me. He has also stayed mostly mum on Edward Snowden, the contractor for the National Security Agency who leaked confidential information about widespread snooping by the United States government....
The article begins and is larded with info about his wedding and his wife (and wives), which I suspect is another example of the NYT's hackneyed, desperate playing up to female readers.
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27 comments:
I don't think anyone should be killing wales. This is horrible. This is what I've come to expect these days and I wonder when it will end.
You still trust Wiki at your peril, regardless of what kind of guy he is.
Ann Althouse said...
The article begins and is larded with info about his wedding and his wife (and wives), which I suspect is another example of the NYT's hackneyed, desperate playing up to female readers.
???
I assume you forgot /sarc.
I can sell you a slightly used Encyclopedia Britannica for cheap!!
Save the Wales.
Chrisnavin:
Thank you.
MadAsHell:
The British pillaged the natural world, and now you want to add sheep to it? I pitty you. What kind of dog is that in your picture? Hope you are feeding it a non-meat diet.
Natural world?
As opposed to the unnatural world?
The only true lights of democracy on earth are places Britain colonized at one time or another.
edbutcher:
I defy your beliefs. Inifinitely.
(1) His wife is better-looking than my wife so hats off.
(2) The article begins and is larded with info about his wedding and his wife (and wives), which I suspect is another example of the NYT's hackneyed, desperate playing up to female readers.
And you, the newspaper of record!
Why bitch about Wales "leaving money on the table"?
Wales created Wikipedia. He's just 46. He's hanging around with the rich & powerful. He's till got LOTS of time to pull in the millions & I bet he will.
The "young cyber-geek worth billions" trope is, needless to say, rare in the business world. It also, in keeping with the Professor's mentioning of "pandering to the NYT female readership", exercises quite a hold on the female mind: to get a man who's both rich & virile.
Much more common is the Al Gore model where old white fart makes so many connections & has so many chips to call in that he'd be hard pressed not to make a bundle out of it.
I agree with Mitchell the Bat because I like bats (related to mice). If I could have I would be a bat.
Candle said...
edbutcher:
I defy your beliefs. Inifinitely.
Nothing to do with belief, everything to do with fact, but who stole Texas?
Edutcher:
Texas was stolen by Hillbillies during the succession wars. They had more shadowmancers, and the Mexicans were at a loss. Years later, it's just a big mess down there, so why are you defending them?
Wikipedia is the best maths textbook I have ever used. I don't know who writes these sections but it is a remarkable store of knowledge. I find the biology sections much weaker and traditional textbooks generally do a better job.
Candle said...
Texas was stolen by Hillbillies during the succession wars. They had more shadowmancers, and the Mexicans were at a loss. Years later, it's just a big mess down there, so why are you defending them?
Never heard of the succession wars.
I do know the Caddos and Karankawas would say Mexico stole it from them.
And the Comanches will tell you they stole it from everybody.
But the Americans were invited to settle on promise of basic services and, when those services were not forthcoming, they petitioned the government and said government, in the person of one Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, tossed the Americans' representative, Stephen Austin, in jail for daring to broach the subject.
But tell me about these succession wars.
I thought succession was something the Euros worried about.
The succession wars started because femenists weren't given equal rights. They took those rights back, but a lot of lives were lost. That is why I struggle so hard these days to keep people equal. Join me.
I know Candle thinks this is too cool (yes, I know we're going wildly OT):
AmnestyCare would apply to most gang members.
PS We need a sobriety check at the door.
edutcher:
Those are the people of the earth, why shouldn't they be given what they need to thrive? The cold chill of indiference seeps from your words like ooze from a hole :(
As I said...
Then there's the wiki Online Encyclopedia of Integer Sequences, on which nobody ever got famous, let alone rich.
Wikipedia is only the most famous Wiki on the internet. He certainly didn't coin the term, so he has no right to be offended when others use it as they should.
I smell someone having a little fun there, candle.
After I get done raping my garden with weed-killer and bad intent, we can meet up, hold hands and weep together for the oppressed peoples of the world.
And did someone say 'maths?'
I smell a Limey or just some trendy sort queuing up for Patriot's beating.
Went to school with Jimmy! He's a (Ran)dork. He'd be an even bigger dork if he were a billionaire.
@Fabi
If you went to school with Jimmy tell us more. Was he a member of the humanitarian club or the beef club? Or both?
Many ethnic Mexicans fought on the Texian side during The Texas war for independence. It was a local revolt against a tyrannical Caudillo.
Before the State of Texas was admitted to the US, The people there called themselves Texians or Texicans. Only as a state did they call themselves Texans.
> who he has criticized for using the “wiki” name
Seriously? The guy who coined the term was Ward Cunningham, who designed the very concept of the easily editable website and wrote the Wiki-Wiki web, devoted to software development and instrumental in the development of Extreme Programming.
Wales has no business griping.
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