Jimmy Wales

:"James Wales" redirects here. For the British film director, see James Whale.

Recent work

Development of Wikipedia

On January 15, 2001, Wales and Sanger set up Wikipedia, a similar wiki-based site intended for collaboration on early encyclopedic content before submitting it to Nupedia for peer review. Wikipedia's rapid growth soon made it the dominant project and "the free encyclopedia", and Nupedia was mothballed. Sanger did most of the early development of Wikipedia, while Wales mainly provided the necessary capital. Because Sanger was Wales's employee, Wales considers himself the sole founder of Wikipedia, though Sanger continues to call himself the "co-founder". Sanger has since dropped out of the project. His resignation can be seen at his Wikipedia user page. Sanger has since criticised Wales's approach to the project - http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2004/12/30/142458/25 - painting Wales as being "decidedly anti-elitist". Wales disagrees with Sanger's viewpoint, saying that he was not anti-elitist, but "perhaps anti-credentialist. To me the key thing is getting it right. And if a person?s really smart and they?re doing fantastic work I don?t care if they?re a high school kid or a Harvard professor, it?s the work that matters. ... You can?t coast on your credentials on Wikipedia... you have to enter the marketplace of ideas and engage with people."

Related Topics:
January 15 - 2001 - Wikipedia - Wiki - Nupedia

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In mid-2003, Wales set up the Wikimedia Foundation, a Tampa-based non-profit organization, to support Wikipedia and its younger sister projects. Since then, he has become increasingly involved with promoting and speaking about the foundation's projects. As of 2005, Wales is the foundation's president and chairman of the board.

Related Topics:
Wikimedia Foundation - Tampa - Non-profit organization

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In 2004, Wales had been quoted as saying that he spent around US$500,000 on the establishment and operations of his Wiki projects. By the end of the foundation's February 2005 fund drive, the Wikimedia Foundation was being supported entirely by grants and donations.

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Wales is sometimes considered Wikipedia's "benevolent dictator", although he rarely tells the community what to do. Despite the creation of the Wikimedia Foundation, Wales retained ultimate control by appointing, in addition to himself, two business partners who are not active Wikipedia editors to the five-member board, thus effectively having a controlling three-vote majority. However, he has stated that if the two members of the board who edit Wikipedia vote the same way on something, he will cast his vote in their favor, effectively giving them the controlling majority.

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Other projects

More recently, perhaps inspired by the success of Wikipedia, Wales has founded the for-profit company Wikia, which hosts various wikis, and manages the Wikicities project.

Related Topics:
Wikia - Wikicities

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Wales was appointed a fellow of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at the Harvard Law School in 2005. Later that year, on October 3, Wales joined the Board of Directors of Socialtext, a provider of wiki technology to businesses (Socialtext press release).

Related Topics:
Berkman Center for Internet and Society - Harvard Law School - Board of Directors - Socialtext - Wiki

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