re web: Listless Wikimedia "In Chaos" Following Co-founder Jimmy Wales Resignation ...

[Dave Farber <dfarber () me com>]

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Mike Godwin <mnemonic () gmail com>
> Date: May 16, 2010 8:12:38 PM EDT
> To: dave () farber net
> Cc: ip <ip () v2 listbox com>, frode () hyperwords net
> Subject: Re: [IP] : web: Listless Wikimedia "In Chaos" Following Co-founder Jimmy Wales Resignation ...
> Reply-To: mnemonic () gmail com

> Hi, Dave.
>
> The notion that the Wikimedia Foundation is enduring some kind of "chaos" and that the organization somehow has "no 
> one at the wheel" is simply nonsense. The Fox News campaign against Wikipedia has certainly led to some reactions, of 
> course, but our Board and executive director remain in charge, and in fact we spent more time last week rolling out 
> an interface redesign for Wikipedia than we did thinking about Fox News's attacks. Whether one takes Gizmodo's 
> gestures at journalism very seriously or not, surely it should give you pause to note that Gizmodo's conclusion is 
> based on an unnamed "source" who very likely has no connection at all to the Wikimedia Foundation nor any knowledge 
> of our day-to-day operations.
>
> Furthermore, anyone who thinks that Jimmy's voluntary decision to limit his own editing powers means that no one is 
> in charge suggests a profound ignorance of how the Wikimedia Foundation operates.
>
> In short, the Gizmodo piece seems aimed primarily at exceeding Fox News's sloppiness and inaccuracy regarding Fox's 
> original self-congratulatory anti-porn-on-the-Internet campaign. I'm sorry to see your mailing list used to give a 
> rotten story a semblance of legitimacy. Weren't we done with this kind of nonsense in the mid-1990s?
>
>
> --Mike Godwin
> General Counsel
> Wikimedia Foundation
>
>
>
> On Sun, May 16, 2010 at 4:51 PM, Dave Farber <dfarber () me com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
> Begin forwarded message:
>
> > From: Frode Hegland <frode () hyperwords net>
> > Date: May 16, 2010 7:01:38 PM EDT
> > To: Dave Farber <dave () farber net>
> > Subject: web: Listless Wikimedia "In Chaos" Following Co-founder Jimmy Wales Resignation  ...
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > "Wikimedia co-founder Jimmy Wales has abruptly stepped down following a controversial porn purge that saw Wales 
> > himself single-handedly deleting questionable content from Wikimedia Foundation servers.
> >
> > The purge was the result of a FOX News investigation started in April that discovered a large amount of pornographic 
> > material on Wikimedia's servers. When FOX News asked Wikimedia donors how they felt about this, the questions 
> > started rolling in and the offending  imagery started going away.
> >
> > Therein lies the issue: Many editors in the organization's "inner circle" disagreed with the way Wales handled the 
> > pornography deletions—some did not see the content as objectionable at all, while others appaently argued the 
> > deletions went against the organization's inherent openness.
> >
> > In any event, Wales has relinquished administrative rights, but will remain a board member.  The resignation, 
> > according to an unnamed source, has sent Wikimedia "into chaos" with no one at the wheel. [Venture Beat, Neowi..."
> >      http://gizmodo.com/5540172/listless-wikimedia-in-chaos-following-co+founder-jimmy-wales-resignation
> >      http://tinyurl.com/23u835l 
> >
> >
> > --   
> >
> >     Frode Hegland, director
> >
> >    The Hyperwords Company
> >     www.hyperwords.net
> >
> >    www.twitter.com/hyperwords
> >   
> Archives       



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