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Jimmy Wales Resigns Chair at Wikipedia
user24 writes "As reported by Wikipedia's Signpost ezine, 'The Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees has moved forward with a step in restructuring the organization by reorganizing itself. Following a planning retreat in Frankfurt, Jimmy Wales stepped down as Chair of the board, and Florence Nibart-Devouard was chosen to replace him ... Wales, meanwhile, will continue to serve on the board and assume the honorary title of Chairman Emeritus. He will remain active in Wikimedia projects, but chose to pass on the responsibility of heading the board, due in part to his commitments to outside projects.'"
and work on a standardization of bureaucratic nerdiness.
Losers.
How we know is more important than what we know.
Jimmy Wales has done an EXCELLENT job creating Wikipedia, but a little change in leadership is probably a good thing right now. By stepping to the side (a little), he opens the door for more collaborative decisions and possibly some creative new direction for Wikipedia. If Jimmy Wales wasn't the chairperson, would Wikipedia have walked away from a $100 Million deal with AOL? Who knows, but I would guess they'd think longer about the offer.
...
Hopefully the new chairperson will help look for ways for Wikipedia to increase it's reach, accuracy, and media content. It's a great tool, but it could be so much better too
Crack - Free with every butt and set of boobs
Why is this on slashdot?
The Wikimedia board only meets a couple of times a year... the chair hardly does any work. The reason for the change is that Florence whines a lot (take a look at the video from Wikimania 2006 for her childish behavior during the public board panel) at giving her a better title might just shut her up.
In any case, Wales is still a board member.. This wasn't a change of consequence to anyone outside the board. Not news.. and it doesn't matter.
I hope I'm not alone in this, but I for one would like to say "Thanks" to Jimmy Wales, and all that he and Wikipedia has done to help advance the internet, modern knowledge, and in particular, the life of this college student. Thank You
Disclaimer: Any errors in spelling, tact or fact are transmission errors.
I met Jimbo Wales when he had visited Bangalore recently and he struck me as a very down to earth person. In his own words, "I don't do much for wikipedia. I travel to places and wikipedia makes it into the local papers". I suspect he was oversimplifying his role in wikipedia, but that is the true success of of a founder - to create a self-sutaining system which doesn't need him to stay alive.
I assume he'll be more involved in Wikia, which though probably similar to wikipedia, can probably exist orthogonally.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur
While Wales was a great chairman, no matter how well a leader leads, they still need to be switched out every once in a while. Wikipedia is one of the greatest things that has ever happened to the internet, and now that there is a new chairman to the initiative, there will be more new ideas to, hopefully, advance the wiki project even further.
it's pretty much the shittiest job on the wiki. Imagine fighting against other people's idiotic drama every single day, except that they have been given a legitimate forum to air their internet grievances. That's what the arbcom has to do.
I agree. Next story please...
My UID is bigger than yours.
and I thought to myself
"Oh God, what's Ballmer done this time?"
Summation 2
"Jimmy Wales Redesigns Chair at Wikipedia"...
I was expecting to see some kind of new modern chair design (which seemed a little odd given the context)...
ok, you can mod me down now....
OK, Frankfurt isn't exactly a luxurious destination- but why are Wikipedia people going on "retreats", and who is footing the bill? And I don't mean just airfare or accomodations...I mean meeting facilities, dinners, etc...
Please help metamoderate.
*runs*
Are we sure this happened? As far as I can see, the only evidence is a page on Wikipedia, and everyone knows how reliable that is.
</sarcasm>
The following text is from Polar Star, by Martin Cruz Smith.
Sounds awfully familiar.
Hey, if *my* web creation were to reach the success of Wikipedia's, I'd retire to be the executive consultant for the Bomis Babe Report, too!
Not sure. But I haven't had mod points in two months or so, which is fairly unusual.
To quote Jimbo: "Hah Hah!"
Hamsters are at least as feathery as penguins. HamLix
Sollog, is that you? :)
It just doesn't feel right, that bad churning feeling isn't subsiding guys, hopefully I'm wrong in assuming that Wikimedia will be run any differently, hopefully. :/
did he throw it?
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
Same here. I've had much less chances at modding (though I have probably reading more) since the new system went up. On the plus side, I finally figured out how to use those arrows to get the right mix of comments while keeping out most of the trolls.
Help! I'm a slashdot refugee.
[[Jimbo Wales]]
In [[November]] [[2006]], Jimbo was voted from the board by a cabal of giant [[badgers]] and [[sockpuppets]] to be replaced by the leader of the [[Transformers]]. His statement[1] to the new board consisted of threats to [[see them all in court| wikilaywer]] them out of [[existence]]. Jimbo then flounced out of the room in his customary [[pink]] [[tutu]] before planting a [[French Kiss]] on the mouth of [[Ted Haggard]]. Haggard then announced that he had only received a [[massage]] from the [[Great White Turd]]
*[This biography is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by extending it]
Tubby or not tubby. Fat is the question
How about this for familiarity?
What happened in the unseen labyrinth to which the pneumatic tubes led, he did not know in detail, but he did know in general terms. As soon as all the corrections which happened to be necessary in any particular number of The Times had been assembled and collated, that number would be reprinted, the original copy destroyed, and the corrected copy placed on the files in its stead.
This process of continuous alteration was applied not only to newspapers, but to books, periodicals, pamphlets, posters, leaflets, films, sound-tracks, cartoons, photographs -- to every kind of literature or documentation which might conceivably hold any political or ideological significance. Day by day and almost minute by minute the past was brought up to date.
In this way every prediction made by the Party could be shown by documentary evidence to have been correct, nor was any item of news, or any expression of opinion, which conflicted with the needs of the moment, ever allowed to remain on record. All history was a palimpsest, scraped clean and reinscribed exactly as often as was necessary. In no case would it have been possible, once the deed was done, to prove that any falsification had taken place....
Even the written instructions which Winston received, and which he invariably got rid of as soon as he had dealt with them, never stated or implied that an act of forgery was to be committed: always the reference was to slips, errors, misprints, or misquotations which it was necessary to put right in the interests of accuracy.
- George Orwell, "1984"
Tubby or not tubby. Fat is the question
Wikipedia just fixed the article. Turns out, Florence Nibart-Devouard was drunk and decided to post some slanderous material on Wales' personal wikipage.
Don't worry if you're a kleptomaniac, you can always take something for it.
Yeah, I have been getting very few mod points lately as well.
Ah, the new discussion system. I tried to help test it for about 3 weeks and finally gave up, flummoxed as to how to make it work. I salute your superior intelligence.
Not only has Jimmy been under attack for the last 10 to 11 months for the increasing inaccuracy of the Wikipedia he's been publically lamenting the low pay. Sort of reminds me of Daniel Robbins leaving Gentoo. Anyways I hear he may go back to running some adult erotic modeling sites on the side to help cover his expenses. Anyone else know anything about this?
He always tries to do the right thing, AFAICT, whether that means telling the truth about Wikipedia (it's inaccurate in many ways and has room to improve*), or stepping aside as chairman. I don't know why he stepped aside, but many (I'd say most) people would put their egos first and resist with all their might. Many organizations fail, or underperform, because founders can't let go.
(* Those are Jimmy's criticisms, not mine: He's judges it more harshly than I do.)
Thank you Jimmy Wales. Whatever its flaws, we are far, far better off with Wikipedia than without it.
If he wants something done, he'll just sit back and wonder if it should be done. He doesn't need to be on the board for that.
Free Hans!
"MORNON."
If you were using Firefox 2, that word would have been underlined in red when you typed it in, and you might have avoided making such a humorous and ironic error while typing.
In short, LOL@U.
If you can read this, I forgot to post anonymously.
The Everywhere Girl has been deleted from Wikipedia. Will she get restored?
Religion is the main cause of atheism.