Thursday
Jan272011
Jimmy Wales, Wikipedia, LWF Talk, London 2011
Thursday, January 27, 2011 at 12:19PM Knowledge, collaboration, freedom & learning
Jimmy Wales is the US Internet entrepreneur and wiki pioneer best known as the founder of Wikipedia. "Imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge" Jimmy asks us in this talk and discusses how Wikipedia has grown, the impact it has made and the people who contribute to its creation.
Jimmy discusses future directions for Wikipedia and Wikia, Inc
tagged #lwf11, access, education, freedom, knnowledge, knowledge, learning, open source, publishing, wiki, wikia, wikipedia in Activism, LWF Talk, Technology, disruption, learning, publishing
#lwf11, access, education, freedom, knnowledge, knowledge, learning, open source, publishing, wiki, wikia, wikipedia in Activism, LWF Talk, Technology, disruption, learning, publishing 
Reader Comments (2)
Jimmy Wales, as usual, confuses "information" for "knowledge". Knowledge comes with accountability and attribution to those who have built the traditions of thought and inquiry before you. Wikipedia does very little of that, and Jimmy Wales in particular undermines knowledge by spreading various falsehoods (such as that he was "sole founder" of Wikipedia, or that Wikia, Inc. is "completely separate" from the Wikimedia Foundation, or that he "didn't really have a problem" with an employee of his falsifying their credentials to a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist). I, for one, am tired of this watered-down version of "knowledge" and what that means.
Gregory, thank you for your comments.
I had the pleasure of chairing the session with Jimmy and spent some time with him afterwards. I must say that I don't think that he is at all confused about the differences between information and knowledge nor wisdom for that matter.
I don't understand the latter half of your post which seem to be more of a personal attack rather than constructive comment about his talk. Did he forget to send you a birthday card or something?
If you have a personal beef then please take it elsewhere. This conversation is about how platforms like Wikipedia can positively disrupt and improve learning and equality of access as indeed they are.
Don't you think for a second that what Jimmy and the contributors to Wikipedia have established isn't somewhat of an incredible achievement?
Is there something intrinsically bad about enabling thousands of contributors to collectively collaborate to provide such a valuable resource of information and knowledge that is accessible freely to so many people?
I would suggest that Wikipedia and its ilk have proven the exact opposite of your canard. That the tradition which says there shalt be the keeper of the book and thou shalt be the reader is now over and what is important is that information and knowledge is no longer the preserve of an elite or those who would manipulate information for their own ends.