The immigration officials of the United Kingdom believed they had caught the infamous Julian Assange bail jumping. Apparently, they were absolutely stunned when a guy showed up at a British airport claiming to be the Chief Executive officer of Wikipedia.
The officials were very surprised, because this fact would have meant that Julian Assange, in a desperate attempt to avoid a court appearance in Sweden, somehow managed to board a plane in the United States without a passport. Jimmy Wales admitted that the immigration woman even dropped her pen with surprise, when he heard about who he was. Wales had to explain her that he has nothing to do with WikiLeaks, and is a completely different bloke, not wanted in Sweden or any other country, and that Wikileaks and Wikipedia are a bit different things.
This didn’t happen yesterday, but the case has only come out in an interview to prove that nobody knows who Jimmy Wales is, but everyone has heard of Julian Assange. During the interview, Jimmy Wales admitted that that the overwhelming majority of people working on the world’s known online encyclopedia are men – about 85%, but Wales has developed a 5-year plan to hire more women. Wales believes that it is because women find the whole idea of the encyclopedia intimidating. However, it would be harder to mistake a woman for Julian Assange in the airport. Or the officials would have to find out when Assange managed to change his sex.
Jimmy Wales explained that within Wikipedia there is no point of view that each opinion is just as valid as everybody else’s. Instead, he explained that online encyclopedia is very keen on using reliable sources and verifiability, ensuring that everything it contains has a good source to back it up.
The interview with Wales is really worth reading, as it’s clear that the author of the article likes him and describes his “capacity to play fair and find compromises”. However, it seems that the writer missed the moment when Jimmy Wales ignored his editor’s decisions and removed thousands of pictures that some deemed pornographic, including those with kids, from Wikimedia Commons. In addition, Wales also allegedly tinkered with the biography of his girlfriend, and was suspected of using the cash strapped Wikipedia as his personal piggy bank
The officials were very surprised, because this fact would have meant that Julian Assange, in a desperate attempt to avoid a court appearance in Sweden, somehow managed to board a plane in the United States without a passport. Jimmy Wales admitted that the immigration woman even dropped her pen with surprise, when he heard about who he was. Wales had to explain her that he has nothing to do with WikiLeaks, and is a completely different bloke, not wanted in Sweden or any other country, and that Wikileaks and Wikipedia are a bit different things.
This didn’t happen yesterday, but the case has only come out in an interview to prove that nobody knows who Jimmy Wales is, but everyone has heard of Julian Assange. During the interview, Jimmy Wales admitted that that the overwhelming majority of people working on the world’s known online encyclopedia are men – about 85%, but Wales has developed a 5-year plan to hire more women. Wales believes that it is because women find the whole idea of the encyclopedia intimidating. However, it would be harder to mistake a woman for Julian Assange in the airport. Or the officials would have to find out when Assange managed to change his sex.
Jimmy Wales explained that within Wikipedia there is no point of view that each opinion is just as valid as everybody else’s. Instead, he explained that online encyclopedia is very keen on using reliable sources and verifiability, ensuring that everything it contains has a good source to back it up.
The interview with Wales is really worth reading, as it’s clear that the author of the article likes him and describes his “capacity to play fair and find compromises”. However, it seems that the writer missed the moment when Jimmy Wales ignored his editor’s decisions and removed thousands of pictures that some deemed pornographic, including those with kids, from Wikimedia Commons. In addition, Wales also allegedly tinkered with the biography of his girlfriend, and was suspected of using the cash strapped Wikipedia as his personal piggy bank
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