On Wed, Jun 27, 2012 at 5:39 AM, Theo10011 <de10011(a)gmail.com> wrote:
So, a chain of events during a 4 month period can not
be incidental. What
you neglect to mention that there was an annual fundraiser during the end
of the year, this was not the first grant Google made to Wikimedia, in
fact, it might not even be the second, they donated in the past fundraisers
as well, larger amounts I believe. I am thinking of the 2
Million received from Google in 2010.
I know Google gave 2 million in 2010, though I am unsure whether that makes
Google influence less or more likely.
To recap, posters here said that what happened to TV Tropes – i.e. Google
influencing their content decisions – couldn't happen to Wikipedia. That
seems rather blue-eyed.
Now, far be it for me to defend Jimmy, but the central
assumption in your
polemic is, that jimmy is devoid of caring about any social issues, issues
that might even affect the identity he has created. He would have to be
paid in order to care, if not Google than someone else paying him off to
care, can't it just be that he believes in something? even if there is
a perceived threat? I know it might be hard to believe, but people have
been known to care about legislation and larger social issues from time to
time, and use the platform they have.
I'm sure Jimmy would not have been a friend of SOPA, regardless of what
Google thought. But I was truly surprised to see Wikipedia jettison its
"holy of holies" – NPOV – in a poll inviting participation from IPs and
SPAs, and becoming a political actor. Whether the money greased the wheels
or not, it was the sell-out of a principle many had signed up for.
Scott put it rather well:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Scott_MacDonald