On Sunday 27 April 2008 16:40, Magnus Manske wrote:
On the other hand, altruism (giving away things for free)
Your understanding of what "altruism" is is wrong. It's too superficial.
An act is only altruistic if one's PRIMARY MOTIVATION in doing so is the benefit of others at net cost to himself.
Wikipedia itself, being an inanimate phenomenon, is not a moral agent. There is nothing moral or immoral about it.
What IS moral or immoral is a particular individual's contributing to Wikipedia--and that depends on what his motive for contributing is.