In a message dated 3/12/2007 11:22:21 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time, jason@calacanis.com writes:

There are no conflicts--none.

It would be a HUGE leap for someone to think that a donation to a non-profit from a corporation would give them the ability to trump a encyclopedia edited by *consensus* by *volunteers* -- most of whom are anonymous.

Would an unpaid editor on the Wikipedia think "gosh, I should lie on Google's wikipedia page because they are one of dozens (hundreds? thousands?) of companies that have donated to the foundation."

Furthermore, for this theory to work it would require that the thousands of other editors think EXACTLY the same way and would not revert the biased revisions.

You're always going to have a contingent of conspiracy theorists out there who think Wikipedia (or any other organization with any level of success) is in on the take. It's the reward you get for being successful at what you do. :-)

I don't think we can't base our fund raising behavior on the conspiracy theories of a the few (and in some cases insane).

I've gotten the opposite position discussing problems editing. Anonymous use gives corporate users anonymity, and reportedly they even involve their legal departments. Right now, truth in articles suffers because of ego and corporate interests, not public-benefit ones.

Vincent

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