[Foundation-l] Answers.com and Wikimedia Foundation to Form New Partnership

[Delirium]

Jimmy Wales wrote:

>Bigger and more corporate?  Can you please define exactly what you mean
>by that?
>
>If you say "I don't really want us to get involved in projects to try to
>expand our work into helping less developed countries.  Merely running
>the website is enough, let the poor people fend for themselves" then
>fine, I think that's a perfectly acceptable position.
>  
>
I mean: "increasingly involved in partnerships with for-profit 
corporations, for the sole purpose of financial gain".

I also think getting involved in such projects is a bad idea, but that's 
a separate matter.  Also, you're putting words in my mouth with the 
second sentence---I think there should be an organization trying to 
bring Wikipedia to less developed countries, but it should be separate, 
organizationally and monetarily, from the project of producing the 
encyclopedia in the first place (although the two should certainly 
coordinate and discuss mutual needs).  It's the organizational analog of 
the "Unix way"---multiple small, efficient organizations each doing one 
thing well, rather than one big monolithic organization doing a lot of 
things poorly.

-Mark