[WikiEN-l] An open letter to Jimmy Wales

Fri Apr 10 00:52:36 UTC 2009

That would be a matter for Foundation-l then, not wikien-l.

2009/4/9 Brian <Brian.Mingus at colorado.edu>:
> Honestly, it's important enough that the Foundation should take an objective
> look at the facts and make a statement about Wikipedia's history.
>
> On Wed, Apr 8, 2009 at 7:36 PM, Larry Sanger
> <sanger-lists at citizendium.org>wrote:
>
>> All,
>>
>> Earlier today, I had no joy in trying to post this "open letter to Jimmy
>> Wales" on Jimmy's own user talk page: the man himself deleted it.  That is
>> not the sort of behavior I would have expected of the head of an allegedly
>> open, transparent community devoted to free speech.  I would like
>> Wikipedians in general to be apprised of my concerns.  I believe they are
>> serious and well-justified, and they should not be dismissed without a
>> careful hearing.  I do not ask that Jimmy Wales reply here on this list.
>> But I do ask that "the powers that be"--including the Wikipedia community,
>> the Wikimedia Board, and the media--hold Jimmy responsible for his very
>> shabby behavior toward me.
>>
>> Let me be clear.  This is not just an attempt to "tell my side of the
>> story."  It is me confronting Jimmy Wales publicly for lying about my
>> involvement in the project after many private requests to stop.  You might
>> disagree with me about many things, but we need not disagree about the
>> facts
>> as they can be found in various Internet archives, nor about the necessity
>> of keeping our leaders honest.
>>
>> A readable copy, with some updates, can be found here:
>>
>> http://blog.citizendium.org/2009/04/08/an-open-letter-to-jimmy-wales-copy/
>>
>>
>> http://blog.citizendium.org/2009/04/08/updates-re-open-letter-to-jimmy-wales
>> /
>>
>> The letter itself follows.
>>
>> --Larry Sanger
>>
>> ===============
>>
>> Jimmy, I don't know a better place than this for an open letter to you
>> [i.e., than on your user talk page on Wikipedia]. I recently read the Hot
>> Press interview with you. The lies and distortions it contains are, for me,
>> the last straw, especially after
>> <http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/xodp/message/1720> this came to light,
>> in which you described yourself as "co-founder" in 2002.
>>
>> I've reached out to you on a couple of occasions to coordinate our
>> "versions" - well, my version and your fanciful inventions - about how
>> Wikipedia got started. Last year I read about a speech in which you
>> represented me as being more or less opposed to Wikipedia from the start -
>> despite it being my own baby, really - and I wrote to you saying that if
>> you
>> keep this up, I will speak out. Well, I'm finally speaking out.
>>
>> In Wikipedia's first three years, it was clear to everyone working on it
>> that not only had I named the project, I came up with and promoted the idea
>> of making a wiki encyclopedia, wrote the first policy pages and many more
>> policy pages in the following year, led the project, and enforced many
>> rules
>> that are now taken for granted. I came up with a lot of stuff that is
>> regarded as standard operating procedure. For instance, I argued that talk
>> should go on talk pages and got people into that habit. Similarly, after
>> meta-discussion started taking up so much of Wikipedia's time and energy, I
>> shepherded talk about the project to meta.wikipedia.org - and after that,
>> to
>> Wikipedia-L and WikiEN-L. I insisted that we were working on an
>> encyclopedia, not on the many other things one can use a wiki for. I came
>> up
>> with the name "Wikipedian" and other Wikipedia jargon. I had devised a
>> neutrality policy for Nupedia, and I elaborated it in a form that stood for
>> several years on Wikipedia. I did a lot of explaining and evangelizing for
>> Wikipedia - what it is about, why we are here, and so forth - for example,
>> in  <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Our_Replies_to_Our_Critics%22>
>> Wikipedia:Our Replies to Our Critics and a couple of well-known posts on
>> kuro5hin.org  <http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/7/25/103136/121> like
>> this
>> one and  <http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/9/24/43858/2479> this. I also
>> recall introducing many specific policy details, the evidence for which is
>> in archives (such as on archive.org) and no doubt in the memories of some
>> of
>> the more active early Wikipedians.
>>
>> These are only some examples of ways in which I led the project in its
>> first
>> 14 months; after I left, there was a lot of soul-searching in the project
>> about what would happen now that it was "leaderless" (see the quotations
>> linked from  <http://www.larrysanger.org/roleinwp.html> this page). When I
>> was involved in the project, I was regarded as its chief organizer. As you
>> can still see in the archives, I called myself "Chief Instigator" and
>> "Chief
>> Organizer" and the like (not editor).
>>
>> I also want to correct you on something that tends to harm me: your
>> repeated
>> insinuations that I was "fired." In the Hot Press interview, you said I
>> left
>> Wikipedia because you "didn't want to pay him any more." You know - and so
>> does everyone else who worked at Bomis, Inc., around a dozen people - that
>> at the end of 2001, you had to go back to Bomis' original 4-5 employees,
>> because of the tech market bust, when Bomis suddenly lost a million-dollar
>> ad deal. Tim Shell told me I was the last person to be laid off. He told me
>> - the day I arrived back from my honeymoon, as I recall - that I should
>> probably start looking for new work, because of the market. I was made to
>> believe, and always did until a few years ago when you started implying
>> otherwise, that I had been laid off just like all the other Bomis
>> employees.
>>
>> In those first three years, Wikipedia did three press releases, in which we
>> are both given credit as founders of the project. I
>> <
>> http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia%27s_first_press_relea
>> se> drafted the first press release in January 2002; you read and approved
>> it before posting it on the wires. Moreover, you must have read the many
>> early news articles that called us both founders. You could have complained
>> then - when you were CEO of the company that paid my paycheck. But you
>> didn't. In fact, you called yourself "co-founder" from time to time.
>> Evidence of this has surfaced in the form of
>> <http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/xodp/message/1720> this post to xodp
>> in
>> which you begin, "Hello, let me introduce myself. I'm Jimmy Wales,
>> co-founder of Nupedia and Wikipedia, the open content encyclopedias." While
>> your company supplied the funding and you supplied some guidance, I
>> supplied
>> the main leadership of the early project. This is why Wikipedia's second
>> press release also called me "founder," in 2003 - just after I broke
>> permanently with you and the Wikipedia community - and the Wikimedia
>> Foundation's first press release described me the same way, in early 2004.
>>
>> I had nothing to do with the second and third press releases, and, as Bomis
>> CEO and Wikimedia Chair, you approved all three. But now read what you told
>> Hot Press recently. The interviewer asked: "Sanger said that proof of his
>> being co-founder is on the initial press releases. Are you saying that he
>> basically just put himself down as co-founder on these press releases?" You
>> answered "Yes." How could I "put myself down as co-founder" in 2003 and
>> 2004, when I wasn't even part of the organization? This is an attempt to
>> buff your reputation while making me look like a liar - but your simple
>> "Yes" answer can be refuted with
>> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Press_releases/January_2002> a
>> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Press_releases/January_2003> few
>> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Press_releases/February_2004>
>> URLs;
>> you were a contact on all three press releases.
>>
>> Beginning in 2004, you began leaving me out of the story of Wikipedia's
>> origin. You began implying, to reporters, that you had done a lot of the
>> sort of work that, in fact, you hired me to do. You have even implied that
>> I
>> was opposed to various ideas that were crucial to Wikipedia's popular
>> success - when those were, for all intents and purposes, my own ideas. A
>> good example is Daniel Pink's
>> <http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.03/wiki.html> article for Wired
>> Magazine - in which you implied that I had little or nothing to do with
>> Wikipedia.
>>
>> You still do this. You told the Hot Press interviewer, "Larry was never
>> comfortable with the open-editing model of Wikipedia and he very early on
>> wanted to start locking things down and giving certain people special
>> authority - you know, recruit experts to supervise certain areas of the
>> encyclopaedia and things like that." This is a lie. I was perfectly
>> comfortable with the "open-editing model of Wikipedia." After all, that was
>> my idea. I did not want to "start locking things down" -  or to "recruit
>> experts to supervise certain areas of the encyclopaedia." I challenge
>> anyone
>> to find any evidence in the archive that I did any such thing. For my early
>> attitude toward expert involvement, see
>> <http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Deferring_to_the_experts> this column,
>> written a year after the project started. Besides, your claim doesn't make
>> sense. Even after a year, I was hoping that a revitalized Nupedia would
>> work
>> in tandem with Wikipedia as its vetting service. Though you increasingly
>> disliked Nupedia as Wikipedia's star rose, it was always my assumption that
>> you felt the same way about at least the potential of the two projects
>> working together.
>>
>> It was one thing, in 2004, to leave me out of the story of Wikipedia. It
>> was
>> another to assert in 2005, (1) for
>> <http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2005-April/021452.html>
>> the very first time, that
>> <http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2005-April/021446.html>
>> somebody else had the idea for the project, contrary to
>> <
>> http://web.archive.org/web/20010406101346/www.wikipedia.com/wiki/Wikipedia_
>> FAQ> what had been on the books since 2001, or (2) that I am not co-founder
>> of the project. But in both cases, people scanning the Wikipedia-L mailing
>> list archives found old mails in which you contradicted yourself.
>> <http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikipedia-l/2001-October/000671.html
>> >
>> One embarrassing mail has you giving me credit - as, of course, I always
>> had
>> been given credit - for the idea of Wikipedia, and
>> <http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/xodp/message/1720> another
>> embarrassing
>> mail surfaced just a few days ago in which you called yourself "co-founder"
>> of Wikipedia.
>>
>> I find your behavior since 2004 transparently self-serving, considering
>> that
>> this rewriting of history began in 2004, just as Wikia.com was getting
>> started, and you started promoting your reputation as the brains behind
>> Wikipedia. There is a long "paper trail" establishing virtually all of my
>> claims about Wikipedia, and which refute your various attempts to rewrite
>> history.
>>
>> I have not publicly confronted you about this before, to this extent.
>> Public
>> controversies are emotionally wrenching and time-consuming. I know I might
>> be (verbally) attacked more viciously than ever by your fans and
>> Wikipedia's. (To them, I just point out that Wikipedia is bigger than Jimmy
>> Wales.) I have mainly limited myself to answering reporters' questions -
>> keeping my more harshly-worded statements off the record - and to
>> <http://www.larrysanger.org/roleinwp.html> this page on my personal site.
>> Occasionally I couldn't help objecting to some particularly outrageous
>> claim, but I never went all out.
>>
>> I thought that the evidence against your claims about me would shame you
>> into changing your behavior. But, five years since you started
>> misrepresenting my role in the founding of Wikipedia, you're still at it.
>>
>> I have been content to watch you reap the rewards of the project I started
>> for you, largely without comment. You (with Tim Shell and Michael Davis,
>> the
>> Bomis partners) did, after all, sponsor the project. After leaving
>> Wikipedia, I went back to academia and, after that, worked for a succession
>> of nonprofit projects - these days,  <http://www.citizendium.org/>
>> Citizendium.org and now also  <http://www.watchknow.org/> WatchKnow.org. I
>> have not tried to cash in on my own reputation. I have been approached by a
>> number of venture capitalists, entrepreneurs, and publishers and have
>> always
>> told them that I have my own plans. If I had wanted to cash in myself, I
>> wouldn't have moved away from Silicon Valley back to Ohio, as I did, in
>> order to lower my costs in supporting the non-profit projects which I've
>> made my life's work.
>>
>> The Hot Press interview is the straw that broke this camel's back. I resent
>> being the victim of another person's self-serving lies. Besides, I don't
>> want to set a poor example in my failure to defend myself.
>>
>> Please don't say I'm making mountains out of molehills. When you go out of
>> your way to edit Wikipedia articles to
>> <
>> http://workbench.cadenhead.org/news/2828/wikipedia-founder-looks-out-number
>> -1> remove the fact that I am a co-founder, or
>> <http://www.wikitruth.info/index.php?title=Jimbo_Found_Out> ask others to
>> do
>> so, I don't call that correcting "very simple errors," as you told Hot
>> Press. What angers me is not any one error, but the accumulated weight of
>> your lies about me - I've mentioned only a few of them here.
>>
>> Finally, you might protest that you have said, several times, that I am not
>> credited enough. For example, you told Hot Press:
>>
>> I feel that Larry's work is often under-appreciated. He really did a lot in
>> the first year to think through editorial policy. . I would actually love
>> to
>> have it on the record that I said: I think Larry's work should be more
>> appreciated. He's a really brilliant guy.
>>
>> This sounds like a fine sentiment. But how could it be sincere? What better
>> way to ensure that I am "under-appreciated" than to contradict your own
>> first three press releases and tell the Boston Globe, just two years later,
>> that it's "preposterous" that I am called co-founder?
>>
>> I have two further requests, not of you, but of those who deal with you:
>> the
>> Wikimedia Foundation and reporters.
>>
>> First, I ask the Board of the Wikimedia Foundation to reiterate the
>> Foundation's original position (as expressed in its
>> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Press_releases/February_2004>
>> first
>> press release) that we are both, in fact, founders of Wikipedia. (I note
>> that the author of the recent history of Wikipedia, Andrew "fuzheado" Lih,
>> was
>> <
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Press_releases/February
>> _2004&action=history> among the authors and contacts for this press
>> release.) If the Foundation is unwilling, I request an explanation why its
>> corporate view has changed. Is it simply because Jimmy Wales has made his
>> wishes known and you enforce them?
>>
>> Second, I request any reporter who interviews you about the early history
>> of
>> Wikipedia and Nupedia to interview me as well, so I can correct anything
>> misleading. They should know that there are many details in my 2005
>> <http://features.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/04/18/164213&tid=95>
>> memoir
>> of Nupedia and Wikipedia, and my story has never varied. I would also
>> appreciate it if a reporter were to inquire about my request, above, to the
>> Board of the Wikimedia Foundation.
>>
>> Larry Sanger (sanger at citizendium.org)
>>
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