An online thermometer, which has popped on and off the site, shows that the effort has raised $2,155,883 towards its $6 million goal. But that figure is meant to deceive potential donors about the level of Wikipedia's grassroots support. It started out $2.1 million ahead, by counting previously made donations from large organizations like the Sloan Foundation, which has already agreed to give Wikipedia $3 million over the course of three years.

But that's not what has Wikipedia's volunteer editors up in arms. They're calling the donation banner "ugly." They're debating how to make it easier to hide. They're even questioning whether the foundation should be asking them for money at all, since they already contribute their labor.

On a Wikipedia mailing list, Nathan Awrich sums up the reaction:

My observation is that the comments have been almost universally negative, and in fact a number of people - including long time administrators and previous donors - have said that this year they will not be donating at all. Reasons have included the banner itself, a sense that the foundation does not use its money appropriately, or concerns related to allegations made by Danny Wool last spring.

Wool, a former Wikimedia Foundation employee, noted earlier this year Jimmy Wales's attempts to expense a $1,300 dinner with a venture capitalist. Now, he points out on his blog, by most standards of charities, the Wikimedia Foundation is incredibly inefficient, spending very little of the money it raises on the mission it claims to be raising money for. Wales's jetset lifestyle is the least of the issues, since much of that is funded by his speaking fees. It's time for the people Wikipedia is hitting up for donations to start asking questions about the foundation's management, starting with the executive director, Sue Gardner, and its board of directors.

Wales has long been an Objectivist, a follower of the writings and political philosophy of Ayn Rand, who thoroughly rejected altruism. Wales's statements in the video thoroughly contradict Objectivist thinking on foreign policy, which boils down to "an eye for an eye" and "screw the United Nations." He also contradicts his own privately expressed political views. But that just makes him a clever capitalist: He knows he can get more speaking gigs overseas by feigning Euroliberalism.

The answer is pure self-interest. $4 million is nothing to a 97-year-old venture capital firm like Bessemer. It could easily write off its investment in Wikia, an attempt to capitalize on the anyone-can-edit wiki concept popularized by Wikipedia.

But Levine has invested his reputational capital in Wikia. Admitting he made a mistake in backing Wales means Levine would lose face with Bessemer's partners, who will be more likely to question his subsequent investments. (That he has also invested in Yelp and Diapers.com surely does not burnish his record.)

Levine would have us be impressed by the fact that Wales "volunteered to forgo his Wikia salary." This would be more impressive if Wales had not long ago forgone any pretense of doing any work to earn that salary. When Levine first invested in Wikia, Wales promised to spend 90 percent of his time on Wikia and 10 percent on Wikipedia. In fact, he spent nowhere near that proportion of time on either, focusing instead on an increasingly lucrative speaking career.

I'm inclined to feel sorry for Levine, who was clearly deceived by Wales, but is stuck defending him, lest he admit to the con. We will give Levine this much. In a recent blog post, he wrote, "Valleywag reported some nonsense about Jimmy getting fired because of a bogus expense report. Nothing could be farther from the truth."

What is uncontestably true: Levine was enraged when he learned that Wales tried to get Wikia to reimburse him for a $1,300 dinner with a private-equity investor, at which he primarily discuss ways to profit off of Wikipedia, not Wikia. But it is quite possible that Wales's attempted expense-account flim-flam was the least of his sins as CEO of Wikia, and that Levine actually fired him over more serious matters. If so, why doesn't Levine wash his hands of Wales, write off the investment, and tells us what Wales did? Otherwise, he'll find that he's only just begun his career of lying on Wales's behalf.

The cause? The same kind of expense-account hijinks that landed him in trouble at the Wikimedia Foundation, the nonprofit parent of Wikipedia.

In 2006, Wales was courting Marc Bodnick, a cofounder of Silicon Valley private-equity firm Elevation Partners, in an effort to find a way to profit from Wikipedia, despite its nonprofit status and volunteer contributors. Bodnick and an assistant had traveled to St. Petersburg, Fla., where Wikimedia was then based. The talks went nowhere, but Wales, his wife, Bodnick, and Bodnick's assistant had a $1,300 meal at one of the city's finest restaurants. ($600 of the bill was spent on wine.)

At that point, the Wikimedia Foundation had confiscated Wales's corporate card, so he paid for the meal himself. But he then sought to have it reimbursed by Wikia. Michael Davis, Wikia's chief operating officer, became enraged and reported the expense to Jeremy Levine, a Wikia board member and partner at Bessemer Venture Partners, which had invested $4 million into the company only a month before.

Levine then told Wales he was fired as CEO, and found Penchina, who had already made a fortune at eBay. Wales must hate that: Every time he sees Penchina, he must ask himself, "Why is this guy rich and I'm not?" Penchina, meanwhile, must be asking why Wikia is still paying Wales a salary.

Here are your options: You can spend thousands of hours editing Wikipedia entries to boost your credibility in the online community, and then pursue a tortuous quasi-legal process for months to change a single word in the entry. Petty-minded volunteer bureaucrats will oppose you at every turn. Or, if you want to make it simpler, you can just bribe Wales with money or sex. But anyone who thinks merely whining will do the trick is deluded. (Photo by David Shankbone)

A source who has seen Wikia's numbers says the company is experiencing "a hemorrhaging of cash circa 1999" — losses, in other words, like the first generation of dotcoms. No surprise there, since it has offices in San Francisco, New York, and Poland, and many of its products, like Wikia Search, are staggeringly unpopular. Wikia raised $14 million in venture capital from Bessemer Venture Partners and Amazon.com, the last of which came in December 2006; without a new infusion, it must surely be running low on cash.

The previous evening, the Berliner Kurier reports, Wales dined with Celia von Bismarck, shown here, a dilettante magazine editor and think-tanker. (She hates "boring society ladies," according to Vanity Fair, so she and Wales must have self-loathing in common.) No mention of Wales's current fling, Andrea Weckerle, who's said to be on the outs with him after rumors circulated that he sent around racy photos of Weckerle without her knowledge.

Wales himself, obviously. He can't resist a chance to burnish his image as a font of wisdom regarding all things Internet, no matter how irrelevant his experience might actually be. AdWeek's Brian Morrissey reports Wales used the word "authenticity" more than a dozen times while on stage.

Wales says he didn’t create green Wikia so much to fulfill his passion for green living, but more to help deliver the truth of eco-info, which he says is sorely lacking: “I’m really passionate about having objective information in this area. It is really hard to get clear information on green issues.”

Doesn't Wales sound just like an oil-company executive insisting we need more research before we can really say if carbon emissions are responsible for global warming?

SmartPlanet catches Wales in a similar hypocrisy, asking him if Wikia has taken concrete steps to reduce the electricity used by its servers. The short answer: It hasn't.

Finally, there's this charge aired on the Wikipedia Review: That Wikia Green has taken copyrighted content without permission from other pro-environment sites.

But why should this be any surprise? Wikia Green, like so many of Wales's efforts, isn't an offshoot of some deeply held belief, besides his core principle — that other people should do the work that makes him popular and rich.

But it will give Wales something to chatter about the next time he runs into Bono or Sir Richard Branson at a party. We'd bet his celebrity friends are too polite to ask the notoriously cheap Wales if he's actually springing for carbon offsets to make up for all of the emissions he generates through his nonstop round-the-world jet travel. Oh, and should we get into the contribution to global warming he makes through all the hot air that issues from his lips?

It's a charity. Nobody is making any money from the organization. Nobody has made any money, and nobody will ever get rich from it because we're never going to sell it. We're not open for business; we're not looking for investment.

Gardner goes on to note the many ways in which the foundation has cleaned up its act under her rule — though some of her claims seem exaggerated. As with so many ex-journalists, Gardner makes an excellent spin doctor. Behind the little fibs and fudges, here's the big truth she's hiding: Wales has attempted, several times, to profit from Wikipedia. And in one way, he's succeeded.

In a 2006 meeting in Mexico City, Wales openly discussed the prospect of commercializing Wikipedia with Bono, the rock star, and Marc Bodnick, a Silicon Valley investor and Bono's colleague at private-equity firm Elevation Partners. Roger McNamee, another Elevation Partners money manager, orchestrated the Wikimedia Foundation's relocation to San Francisco and the hiring of Gardner as its executive director.

Those moneymaking efforts have, to date, gone nowhere. But that doesn't mean Wales didn't try. Wikia, his for-profit wiki startup, was another effort to make money off the Wikipedia brand, though that has mostly floundered; the market share of Wikia Search, the effort Wales has worked most closely on, is infinitesimal.

Where Wales has been successful in making money: His speaking gigs. He's said to be traveling 250 days out of the year, and often gives paid speeches while on tour, garnering $30,000 to $90,000 per event. People aware of Wales's dealings with the Wikimedia Foundation say he pockets those fees rather than give them to the nonprofit — even though his status as cofounder of the online encyclopedia is the only reason anyone's interested in hearing Wales talk.

That's where Gardner is, at long last, hitting Wales where it hurts — his pocketbook. How so? By competing with him.

Buried in a lengthy update for the foundation's board, Gardner included this note:

Sue is now represented by The Lavin Agency for speaking engagements. Her fees will be paid to the Wikimedia Foundation.

That Gardner's fees would be paid to her employer only makes sense, since she's speaking in her capacity as the foundation's executive director. It would hardly be worth nothing — except to draw a contrast to Wales's venal abuse of his role as the site's cofounder. It's a big shift from March, when Gardner was defending Wales as "modest" and "frugal."

Wales has long tried to portray himself as Wikipedia's "hereditary monarch," a role the foundation's board nodded to when they created a permanent board seat for him. That Gardner is gunning for Wales's speaking gigs suggests that she's realized he's more of a liability than an asset for Wikipedia. She's ready and willing to displace him as the community's leader. When Wales and Gardner met up in Amsterdam for a friendly chat about her taking the top job at Wikipedia, who was taking advantage of whom?

Because W is a print magazine — the kind of source Wikipedia's fussy editors favor — Pam's characterization of Wales has made it into his Wikipedia entry. "His whole ‘Mr. Save the World’ is so contrary to what he said every day for seven years," Pam told W. She also said that Wales, a follower of Ayn Rand, discouraged her from pursuing a nursing career; his Objectivist beliefs, she suggested, made him look down on anyone pursuing work that smacked of altruism. The opinions Wales expressed to Pam then are not fashionable among his recently acquired limousine-liberal friends.

Pam, who has since remarried, had stayed close to Wales for some time after their divorce. (Shades of Sweet Home Alabama: We've learned that Wales didn't bother to finalize their divorce until shortly after Pam told him she was planning to marry someone else.) A friend says Pam only fell out with her ex-husband over his treatment of Christine, his current wife, from whom he is separated.

Most disturbingly, he has called her three times since the W article came out, announcing his plans to visit her, uninvited, while he's in Alabama. Wales even had his sister email Pam to let her know he wanted to speak to her. Obviously, there are some things in Wales's life that can't be resolved with an old-fashioned edit war.

(Photoillustration by Jackson West)

A refresher on naked shorts: In a regular short sale, a trader borrows shares and sells them, profiting if the stock drops in price; a "naked" short skips the step of borrowing shares. How can you sell something you don't own? A loophole in stock-trading rules that gives traders three days to settle up. "Naked shorts" is also possibly the most hilariously homoerotic term for a trading scheme yet invented.

Byrne loudly insists that investigative reporter Gary Weiss, formerly of BusinessWeek, edited the Wikipedia entry on naked shorting. Asked by The Register, a U.K. tech publication, Weiss denied this charge. Byrne's undocumented conspiracy theories have won him few friends on Wikipedia, where editors punctiliously insist on mainstream-media verification of all charges, unless an unproved assertion happens to suit their agendas.

And that's where Jimmy Wales comes in. One has to think Wales, a former stock trader himself — though not a very successful one — has got his former colleagues' back. Wales has not visibly weighed into the Byrne argument. But he rarely does so publicly, preferring to use private mailing lists to direct Wikipedia editors, as he did when his then-girlfriend Rachel Marsden prevailed on him to brighten up her entry.

So, Patrick, there's your solution: Stop whining on Wikipedia about how ill-treated you are. It's become clear that the only way to get a speedy revision to your WIkipedia entry is a personal appeal to Wales himself.

So ring up Jimmy directly. Tell him how much you admire the cheerful cynicism behind his supposedly altruistic work. Brush up on your Ayn Rand quotes. Offer a "donation." Or how about a very graphic, in-person demonstration of "naked shorts," if that's what it takes? Just remember: Wikipedia isn't about the sum of all human knowledge. It's about what humanity can do for Jimmy.

(Photo by markjhandel, photoillustration by Jackson West)

(Photo by David Haslip)

Wales's deep thought, which ends the piece:

I like to think about how there are about a billion people online now, and in the next five to 10 years there is going to be the next billion coming online. Interesting things are going to happen.

Those who have attended Wales's speeches know this is par for the course; Wales says things that seem like they ought to be interesting, but are, on inspection, not. Only the ranks of cultishly fervid listeners hanging on his every word manage to create the illusion of importance.

Indeed, the illusion of importance is what unites Wales and Wikipedia. W managed to find Wales's first wife, Pam, who recounts how Wales in his 20s dreamed of owning a castle and being a millionaire before he was 40.

Instead, he ended up as an options trader. He often couches his biographies to suggest that the money he made trading options let him fund Bomis, the porn portal from which Wikipedia sprang. The truth, people close to Wales say: He was an utter failure as a trader, and the money behind Bomis came from somewhere else. Wikipedia, as a nonprofit, has not paid off for Wales; nor has, to date, Wikia, his for-profit wiki startup, which he has mostly neglected.

Wales has been a failure at love, too. After Pam came his second wife, Christine, from whom he is separated. His entanglement with Canadian political pundit Rachel Marsden was brief, torrid, and ill-fated. He has estranged some of his oldest friends, substituting celebrities like Bono and Desmond Tutu for them.

With neither money nor love, what's left? Fame, but of an empty sort; the kind of fame that leads to strangers Twittering about him in airports. Not a fame that profits Wales, except for the speaking fees; and not a fame that makes his life better. His quest for money has veered strangely off course. Middle-aged, muddle-brained, and middle-income, Wales has realized none of his original ambitions. And the worst part? Everyone knows it.

(Photo by Anthony Blasko/W Magazine)

With 600 conferencegoers, attendance is down, but not dramatically. It's not a boycott; it's a borecott. But 600 followers devoted enough to trek to Alexandria are more than enough to puff up Wales's ego. They think they're attending a conference; like the postadolescents ringing Wales at Foo Camp, they're really just playing his game.

That Wikipedia has gone to Wales's head. "[He] has created something of a mythology about himself,” a former friend tells the Economist. “The image he created is that he is this benevolent millionaire who donates his time for this charitable project; that is not true.” At last, one true not-true thing about Jimmy Wales: the self-proclaimed "monarch" of Wikipedia may want you to think he's joking about his regal ambitions, but he's not. (Illustration by Andy Potts for the Economist)

Any news organization struggles with covering itself, all the more so when, as with Wikinews, the authors are unpaid volunteers who do not report to anyone. But that difficulty makes the hamhanded approach the Wikimedia Foundation has taken all the worse. Contributor Jason Safoutin recently told Valleywag that Wikimedia administrators, acting at the behest of foundation lawyer Mike Godwin, deleted two articles he wrote, one on a legal case involving literary agent Barbara Bauer, and another looking into Wikimedia Foundation deputy director Erik Möller, the outspoken defender of pedophilia.

But let's return to Wales's supposed interest in the Mormon copyright fracas. Likely he's just concerned with protecting Wikimedia's legal position against the church's claim, which seems specious; the document in question was linked to by Wikinews but not published on the site.

But the document itself is intriguing. A set of directions for church leaders, it was written in part by Lorenzo Snow, who is an ancestor of Michael Snow. Snow, a devout Mormon, serves with Wales on the board of the Wikimedia Foundation. On his Wikipedia user page, Snow maintains that he is a devotee of Wikipedia's "neutral point of view" principle. But one wonders how he can stay neutral on this particular issue.

Or so says Wikimedia lawyer Mike Godwin, who recently posted this on a foundation mailing list:

I should add that there is a complicating factor with regard to Sec. 230, and that's that while simple removal is protected, it's unclear whether every court would agree that more subtle substantive editing is protected — by engaging in the development of the content of an article, the Foundation and its agents or employees may unintentionally negate Sec. 230 immunity, depending on the scope and substance of the editing. That's a legal question that I'm studiously avoiding investing the Foundation's donated funds in finding an answer to. I'd rather see a richer defendant sort that one out for us.

Marsden, who is seeking to have her biography removed from Wikipedia altogether, writes:

It would appear that the approach you describe directly contradicts the spirit of the CDA, which claims that Internet providers are merely providing a blank bulletin board, where people can post whatever they want. That is only true, however, insofar as the owners of the bulletin board do not interfere with what is posted there. It is my understanding, based on extensive legal consultation, that the moment they decide to take action regarding postings, they are liable for everything that is on it.

Jimmy Wales, my ex-boyfriend and Wikimedia Board member, admits publicly to having my article altered. In other words, he is admitting that he is essentially responsible for the content of the bulletin board—he can influence what it says, and the law says that since he can, he should. In other words, the safe harbour—I am not responsible for what people post on my bulletin board—goes right out the window.

But the question isn't so much Marsden's page, or her individual case. If she does not test the law, someone else will. The larger question is whether Wikipedia loses its legal protections if its board members or employees involve themselves in any way in the editing of the site. The answer may well lie in the courts, thanks to Wales's thoughtless actions. If that happens, Wikipedia will not be the better off for it. But why should Wales care? He got his fling.

[May 11 2008 00:18:32] <jwales> [00:15] <jwales> Well one piece of useful information is that as far as I am aware, there is absolutely no truth to there being an FBI investigation.
[May 11 2008 00:18:46] <jwales> [00:16] <jwales> I do not think images should be removed just because of a moral panic... but perhaps just as importantly, I do not think images should be kept just to defy a moral panic.
[May 11 2008 00:18:52] <jwales> that is not exactly a lecture
[May 11 2008 00:19:05] <jwales> I was talking about the story in worldnetdaily
[May 11 2008 00:35:33] <jwales> "I seem to recall a Wikipedian policy that says just because an image is schocking doesn't mean it should be excluded" - but just as importantly... just because it is shocking is certainly not an argument for *inclusion*
[May 11 2008 00:44:31] <jwales> so on this VK image
[May 11 2008 00:45:04] <jwales> I think it is a really difficult borderline case and I think people should be able to debate it with mutual respect.
[May 11 2008 00:45:55] <jwales> I wonder: was the album cover *legally* banned in the US?
[May 11 2008 00:45:59] <jwales> as in, a court case?
[May 11 2008 00:46:05] <jwales> that would have to be in federal court I suppose
[May 11 2008 00:46:10] <jwales> and there would have been an appeal, I suppose
[May 11 2008 00:46:11] <jwales> and so on
[May 11 2008 00:46:24] <jwales> as opposed to merely being "banned by the record company" for sales reasons or whatever

Last fall, Weckerle interviewed Wales to get advice on how flacks can use Wikipedia to buff their clients' images. Wales is separated from his wife, Christine; the last time he mixed Wikipedia editing with pleasure, things ended badly. Can you come up with a better caption? Suggest one in the comments, and it will become the post's new headline. Friday's winner: hopelessdeskmonkey, for "Robot CEO smuggles human wife into movie premiere"

(Photo by Craig Newmark)

How to have a failed career as an options trader? How to build a porn site? How to launch, inadvertently, the world's seventh most popular website and yet avoid making any money on it? How to hire a convicted felon as chief operating officer of a nonprofit? How not to build a Google-killing search engine? How to cheat on one's spouse, get a divorce, and neglect one's seven-year-old daughter? These topics would be fit additions to the sum of all human knowledge, and yet I doubt Wales will address them.

Not that she needs the help. The foundation's bylaws only require that a majority of its board members be "elected or appointed from the community." The spirit of the term "community" suggests those who actively edit Wikipedia; Wikipedia was originally conceived as a membership organization. But that plan was abandoned, the bylaws rewritten. The Wikimedia Foundation's board can define "community" as it sees fit.

By right, the board could declare that, say, Roger McNamee, the Elevation Partners cofounder who helped broker $1 million in donations recently, was a member of the community, by virtue of his financial support.

The current board, of which three out of seven members are elected, would likely oppose such a move. But three more Gardner-approved appointees could likely swing the vote the other way. And then the board could redefine "community," or just rewrite the bylaws altogether.

Only one seat is up for election in the short term. Conveniently, it is that of board chair Florence Nibart-Devouard, who has consistently led the opposition to Gardner's moves. She is unlikely to stand for reelection in July, we hear. Wikipedians may elect a new board member in protest, but at the cost of losing the most effective resistance they have to Sue Gardner's quiet takeover. (Users have started a toothless online petition.)

The most curious seat is Wales's. It is reserved for a "community founder," and according to Wikimedia vice chair Jan-Bart de Vreede, if Wales does not occupy it, it will go empty. Here's an amusing thought: Why not have Larry Sanger, whom some say has a better claim to founding Wikipedia than Wales, bid for the spot in December, when Wales's term expires?

If the board rejects Sanger for the "community founder" spot, it will have to admit the truth: Jimmy Wales gets a board seat not because he was elected to it. Not because he has any distinct competence. Not because he is popular with the chapters. No, Wales gets a board seat because he's special. This isn't gerrymandering. It's Jimmymandering.