No Wonder Elon Musk Is Now Attacking Wikipedia
25.10.2023 - 02:56
/ tech.hindustantimes.com
/ Elon Musk
Not content with trashing one treasured website this year, Elon Musk has turned his sights on another: Wikipedia, the crowdsourced encyclopedia founded in 1999 that has come to represent the very best of what the internet has to offer.
The world's richest person and owner of X, the social media site formerly known as Twitter, seems to have been rattled by a report published by Newsguard, a company that rates the trustworthiness of information sources. Late last week it offered some troubling statistics around misinformation on X pertaining to the Israel-Hamas conflict almost a year after Musk bought the website for $44 billion. Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales is an advisor to Newsguard.
“Have you ever wondered why the Wikimedia Foundation wants so much money?” Musk wrote Sunday on X, referencing the non-profit organization that operates Wikipedia and its appeals for user donations. “It certainly isn't needed to operate Wikipedia. You can literally fit a copy of the entire text on your phone! So, what's the money for? Inquiring minds want to know…”
Musk then suggested he would give Wikipedia $1 billion if it changed its name to a juvenile alternative. The Trumpian broadside was just the latest from Musk against sources of information that disseminate credible information. Yes, Wikipedia's articles can be updated by anyone, but they are tightly edited by a team of thousands of mostly volunteer editors, and its guiding principle has always been that every stated fact requires a citation from a trusted, verifiable news source with recognized standards. Millions of college graduates can vouch for the system.
Of course, in Musk's world, no media source can be considered trustworthy, particularly those that criticize him. Indeed, he claims his own Wikipedia entry is false, despite being heavily moderated and containing verified facts. One of his followers on X suggested someone had been paid to write a negative Musk entry on “Wokipedia.” Musk agreed, naturally.
Unlike X, which as a private company no longer has to share details on its financial condition since being purchased by Musk, the Wikimedia Foundation regularly publishes its audited accounts. In the 12 months ending June 2022, it received $165.2 million in contributions from some 13 million donations. That year, it spent $88 million on salaries and wages; $15 million on awards and grants; and $2.7 million on internet hosting — keeping Wikipedia and its related websites online.
In a Q&A accompanying the release of those numbers, Wikimedia Foundation itself draws attention to the most glaring detail — the payroll spend, which increased by just over $20 million year-on-year. Since 2020, it has added more than 200 roles, as projected in its annual plans.