Jimmy Wales
| Jimmy Wales | |
|---|---|
 Jimmy Wales in 2008 |
|
| Born | Jimmy Donal Wales August 7, 1966 [note] Huntsville, Alabama, US |
| Residence | St. Petersburg, Florida, US |
| Nationality | United States |
| Other names | Jimbo (online nickname) |
| Alma mater | Auburn University University of Alabama Indiana University Bloomington |
| Occupation | Internet entrepreneur |
| Known for | Co-founding Wikipedia |
| Title | President of Wikia, Inc. (2004–present) Chairman, Wikimedia Foundation (June 2003 – October 2006) Chairman Emeritus, Wikimedia Foundation (October 2006-present) |
| Successor | Florence Devouard |
| Board member of | Wikimedia Foundation, Creative Commons, Socialtext, MIT Center for Collective Intelligence (advisory board) |
| Awards | EFF Pioneer Award (2006), The EconomistTemplate:'s Business Process Award (2008), The Global Brand Icon of the Year Award (2008) |
| Website | |
| Personal weblog English Wikipedia userpage |
|
Jimmy "Jimbo" Donal Wales was born on August 7, 1966. He is the co-founder of the Wikimedia Foundation. He was also the chairman of the foundation until October 2006. He is best known as the co-founder of Wikipedia with Larry Sanger. He currently lives in St. Petersburg, Florida.
Wales and Larry Sanger developed a website named Nupedia. It was a free encyclopedia. Then he and Sanger launched the website Wikipedia, which was supposed to be a side project to Nupedia. Instead, it received a lot more interest than Nupedia. It became a large online community with over two million articles.
He also launched another website project called Wikia. He worked on the site with Angela Beesley.[1]
Florence Nibart-Devouard took over as chair of the Wikimedia Foundation in October 2006. But after this he stayed on as a board member with the title Chairman Emeritus. In December 2011, Wales announced that he would be turning over his other Wikipedia duties "soon".[2]
[change] Personal life
Wales has been married twice. He also has one child.[3][4] When he was 20, Wales married Pam.[4] Pam was a worker at a store in Alabama.[4] He met his second wife, Christine Rohan, through a friend in Chicago.[3] They had a daughter before their marriage ended. Wales moved to San Diego in 1998. In 2002, he moved again to Florida.[5] In 2007, he still lives there.[6]
He says that he follows the idea of Objectivism. He also says that he is a libertarian to some extent.
[change] References
- ↑ McNichol, Tom (May 1, 2007). "Building a Wiki World". Business 2.0 (CNN). http://money.cnn.com/magazines/business2/business2_archive/2007/03/01/8401010/. Retrieved October 31, 2007.
- ↑ "Arbcom Appointments". http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=467170458#ArbCom_Appointments_2011. Retrieved January 3, 2012.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 "Q & A". q-and-a.org. http://www.q-and-a.org/Transcript/?ProgramID=1042. Retrieved 20 May 2010.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 "Jimmy Wales: Celebrities: Wmagazine.com". wmagazine.com. http://www.wmagazine.com/celebrities/2008/09/jimmy_wales. Retrieved 20 May 2010.
- ↑ "Business & Technology: He's the "God-King," but you can call him Jimbo". seattletimes.nwsource.com. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2003525473_btwikipedia15.html. Retrieved 20 May 2010.
- ↑ "Jimmy Wales - Wikipedia - New York Times". nytimes.com. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/18/magazine/18wwln-domains-.html?_r=2&oref=slogin. Retrieved 20 May 2010.
