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

Sat Oct 22 20:37:14 UTC 2005

On 22/10/05, Anthony DiPierro <wikispam at inbox.org> wrote:
> For some reason I can't post to the foundation-l list...  Feel free to
> forward this there if you want.
>
> On 10/22/05, Dan Grey <dangrey at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 22/10/05, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> > > Yes, but I think mostly because Amazon is under a boycott by RMS for
> > > their patent policies.
> >
> > Reading back through posts from that time, most the objections seem to
> > be about the "slippery slope" - a quite understandable view. It's also
> > notable that the income from the Amazon was pathetic - it would be
> > nice if there was some assurance that this 1-Click business might
> > actually be worthwhile before we try it.
>
>
> They *are* doing a 6 month trial first.  I think the revenue would be a lot
> better from this.  I say this as someone who is running a mirror of
> Wikipedia with google ads on it.
>
> > I also note that the recent posts on the wiki are against this idea.
> > The legal issues are very far from clear, and it's also apparent that
> > there is opposition to this.
>
>
> As one of the people most skeptical of this under that legal issues thread,
> I'd say it's pretty indisputable that it's legal.  The only real question is
> whether or not there are tax consequences.
>
> > I think it was rather presumptious of the board to "announce" this
> > without consulting editors first. The board may have "signed up" to a
> > trial of this, but *we* haven't, and I think the board may well have a
> > hard time stopping editors removing this advertisting from the site.
>
>
> Answers Corporation is a public company, and there's some evidence that this
> deal might have affected the price of the stock.  Part of the agreement was
> probably to keep the conversations confidential until a deal was made.
>
> In any case, I believe that this is exactly the type of decision the board
> should be making on its own.  If you don't like what the board is doing, by
> all means tell them, and then elect new members at the next election if they
> don't do a better job.  But in my opinion the board needs the autonomy to
> make these decisions on its own.