The New York Times has picked up Valleywag's extensive reporting on the ongoing Jimmy Wales scandal (How to decode the Times story: Whenever they say "a gossip Web site," they mean us.) While most of the story is a rehash, it does raise one interesting point: What's the relationship between Wikipedia and VC firm…
Jeff Merkey, a former Novell chief scientist, has issued a statement accusing Jimmy Wales of extortion. Merkey says that Wales offered him "special protection" for his Wikipedia entry in exchange for a "substantial" donation to Wales's Wikimedia Foundation. After Merkey withdrew his donation over concerns that the…
Did Jimmy Wales misuse funds from the Wikimedia Foundation, a nonprofit he set up in 2003 to oversee Wikipedia? Publicly, the foundation's leaders are saying no. Privately, foundation chair Florence Devouard has alternately bragged about how she's mislead reporters and upbraided Wales over the scandal.
