Elon Musk Criticizes Wikipedia
Elon Musk, who has already targeted one beloved website this year, is now directing his attention towards another: Wikipedia. The crowdsourced encyclopedia, established in 1999, symbolizes the finest aspects of the internet.
The richest person in the world and the owner of the social media site X, formerly known as Twitter, seems to have been dismayed by a report published by Newsguard, which evaluates the reliability of information sources. Late last week, it offered troubling statistics about misinformation about the Israel-Hamas conflict on X, nearly a year after Musk bought the website for $44 billion. Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales is an advisor to Newsguard.
“Ever wonder why the Wikimedia Foundation wants so much money?” Musk wrote X on Sunday, referring to the nonprofit organization that runs Wikipedia and its appeals for user donations. “It’s not really necessary to use 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 that he would give Wikipedia $1 billion if it changed its name to a youth alternative. Trump’s wide-ranging page was just Musk’s latest in terms of credible information sources. Yes, Wikipedia articles can be updated by anyone, but they are rigorously edited by a team of thousands of mostly volunteer editors, and its principle has always been that every fact stated requires a citation from a reliable, 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 trusted, especially those who criticize him. In fact, he claims that his own Wikipedia entry is false, even though it is heavily moderated and contains verified facts. One of his followers on X suggested that someone had been paid to write a negative Musk entry on “Wokipedia”. Naturally, Musk agreed.
Unlike X, which as a private company is no longer required to share information about its financial status after being bought by Musk, the Wikimedia Foundation regularly publishes its audited accounts. In the 12 months ending June 2022, it received $165.2 million in donations from about 13 million donations. That year it spent $88 million on salaries; $15 million in awards and grants; and $2.7 million for internet hosting – keeping Wikipedia and related websites online.
The Wikimedia Foundation itself draws attention to the most glaring detail—salary expenses, which increased by just over $20 million annually. As of 2020, it has added over 200 roles as per its annual plans. These new jobs are focused on expanding the Wikimedia Foundation’s programs globally and don’t have Silicon Valley salaries for employees.
Internet hosting costs are also worth noting. While Musk is right that Wikipedia can be stored on a single smartphone, making it accessible to 25 billion visitors every month is no small feat. Compared to the operating costs of comparable sites, Wikipedia is run on a shoestring. (Twitter’s operating expenses in 2021—the most recent full year available—were $5.6 billion.) And keeping an encyclopedia online is more than just hosting. It requires protection against cyberattacks, legal fees to protect user privacy, and experts to help fight misinformation.
Not for the first time, Musk is making enemies of people who vehemently defend the principles of free speech that he apparently cares so deeply about. Building Wikipedia could have made Wales one of the richest people on the planet, but instead his net worth is in the millions of dollars. Wales has long been a prominent activist for an open internet, and has previously called for “very strong enforcement of the right to free speech in Europe – essentially the language of the US First Amendment”. Unlike Musk, who readily admits to removing content in countries that require it, Wales has consistently demonstrated his skills and resisted Chinese censorship.
Wikipedia is one of humanity’s greatest achievements. A collectively written and edited database of nearly 60 million articles in 336 languages, freely available to anyone with an Internet connection – and many without. I once joined a group of activists in South Korea who downloaded the Korean version of Wikipedia onto USB sticks and sent them north by hot air balloon to be picked up and plugged into secret laptops – such was the longing for its content. Wikipedia would be, if we ever choose to name such things, a digital wonder of the world, perhaps one of the last surviving relics of the early internet, when the possibilities for what we could achieve together seemed endless and exhilarating.
The fact that it has stood the test of time is due to good management and selfless volunteer work. Its financial record, like everything else that happens on the site, is in the public domain. Its design makes it the only one of the top 10 most visited websites worldwide that doesn’t sell our data, target us with targeted advertising, or require a subscription. No wonder Musk is attacking Wikipedia. If he cared to just look, he would see that his complaints are false. Willfully ignorant or just ignorant – take your pick.
Dave Lee is a US technology columnist for Bloomberg Opinion. He was previously a correspondent for the Financial Times and BBC News.
