QUOTE(tarantino @ Sat 29th August 2009, 9:34pm)
Well, that settles that.
Thank goodness they cleared that up... (IMG:
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Jimbo does have a possible point in this last paragraph:
QUOTE(Jimbo @ 23:36, 29 August 2009 (UTC))
I think that people who are concerned that this is "buying a seat" can take some comfort in the fact that not one board member supports the notion that it would be ok to "sell" a seat on the board. But additionally, I think it's important to remember that it would be absolutely impossible for anyone to get their money's worth, if they have some nefarious purpose in mind. A board seat simply wouldn't be worth $2 million - how the heck could you ever make anything back out of it?
Obviously $2 million is chicken feed to someone who's worth as much as Omidyar, but still, for that much money you'd think they could at least protect his BLP article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=304495270http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=289928161http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=282812790http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=269639351http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=241183460http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=244149975http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=244150308http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=248848644http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=249188488http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=263157532http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=266004442http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=266004575http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=266004834...all of which is not as bad as it's been for a lot of other People With Big Bucks - none of these edits lasted more than a minute or two. When you think of all the people who have been ripped off in eBay transactions over the years, that's a fairly large pool of potential "vandals."
Then again, if I were really,
really cynical, I could maybe suggest that the grant is a defensive move, to ensure that WP won't start taking ad revenue anytime soon - since some of the companies taking out ads on Future Wikipedia might be eBay competitors, whose success might serve to diminish Omidyar's net worth (much of which is in the form of eBay stock). I don't think I'm quite that cynical, though... (am I?) (IMG:
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