Jimmy Wales
American entrepreneur
Also known as: Jimmy Donal Wales
Written and fact-checked byThe Editors of Encyclopaedia BritannicaThe Editors of Encyclopaedia BritannicaEncyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors.
- Born:
- August 8, 1966, Huntsville, Alabama, U.S.
- Also Known As:
- Jimmy Donal Wales
Jimmy Walesis an American entrepreneur who cofounded Wikipedia, a free Internet-based encyclopaedia operating under an open-source management style.
When was Jimmy Wales born?
A number of sources, including a marriage license filed in Monroe county, Florida, give Walesâs birth date as August 7, 1966. In June 2007 Wales notified Britannica that this date was incorrect. At the time, Wales said he would provide Britannica with the correct date and appropriate documentation only if it was agreed that his date of birth would not be published, which runs contrary to Britannicaâs policies. Given that the majority of sources consulted by Britannica at the time reported August 7, 1966, and without documentation that disproved this date, Britannica decided to use August 7.
In 2011 Wales provided to Britannica a scanned image of his passport showing his birth date to be August 8, 1966. As this was the most authoritative source available to Britannica, his birth date was then changed to August 8.
When directly asked about the issue on a Wikipedia talk page in 2015, Wales wrote, âMy birth certificate has an error, which has propagated across many but not all legal documents.⊠My mother and father were there, though, and it was definitely not the date listed on my birth certificate.â He added, âMy sense of humor has been, in the past, to play with peopleâ about which date is the correct one.
Wales received degrees in finance from Auburn University (B.S.) and the University of Alabama (M.S.). From 1994 to 2000 he was an options trader in Chicago, amassing enough money to allow him to quit and start his own Internet company. Wales was a devotee of objectivism, and in 1989 he began moderating the online Ayn Rand Philosophy Discussion List. In March 2000, perhaps inspired by objectivist âopenness,â he founded a free online encyclopaedia called Nupedia, which sought free contributions from scholars and other experts and subjected them to an intensive peer-review process.
Frustrated by the slow progress of this project, Wales and Nupediaâs editor in chief, Larry Sanger, in 2001 turned to a new technology, a type of software called wiki, to create Wikipedia, a companion encyclopaedia site that anyone could contribute to and edit. Sanger and Wales parted company in 2002, but they continued to dispute who first came up with the idea of using the wiki software.
Despite certain vulnerabilitiesâincluding the fact that Wikipedia was the object of deliberate vandalism, editorial wars, and practical jokesâthe site was a huge success. By 2006 Wikipedia was available in a number of languages and was one of the Internetâs most popular sites. In 2003 Wales established the Wikimedia Foundation to oversee his expanding online enterprises. He extended the wiki model to several other projects, including Wiktionary and Wikinews. In 2004 he cofounded with Angela Beesley the for-profit Wikia, Inc.
This article was most recently revised and updated by The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
