Wikipedia’s Jimmy Wales has been called the last decent tech baron. It’s sounds like a flattering label, although one I usually associate more with yacht-dwelling meatheads who feed their herds of cattle homegrown macadamia nuts; the kind of person who can most recently be found wining and dining with the President of the United States and his coterie of MAGA sycophants.
Wales, on the other hand, keeps things relatively low-key. Even as the site he founded, Wikipedia, turns 25 years old this month, he seems more interested in fixing his home Wi-Fi than joining the tech elite’s performative power games. He has also spent the past few months promoting a new book, The Seven Rules of Trust, that uses Wikipedia’s overarching strategy and unlikely rise to articulate Wales’ playbook for fixing much of what’s broken in today’s deeply polarized and antagonistic society.
On this week’s episode of The Big Interview, Wales and I discussed what it means to build something used by billions of people that’s not optimized for growth at all costs. During our discussion he reflected on Wikipedia’s messy, human origins, the ways it’s been targeted by governments from Russia to Saudi Arabia, and the challenges of holding the line on neutrality in an online ecosystem hostile to the notion that facts even exist. We also talked about what threatens Wikipedia now, from AI to conspiracy-pilled billionaires, and why he’ll never edit an entry about Donald Trump. Read our full conversation below.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
KATIE DRUMMOND: Jimmy Wales, welcome to The Big Interview. Thank you so much for being here.
JIMMY WALES: Thanks for having me on.
We always start these conversations with a few quick questions, like a little warmup for your brain. Are you ready?
Yes.
What’s an internet rabbit hole you’ve fallen into most recently?
Home Assistant. I’ve just started using Home Assistant to run smart home devices, and there’s a huge community and thousands of things to read about and so on and so forth. So it’s what I’m obsessed with.
What is this community doing?
Troubleshooting. People are working on extensions to deal with every kind of thing in the world, and it’s amazing.
What’s a subject you never argue about online anymore?
I would say I don’t argue with anybody about trans issues. There’s absolutely no point in it. It’s too toxic. I never did argue about it, but I don’t even talk about it.
You’re just going to stay away.
Yeah, it’s too unpleasant.
What do you trust more: Wikipedia or ChatGPT?
Definitely Wikipedia.
I had to ask. What’s your favorite website or app that is not Wikipedia?
I really do like parts of Reddit. There’s some really great communities on Reddit, and great people. I lurk and read in the personal finance subreddit. There’s just a lot of really nice people there. I’m always amazed by it.
Reddit is really having a moment. I find that I spend a lot more time lurking in the Reddit app on my phone, because I would rather read thoughtful conversations than scroll on X.
That’s exactly it. It’s like a place with paragraphs.
And often really thoughtful people. What is the best thing about living in the UK versus the US?
Well, my family’s here. I always say this about the US: Tech is in Silicon Valley, and politics is in Washington, and movies and showbiz are in LA, and finance is in New York. But all those things are in London.
So if I lived in Silicon Valley, I would only have tech friends because that’s who lives there. Whereas in London, it’s much more comprehensive. All kinds of people. So I like that.