Jimmy Wales's Wikipedia Balancing Act

Everyone assumes it's hard for us to take no advertising on Wikipedia, but that decision was actually easy. It's just not the right place. The more difficult question for us was how we could organize and empower volunteers while still maintaining control. It's a constant balancing act to promote local autonomy with consistency across the brand.

Early on, some people thought we should radically decentralize and have local groups in different countries control their own sites. Each could have its own look and its own standards. The Germans were the first to organize and want to start a chapter. Some wanted to set up a club to represent Wikipedia there, but the idea raised tough questions. You don't want to give away too much power. What if they started endorsing a political candidate? We decided there was no way we'd do that. Still, we needed a local presence and couldn't afford to set up offices with paid staff. The best solution was to set up a local nonprofit chapter. It meant more work and sometimes more costs, but we could decide how they'd operate under our trademark.