 "Elon Musk performs the controversial 'Nazi salute' at President Donald Trump inauguration ceremony. Reuters")
Two of the biggest tech moguls Elon Musk and Jimmy Wales are at loggerheads. The X owner is asking for Wikipedia’s defunding, after a description of his recent flourish, seen by some as a Hitler salute , appeared on the encyclopedic website.
The verbal spat has highlighted the different ethos of Musk’s X and Wikipedia, founded by American entrepreneur and Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales. While X, which underwent content moderation after Musk’s takeover, allows rampant disinformation across its platform, Wikipedia aims to provide factual information. The clash between the two organisations places them at opposite ends of the stick.
The Tesla CEO, who has positioned himself as President Donald Trump’s right-hand man, has been criticised by not just Wikipedia but also the mainstream media for his allegedly controversial hand gesture. Many have compared it to the ‘Nazi salute’. Now, the media holding him accountable as he thrusts himself into the centre of US politics.
In a December interview with New York Magazine’s Intelligencer, Jimmy Wales emphasised that Wikipedia’s goal is for editors to produce content that is “clear and acknowledges the different viewpoints out there,” even in the face of growing divisiveness, partisanship and culture wars. Despite being created by a community of volunteers, the site is currently considered a generally reliable source.
The tiff between Musk and Wales began after the former raised eyebrows on Monday (January 20) with a gesture during Trump’s inauguration event . Musk while thanking the crowd for Trump’s return to the Oval Office first tapped the left side of his chest with his right hand and then extended his arm with his palm open. As crowds cheered, he repeated the gesture once again.
As of Wednesday, both Musk’s biographical Wikipedia page and the page on the “Nazi salute” mention the episode.
The ‘Defund Wikipedia’ campaign
Musk took to X on Tuesday (January 21) to share an excerpt of the Wikipedia entry, although the wording found on the website, as of Wednesday (January 22) was slightly different. Sharing the Wikipedia excerpt, Musk wrote, “Since legacy media propaganda is considered a ‘valid’ source by Wikipedia, it naturally simply becomes an extension of legacy media propaganda!”
The reposted text read, “In his speech during the second Trump inauguration, Musk twice extended his right arm towards the crowd in an upward angle. The gesture was compared to a Nazi salute or fascist salute. Musk denied any meaning behind the gesture.”
In his repost, Musk criticised both Wikipedia and the news media, two of his frequent targets, accusing them of spreading disinformation. He also urged his supporters to “defund” Wikipedia.
Trolling Musk for his 2022 purchase of X for $44 billion, Wales shot back, “I think Elon is unhappy that Wikipedia is not for sale.”
Run by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation, Wikipedia is an outlier in today’s internet landscape, dominated by the likes of Google and Meta - instead harking back to the web’s early, idealistic days when the open-source movement harnessed the talents of volunteers to offer free access to tools and knowledge.
Wales asked Musk whether there was “anything you consider inaccurate in that description?” and added that it wasn’t propaganda but “fact… every element of it.”
All about Wikipedia
Initiated on January 15, 2001, with an English-language edition, Wikipedia’s reach quickly extended, adding German and Swedish versions within two months. Now, it’s accessible in hundreds of languages worldwide.
“I would say the decline of trust in journalism and politics is quite severe, which then, in some cases, translates into people feeling more angry and lost,” Wales told Intelligencer.
But among the Wikipedia community, he said, “We just plug away, trying to be neutral, trying to be clear.”
After Musk’s 2022 purchase of Twitter, rebranded as X, he gutted trust and safety teams and introduced Community Notes, a crowd-sourced moderation tool that the platform has promoted as a way for users to add context to posts.
However, researchers say the lowering of the guardrails on X, and the reinstatement of once-banned accounts of known misinformation peddlers, has turned the platform into a haven for misinformation.
With inputs from agencies