Musk mocks Wikipedia: He offered them a billion dollars for a childish name change

Musk first made the proposal in October 2023, and recently confirmed on Xu that the offer is still on the table, replying to the user with: “The offer still stands. Come on, do it…”. He wants Wikipedia to change its name to “Dickipedia”, claiming it would be “in the interest of accuracy”. In order to prevent the foundation from taking the money and immediately returning the old name, he set an additional condition that the new name must remain in force for at least one year. “I’m not stupid, lol,” he said. However, now it is more enough time has passed that we can state that the offer remained unanswered and that Wikipedia distanced itself from such games.

Criticisms on account of costs and ideology

This provocation is just the tip of the iceberg in Musk’s conflict with the Wikimedia Foundation, which is behind Wikipedia. He alreadyć has been publicly questioning for a long time why the foundation is asking for so many donations.

“Ever wonder why the Wikimedia Foundation wants so much money? It certainly isn’t needed to run Wikipedia. You can literally put a copy of the entire text on your phone! So, what’s the money for?” Musk wrote in one of his posts on X.

He is particularly concerned about spending on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives. After it was announced that the foundation allocated more than 50 million dollars in the budget for these purposes, Musk called the platform “Wokepedia” and called on his followers to stop donating until he “returns to balance and adjusts politics”. That’s why he founded his own version of the online encyclopedia, which immediately raised dust for glorifying war crimes.

Cold reaction from Wikipedia

Co-foundedč Wikipedia’s Jimmy Wales and the foundation itself largely ignored Musk’s offer, considering it frivolous trolling. Wales has previously been a vocal critic of Musk himself, accusing him of destroying X’s reputation as a reliable source of information. Interestingly, Musk’s cost announcement was corrected by “Community Notes,” a feature on Xu itself. The explanation stated that Wikipedia records over 25 billion page views per month and that all financial statements are publicly available and audited by a third party.