"Bomis is a dot-com company founded in 1996. Its primary business is the sale of advertising on the Bomis.com search portal. It was founded by Jimmy Wales and Tim Shell, and provided support for the free encyclopedia projects Nupedia and Wikipedia. As of 2006, Tim Shell is the CEO of Bomis. On the Bomis.com site, Bomis creates and hosts web rings around popular search terms. The rings are currently categorized broadly as "Babes", "Entertainment", "Sports", "Adult", "Other" and "Science fiction". The "Adult", "Babes" and "Entertainment" categories are the most frequently updated and the most popular. In addition, Bomis hosts a copy of the Open Directory Project search directory. Revenue from search-related pages is generated from advertising and affiliate marketing." - Wikipedia

Here are two images, I'd guess some of the last ones we'll see of what the Bomis Babe Report looked like? I edited one slightly with a white rectangle. I did the best I could with it, but they doesn't get any clearer. I am always looking for old images related to Bomis. If people can't find these things on Wikipedia, perhaps they'll be able to find them here, with your help.

NUPEDIA. Have a look at their page. It doesn't seem to be doing much of anything, try a search once you're there, and you'll see what I mean. It will return something like:"This page is temporarily down for maintenance."  It has been returning this message for many months. Maybe this one is about to take off, but I think I can say that I Hate Wikipedia has left Nupedia in the dust.

These are images retrieved October of 2006 from Bomis.com, using a Google © Gadget that pulls a random image from a domain. The search terms were: "Bomis.com" and "Babes.Bomis.com"  As mentioned elsewhere on this page, within five days of my running these here using the gadget, they disappeared from the Bomis site. I'd guess they existed on the server but were unlinked. These are copies I made before running the gadget on this site.

What was Bomis? These pictures argue that it was quite mild, though I did not repost a few borderline images including one of Linda Tran and many of Tera and Devon. These borderline images are rated R. One way of looking at it is to say that the quality and standards were higher than most. Do these pictures have an redeeming value as the phrase goes? You can look here to get an idea of what Bomis was. Maybe there is value in answering that question.

The Wikimedia Foundation Inc. is the parent organization of the Wikipedia, and a host of other Wikis such as, Wikiquote and Wiktionary. The Bomis company for a time ran Wikipedia until it became a part of the Wikimedia non-profit Foundation.

A goal of Wikimedia is to, “develop and maintain open content, wiki-based projects and to provide the full contents of those projects to the public free of charge.”

It seems a laudable goal. Who could be against knowledge?

I can think of two points though to consider. The first is the phrase, "free of charge". Is free knowledge better than knowledge you have to pay for? Maybe it is. Perhaps it is true that societies problems are explained by a lack of knowledge and so we should promote free knowledge, or at least not be against it. Still this sounds a bit like free roads, free healthcare, and free education, things that arguably are better provided by the market.

I can’t help thinking about the “tragedy of the commons, where no one real cares what happens to it, because problems with the commons don’t are spread over so many owners. It like littering at a public park, the person responsible for the litter doesn’t have to pick it up. It’s like polluting an ocean and not having to pay for it, the impact to the one individual who does it, is so minor.

Wikipedia is a commons. It has vandals that run around and try to mess it up. Wiki, not unlike the Keystone Cops, chases after them. The vandals of Wikipedia don’t have to pay for the cost they inflict.

The second point is, what is open content and why is it better? The traditional model is have books owned by specific entities. Are we moving to the point where authors and publishers feel less inclined to produce books because information is so readily available elsewhere?

Ayn Rand was a great fan of private ownership, as are the libertarians. What would she say about a media commons? I imagine she protected her books. She thought of the world as divided into two groups. The producers, and the parasites. In this case, that I imagine she never had to deal with, those producing knowledge would the heroes and heroines. The parasites would be those not giving value for value. Those living off the work of others.

Is that the case with Wikipedia’s users? I don’t know. In a way, free knowledge has no value, because you are not trading value for value. You just pick it up off the street like you found a quarter. Perhaps this is all just beyond Rand‘s work, as the world changes. Still I wonder what she thinks of Jimmy Wales?

 Hit your refresh button and a new "Random Riddle" will appear.

4/30/2006

Problems with Wikipedia by John Lott 

A word to the wise: Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia that can be altered by anyone with a computer, has proved remarkably useful for pulling political dirty tricks.

Political operatives are covertly rewriting -- or defacing -- candidates' biographical entries to make the boss look good or the opponent look ridiculous.

As a result, political campaigns are monitoring the Web site more closely than ever this election year.

Revisions made by Capitol Hill staffers became so frequent and disruptive earlier this year that Wikipedia temporarily blocked access to the site from some congressional Internet addresses. The pranks included bumping up the age of the Senate's oldest member, West Virginia's Robert C. Byrd, from 88 to 180, and giving crude names to other lawmakers.

The entry for Democratic Rep. Jim Marshall of Georgia labeled him "too liberal" for his state, in part because of a contribution he received from a political action committee run by Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, New York Democrat. The man who doctored Mr. Marshall's biography now works for his Republican challenger.

In Georgia this week, the campaign manager for a candidate for governor resigned amid allegations he doctored the Wikipedia biography of an opponent in the Democratic primary.

More from John Lott

Lost Bomis T-Shirt Pictures

Help JokeCat find the dis-appeared lost Bomis T-Shirt pictures. This part of Wikipedia's history should be preserved, like just about everything else they save. As is written on Wiki's "Please do not bite the newcomers" page: "Please gently let newcomers know that their work is never lost and can always be retrieved from the history." I guess that doesn't apply to Bomis, which to be fair, was not a Wiki. But it seems a bit like erasing history to me. JokeCat is looking for these models wearing a Bomis T-Shirt: Deanna Merryman, Suzi Simpson, Bonita Saint, and Aimee Sweet, whose names have been added to the list of Bomis Babes.

WikiFreak Searches websites critical of Wikipedia: 

Below is the PACMAN game. Click on "Popout and play in window" to evade the Wikipedian Volunteers as a Sock Puppet (Wikipedia Vandal.) for as long as you can.

IHateWikipedia.com - A One Trick Pony

http://ihatewikipedia.com/uploads/Bomis_Babe_Aria_Giovanni_b 
http://www.ihatewikipedia.com/images/aria_giovanni_bomis_babe_mini_b.bmp
http://www.ihatewikipedia.com/images/tylynjohn_2_small.jpg
http://www.ihatewikipedia.com/images/jeri_ryan_borg_medium.jpg