Wikipedia community to interact in a personal way. Wikipedia has been subject to several kinds of criticism. For example, the Seigenthaler and Essjay incidents caused criticism of Wikipedia's reliability and usefulness as a reference. The complaints related to the community include the effects of users' anonymity, the attitudes towards newcomers, the abuse of privileges by administrators, biases in the social structure of the community, in particular, gender bias and lack of female contributors, and the role of the project's co-founder Jimmy Wales, in the community. Sue Gardner, former executive director of the Wikimedia Foundation, described Wikipedians as being like a "crusty old
Jimmy Wales of a Chicago futures and options firm. In 1996, he and two partners founded Bomis, an adult web portal featuring entertainment and adult content. The company would provide the initial funding for the peer-reviewed free encyclopedia, Nupedia (2000–03), and its successor, Wikipedia. On January 15, 2001, with Larry Sanger and others, Wales launched Wikipedia—a free, open content encyclopedia that enjoyed rapid growth and popularity; as Wikipedia's public profile grew, he became the project's promoter and spokesman. He is historically cited as a co-founder of Wikipedia, though he has disputed the "co-" designation, declaring himself the sole founder. Wales serves on