“It’s really not fair”: Jimmy Wales reveals Wikipedia’s servers are struggling thanks to AI bots pretending to be humans
Wikipedia’s co-founder said in a recent interview that AI companies scraping the site had begun to cost the nonprofit real money. In a recent Bloomberg interview, Jimmy Wales explained that the traffic spike from bots strained infrastructure and clashed with the site’s mission. However, he also said Wikipedia had not yet moved toward legal action.
Wales framed the issue as a question of fairness. He said donors give money to support Wikipedia, not to subsidize AI companies training models on its content. At the same time, he stressed that the organization preferred cooperation over conflict.
Wikipedia says AI bots are driving up costs
"All of the AI bots scraping Wikipedia are actually costing us a lot of money," Wales said. "And our donors aren't donating to subsidize Sam Altman, they're donating to help Wikipedia." He added that those companies should use the Wikimedia Enterprise product instead.
When asked whether Wikipedia might sue, Wales sounded cautious. "No, not. Not yet. Not yet," he said. However, he added that conversations were ongoing. Google, he noted, had long been "a great customer" of the Enterprise product.
Still, he said the organization had considered technical measures. "We may go in for whether or not we would use Cloudflare or not," Wales explained. He also suggested blocking AI crawlers. "It’s really not fair. Like, you need to pay because you're costing our donors a lot of money."
Folks on TikTok, where Bloomberg posted a clip of the interview, had a lot to say. One commenter wrote, "Wikipedia is closer to what the internet should be than ai slop that’s just a rip off of real people’s creativity & knowledge."
Another person reflected on the site’s changing reputation. "Remember when u couldn’t use Wikipedia as an essay source but now it’s considered more legit than 90% of all media news and history."
However, not everyone felt patient. "'We are too friendly' this kinda just makes me annoyed," one TikToker wrote. They added that tech companies were "taking part in illegal activities" and that Wikipedia should push back harder.
Wikimedia asks for responsible AI use
In a blog post, the Wikimedia Foundation asked AI developers to use its content "responsibly." The post said companies should rely on the paid Wikimedia Enterprise platform and give proper credit to contributors.
"For people to trust information shared on the internet, platforms should make it clear where the information is sourced from and elevate opportunities to visit and participate in those sources."
The opt-in product lets companies use Wikipedia at scale without "severely taxing Wikipedia’s servers." At the same time, the paid access supports the nonprofit’s mission.
While the foundation stopped short of legal threats, it shared new data. AI bots had scraped the site while "trying to appear human." After detection updates, Wikipedia found that unusual traffic in May and June came from those bots. Meanwhile, human page views dropped 8% year over year, which the company attributed to people shifting their online search habits.
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