Gil Penchina Leaves eBay To Run Wikia

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1. Simran
   

   June 5th, 2006 at 11:58 pm

   Interesting. She must have gotten a much better offer. I doubt eBay’s Vice President would just leave without being promised significant monetary gain.

   Digg this story here.

2. Michael Arrington
   

   June 6th, 2006 at 12:08 am

   Simran - agree, except that Gill is a dude - http://www.eadp.org/main2/Rome05/Penchina.jpg

   

3. Andrew Fife
   

   June 6th, 2006 at 1:23 am

   Actually, I’d be surprised if an early-stage startup CEO drew as high a salary as a VP at Ebay so I bet Mr. Penchina left because he believed the equity was highly valuable. In fact, I believe that equity is really the only reason why anyone should ever take a startup CEO position.

4. jme giffo
   

   June 6th, 2006 at 2:09 am

   they need to get some branding people in, so its a wiki for everything, even a pro-george bush page lol,

   its a big risk, no marketing, no ads.

5. Ali
   

   June 6th, 2006 at 2:21 am

   How do these people manage to Millions of dollars into a website? And than all you see is google ads on the side. wikia has them you tube has them and others as well.

   No wonder google keeps getting richer!

6. donal scannell
   

   June 6th, 2006 at 2:24 am

   so this paves the way for the wiki sell-out by the back door? wikipedia is not for profit but the ring-leaders side-step that with this new venture, also based on thousands of people writing free content.

   those who have been screaming about the death of wikipedia have been proved right sooner than i thought.

   not for profit indeed.

   donal scannell

7. Dimitar Vesselinov
   

   June 6th, 2006 at 3:12 am

   Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders
   “Gil Penchina, CEO of Wikia, and an 8-year veteran of eBay, contrasts his experiences and lessons of working in a big company with heading a small start-up.”
   http://odeo.com/audio/1162574/view

8. Yakov
   

   June 6th, 2006 at 3:15 am

   I have a question - what equity stake would CEO get? How much?

9. Kevin
   

   June 6th, 2006 at 4:02 am

   Sorry guys, i knew it was coming….

   http://www.redherring.com/Arti.....l+Penchina

10. Darren McLaughlin
    

    June 6th, 2006 at 6:22 am

    Make sense. You knew they’d want to leverage the brand name while it’s still hot.

11. Kevin
    

    June 6th, 2006 at 6:56 am

    ohhhh yes

12. Joe Anderson
    

    June 6th, 2006 at 7:41 am

    Interestingly enough, I was talking to Jimbo Wales on IRC last night and he didn’t mention this… curious.

13. Joel
    

    June 6th, 2006 at 8:02 am

    Great. Another forum to hear peoples opinions. It will be interesting to see how this takes off, how it is moderated and monitored etc.

14. Daniele Levy
    

    June 6th, 2006 at 8:33 am

    Gil is an absolutely great business leader and Wikia is lucky to get him. He is fun, sharp, and inspirational. He’s done great things for helping build eBay’s business. I am looking forward to seeing him in action again at Wikia.

15. Qian Wang
    

    June 6th, 2006 at 8:47 am

    Went over to Wikia and looked around. In a word, it’s quiet. Looks like they’ve got their work cut out for them to replicate the success of wikipedia. From the podcast it sounds like Gil’s hoping for organic growth with pretty realistic expectations, so hopefully they’ll make it.

16. Gregory
    

    June 6th, 2006 at 2:17 pm

    It’s sad when a website can use free software (MediaWiki), base a site on a famous site almost completely (Wikipedia), and end up getting $4 million and a famous CEO.

    At least it’s started by Jimmy Wales.. But, still, I don’t see how they could raise $4 million with what looks like a striped down and Google-Ad-ized version of Wikipedia…

17. John D
    

    August 24th, 2006 at 3:20 pm

    Gil was a valued team member at eBay, I am sure he’ll do well!

18. Seo Update
    

    October 7th, 2006 at 3:09 am

    I Like the idea but still think wikipedia rulez better, and i hate te ads on Wikia, Wikipedia is nice and clean.