Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales fears online regulation could stamp-out challengers to Facebook

Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales

Enforcing laws to curb harmful content online risks stamping out challengers to Facebook and Twitter, the founder of Wikipedia has warned. 

Jimmy Wales said governments and regulators had to be careful not to create online red tape that only the biggest tech platforms had the financial firepower to comply with. 

Mr Wales said tougher rules could create an environment similar to the car industry, where heavy regulation meant start-ups struggled to break the status quo for decades. 

He said Elon Musk’s Tesla had proved an exception to that rule because he had the huge financial backing needed to upend the dominant players.  

In a hearing with the House of Lords Communications and Digital Committee, Mr Wales added that competition was crucial for addressing big tech’s  problems with abusive content online. 

He said: "We don’t want to get into a situation where it is impossible to launch something new to compete with Facebook and Twitter, simply because we have passed some regulations that are impossible for small start-ups to comply with."

The comments came as Mr Wales admitted that Wikipedia needed to take action to improve its complaints procedure when an article misrepresented the facts. 

"One of the things I do think we could do much better is having a clear method for people who see a problem with an entry about themselves," he told the inquiry into Freedom of Expression Online.

"You don’t want to start editing it yourself, because the next thing you know the tabloids will hear about it and then it will be a fiasco. 

"I think [our guidelines and suggestions] should be clearer, and we should be faster to respond to people."

Ministers are poised to introduce online harms legislation that will prompt a crackdown on illegal content by imposing a duty of care on social media platforms. 

Mr Wales said he feared if regulation was too simplistic then it could "enshrine certain models of moderation that were fundamentally broken."

"I want to be careful that we preserve avenues for social innovation online, for new models of moderation, and new systems of community control."