No. 7 Jimmy Wales, founder and chair, Wikimedia Foundation
Last year's position: Not placed
Why? Putting the 'wiki' in Wikipedia
It's an interesting testimony to Jimmy Wales' best-known creation that writing biographies such as this was a lot more difficult before Wikipedia came along.
Active in the dot-com world since the mid-1990's, Wales splashes into the top 10 for his role in creating the group-edited encyclopaedia and popularising this 'open source' approach to information management known as 'the wiki'.
The Wikipedia - the flagship of the Wikimedia projects which also include the Wiktionary and WikiNews - has grown at a phenomenal rate and proved that the wiki paradigm can produce a reliable (if not flawless) source of information.
Beyond creating the encyclopaedia, Wales represents yet another expression of user-generated content which the Agenda Setters panel believes is shaking up the traditional media world.
The wiki's impact is proving considerable as many businesses look to ways of harnessing this kind of resource. The panel expects we'll be hearing more from Wales in this arena.
Take a walk down memory lane - and find out who made the Agenda Setters poll over the years:
"Ray Ozzie is a radical change force for Microsoft. He is moving them in a very different direction."
--Richard Sykes, Agenda Setters panellist
"My observation is that [kids today] are far more networked and open than any other generation we have ever seen."
--Peter Cochrane, Agenda Setters panellist
The world's most powerful women Forbes.com
Smart 50 - Asia's best users of IT ZDNet Asia
Chron 500 - The San Francisco Bay Area's top public companies San Francisco Chronicle
The 50 people who matter now Business 2.0
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