If Wikipedia says it, it must be true: Tim Howard, who stopped approximately 14,000 shots on goal in the U.S. Men's National Team's narrow World Cup loss to Belgium last night, is the USA's acting Secretary of Defense.

One tactic Wikipedia has seized on to combat its dwindling number of editors is to try to attract more women to its ranks of geeky white dudes. Plus, they can edit all the girl stuff.

Jimmy Wales, the iconoclastic founder of Wikipedia, made a troubling announcement at the seventh annual Wikipedia conference: Nobody wants to edit Wikipedia anymore. Is Wikipedia going to shrivel up and fade away?

Google's chairman Eric Schmidt has a new girlfriend, who's just like all his other girlfriends. Also in today's Valleywag roundup: Wikipedia's co-founder is burning through his money fast and Twitter will now take bribes for access to the top of your stream.

Wikipedia is one of the most important websites on the internet. It's also one of the most self-important. Now, Wikipedians are trying to get the site listed alongside the Grand Canyon and the Pyramids on the UN's "world heritage list."

Aspiring fameball Rachel Marsden once loved Fox News mastermind Roger Ailes like an uncle — even after his henchmen booted Marsden from the building. No more: in a "novel" she's shopping, Ailes is the "blubbery" villain.

Our favorite fake answer is tech investor Peter Thiel's theory that the interent is a harmless network of FAX machines. Always running PR for our future robot overlords, that one.

Ohhh yeahhh, baby: Jimmy Wales did just hand you a picture of his dapper self, giving you The Look. You know, the sultry one he's used on a long line of women. The look that says, "this card means business."

Twins Charlotte and Samantha Ronson turn 32 today. David Duchovny is turning 49. Charlize Theron is 34. Author and radio personality Garrison Keillor is 67. Conservative political commentator Alan Keyes turns 59. Wayne Knight, the actor best known for playing Newman on Seinfeld, is turning 54. And Jimmy Wales, the co-founder of Wikipedia, is 43 today—at least according to his Wikipedia page. A handful of weekend birthdays—including that of Michael Kors, Chris Cuomo and Dustin Hoffman—follow below.

Jimmy Wales had an image problem. After bending his online encyclopedia's rules for a lover and, allegedly, for a benefactor, the Wikipedia co-founder faced rebuke and embarrassment. Then the New York Times made him a hero.

In a rather extraordinary effort to crack down on the Church of Scientology's obsessive policing of its online public image, Wikipedia has banned all IP addresses owned or affiliated with Scientology from making edits to entries on its website.

Dear Ryan:

As I head to NBC to run its Bay Area site, I'm leaving you one Silicon Valley gossip blog, used but in good condition. A few thoughts on how to keep it that way.

Did you know the founder of Wikipedia had a search engine? By the numbers, it's unlikely, since Wikia Search, Jimmy Wales's would-be Google killer, only attracted 10,000 users a month. He's now closing it.

Dear important scientist Tim Berners-Lee: Thank you for inventing the World Wide Web 20 years ago. It's really great and stuff! But were you aware of the crimes committed in your name?

Jimmy Wales, the scandal-prone cofounder of Wikipedia, thinks Barack Obama's first priority should be creating government websites anyone can edit. Translation: A bailout for makers of wikis.

Imagine an online encyclopedia anyone can edit — and no one can run. With the calendar running out on 2008, Jimmy Wales, Wikipedia's sleaze-drenched cofounder, nearly lost his seat on the board. Who's in charge here?

The children of the world will be deprived of knowledge unless you shell out money soon, says Jimmy Wales, the sleaze-drenched cofounder of Wikipedia. Is this what Wikipedia has come to — an online telethon?

Wikipedia, to cofounder Jimmy Wales's eternal dismay, is a nonprofit project rather than a lucrative private enterprise. The online encyclopedia, home to volunteer-written disquisitions on subjects like the umlaut in names of heavy metal bands, hopes to raise $6 million this year in a fundraising drive now featured in prominent ads on the top of most pages on the otherwise ad-free site. How's it going?An online thermometer, which has popped on and off the site, shows that the effort has raised $2,155,883 towards its $6 million goal. But that figure is meant to deceive potential donors about the level of Wikipedia's grassroots support. It started out $2.1 million ahead, by counting previously made donations from large organizations like the Sloan Foundation, which has already agreed to give Wikipedia $3 million over the course of three years. But that's not what has Wikipedia's volunteer editors up in arms. They're calling the donation banner "ugly." They're debating how to make it easier to hide. They're even questioning whether the foundation should be asking them for money at all, since they already contribute their labor. On a Wikipedia mailing list, Nathan Awrich sums up the reaction:

Will the real Jimmy Wales please stand up? Troll 2.0 nails the slippery Wikipedia cofounder:

What's that on the top of every page on Wikipedia, Jimmy Wales's nonprofit encyclopedia? Why, it's an ad! Wales had long promised that Wikipedia would not carry advertising, but he makes an exception for the Wikimedia Foundation, Wikipedia's nonprofit parent. What Wales doesn't mention: Wikipedia will soon have many new ways of making money available to it, thanks to a revision in its open-source license. Wikipedia is switching from an obscure, restrictive agreement with its roots in software documentation to a much looser Creative Commons copyright license — which means the Wikimedia Foundation will be able to profit from its volunteers' editorial work. While they're at it, why don't Wales and company just run banner ads, too? The donation drive seems like an excellent opportunity to show potential advertisers how effective Wikipedia's ads can be.