Why Does Wikipedia Think I’m Evan Spiegel?

A striking development has emerged in artificial intelligence. Maxwell Zeff Business May 2, 2026 5:00 AM Why Does Wikipedia Think I’m Evan Spiegel? For the past week, a photo of me has been plastered on the CEO of Snap’s Wikipedia page. No one, not even Spiegel, seems to care.

Photo-Illustration: WIRED Staff; Getty Images Comment Loader Save Story Save this story Comment Loader Save Story Save this story For fifty-one weeks out of the year, I’m 100 percent not the CEO of Snap, the company behind Snapchat . That’s Evan Spiegel , the company’s billionaire cofounder. No one in their right mind would question that.

Technical Details

But for one week out of the year, specifically last week, some people may have thought I was the social media firm’s top executive. If you looked on Wikipedia , it sure seemed like I was. Starting on Sunday, when you clicked on Spiegel’s Wikipedia page , there was a picture of me.

The same thing happened if you ran a Google Search for Evan Spiegel or asked Google Gemini about him. At the time of publication, that’s still the case. Despite what the internet might have you believe, I’m Maxwell Zeff (friends call me Max).

The photo on Spiegel’s Wikipedia page was taken at a conference last year. I’m a reporter in my twenties, and while I write about technology companies for a living, I’ve never met Spiegel and have barely ever written about Snapchat. But now I’m the CEO—according to Wikipedia.

Industry Implications

This first came to my attention on Monday, when I was scrolling through social media and I saw a random account post “that doesn’t look like Evan Spiegel” with a screenshot of my photo on his Wikipedia page. I paused for a second, wondering if I was seeing things. I reposted the photo on Twitter and said, “Very flattering but that is indeed me, and not the CEO of Snap.

” My followers were amused, responding with comments such as “Congrats on the promotion” and “when yacht invitation max. Are you a current or former tech worker who wants to talk about what's happening? We'd like to hear from you.

Using a nonwork phone or computer, contact the reporter securely on Signal at mzeff. The next day, I was still Wikipedia Evan Spiegel. A Snap employee texted a mutual friend a screenshot of a Google search for Spiegel, saying, “Not Max being the second photo that comes up on Google now …” A day later, more colleagues, friends, and family members had started to notice.

This advance offers important signals about the future of the sector, and the tech world is watching closely.