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Google gives Wikimedia millions

wired.com

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Re: Google gives Wikimedia millions

#41

Post by scrollaway »

ardy42 wrote: post #37
baroffoos wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is wrong. Low view articles cost essentially nothing to host. The whole of wikipedia can be stored for about $1 per month if all you care about is storage. Also rejected articles don't get deleted from the system they just get moved to the draft section which is hidden from search results.

> This is wrong. Low view articles cost essentially nothing to host. The whole of wikipedia can be stored for about $1 per month if all you care about is storage. Also rejected articles don't get deleted from the system they just get moved to the draft section which is hidden from search results. That's wrong. Low view articles still cost volunteer time to maintain, otherwise many would become home to malicious edits…

Malicious edits don't scale with the number of articles, they scale with the number of edits and users. If all of a sudden Wikipedia gained 10 million more articles, there would not be more malicious edits per day than there are now without the amount of malicious users increasing.

Re: Google gives Wikimedia millions

#43

Post by kondro »

webaholic wrote: post #14

I hope this reduces the "we need donations" banner to an extent. I contribute changes whenever I can, so seeing that banner each and every time is a bit frustrating.

Probably not. Wikimedia like money[1].

They've been running a revenue surplus of $20m+ per year for the last while and are currently sitting on a $130m cash & equivalents hoard.

[1] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/6/60/FY17-...

Re: Google gives Wikimedia millions

#45

Post by Retric »

ardy42 wrote: post #35
SEJeff wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And it is super arbitrary. There is a joke I made over 10 years ago making fun of a friend and it is still up (totally not giving it away as then it will be deleted). The admin / oversight is hit or miss to the extreme.

> The admin / oversight is hit or miss to the extreme. Of course, there's no way they could formally audit every article. They're heavily reliant of some rando noticing something fishy in an obscure article and bringing it to their attention.

Wikipedia is still small enough to see every article reviewed. They don’t largely becase they funnel funding into other unrelated projects.

Re: Google gives Wikimedia millions

#46

Post by lern_too_spel »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #10
lern_too_spel wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And shuttered Freebase. Similarly, Apple used Openstreetmap to get their mapping effort off the ground and then didn't contribute back. I understand the profit motive for both of them, but it still rubs me the wrong way.

Apple doesn't contribute back? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18913408 > Apple employee spoke at a recent OSM conference. Yes, they use OSM data as well. In some countries more than others. Apple also has a fulltime staff working on OSM. https://github.com/osmlab/appledata/issues , https://github.com/osmlab/appledata/

Apple is replacing OSM and all other sources with its own private maps. https://www.justinobeirne.com/new-apple-maps/

Re: Google gives Wikimedia millions

#47

Post by lern_too_spel »

zozbot123 wrote: post #19
lern_too_spel wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And shuttered Freebase. Similarly, Apple used Openstreetmap to get their mapping effort off the ground and then didn't contribute back. I understand the profit motive for both of them, but it still rubs me the wrong way.

AIUI, Freebase was not "shuttered" - it was used to seed Wikidata, a Wikipedia sister project which makes its data available under permissive CC0 licensing.

It was shuttered. You can no longer contribute to Freebase. Wikidata used some data from the last Freebase triples dump, but Google is not contributing its updates to either, despite using Freebase's crowdsourced work to seed its internal knowledgebase.

Once again, I understand the profit motive. I just don't like it.

Re: Google gives Wikimedia millions

#48

Post by ajross »

lwansbrough wrote: post #22
skj wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it impossible to attempt to innovate in a space without being accused of trying to kill the space's current leader? (googler, but had never even heard of knol until now)

When Google innovates, it’s usually in a vein attempt to kill competitors in a place where it sees an opportunity for more revenue. Competition from Google is hardly ever fair (despite most of their projects being spectacular failures regardless.) So no it’s not impossible, but it’s always gonna happen when it’s Google/Amazon and the “innovation” is a free alternative to a successful independent business.

> When Google innovates, it’s usually in a vein attempt to kill competitors in a place where it sees an opportunity for more revenue

Isn't that how everyone innovates?

(FWIW: you meant "vain", I think, but that doesn't seem like the right word either. Maybe "arrogant" was the spin you wanted?)

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