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Khan Academy requests for donations as their servers are at 250% normal load

khanacademy.org

61–70 of 232 posts

Re: Khan Academy requests for donations as their servers are at 250% normal load

#61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The IT staff also get paid... How very dare them. Go to work and earn a living... It’s disgusting I say. They should do it completely for the love of it. Same goes for those pesky YouTubers. Long story short. If you don’t offer a decent incentive package, you won’t incentivise people to come and take a CEO roll. If you look around you will find that CEO at other charity’s also get paid well.

Yes I know and it does disgust me. I wasn't talking about IT staff and regular employees. The CEO founded the "company", does he really need to incentivise himself with a near million dollars a year? I thought NPOs were created by people who want to change the world, but with this salary it seriously skews my perception of his true intentions.

Since it’s a non-profit there are no shares or shareholders and he has no equity, ie the salary is the only way he financially benefits from the success of the organization. 800k is a lot of money but it doesn’t seem outlandish to me, considering the impact and popularity. Why should you need to choose between doing good and doing well?

Re: Khan Academy requests for donations as their servers are at 250% normal load

#64

Worthy internet causes: Khan Academy, Wikipedia and Electronic Frontier Foundation Any other suggestions?

Note that Wikimedia has a huge income already. They're important and valuable, but if we're talking about who doesn't get enough publicity and donations, it's not Wikipedia/Wikimedia.

Re: Khan Academy requests for donations as their servers are at 250% normal load

#65
post #27

(Replying to a trollish comment, but don't want to push it to the top). There was a comment about the salary that CEO Sal Khan takes, with is over $800,0000 per year. I think Khan Academy is fantastic, and was going to donate until I saw this figure (verified). I think that it's entirely inappropriate to extract that much from the donations.

Are you not the one trolling? So will the figure be less of it's he is doing the same work for a company?

Why run KA as a non-profit at all then?

If you run something for the common good, you extract whatever you need to live and to run the thing — not $800k.

At least, that's what I would do if I ran a non-profit, I would take only the money I need to live/perform my duties in the upkeep of the service.

Which would not be anywhere near $800k.

Re: Khan Academy requests for donations as their servers are at 250% normal load

#66
post #27

(Replying to a trollish comment, but don't want to push it to the top). There was a comment about the salary that CEO Sal Khan takes, with is over $800,0000 per year. I think Khan Academy is fantastic, and was going to donate until I saw this figure (verified). I think that it's entirely inappropriate to extract that much from the donations.

He was a hotshot stock broker who would be making 10 times that. 0.8m isbarely respectful for him.

To me that speaks more about the wage disparity between normal folks and those working on Wall Street, etc. No one needs that much money, and someone willing to take such a pay cut yet still be well above the average only exposes that truth.

Re: Khan Academy requests for donations as their servers are at 250% normal load

#67
post #46
post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, truly terrible that non-profit organisations serving the common good should provide high salaries. Founder and employees should just go into banking, because those guys absolutely deserve their high pay. Imagine, just imagine a society, where doing non-profit could be a valid career option without a disadvantage in the income department. The horror.

Try arguing with less snark. Every comment like yours attacks the strawman that the CEO and employees should not get paid. Nobody is saying that. But I'm absolutely not going to donate anything while the CEO takes out over 800000 dollars in pay, and it looks distasteful to me to go around begging for donations.

I hold the position represented by Dan Palotta in this Ted Talk: https://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pallotta_the_way_we_think_abou...

There is nothing distasteful about non-profit CEOs wanting high pay. We're speaking about the founder of something that has and is helping millions of people around the world with arguably one of the most difficult and important educational needs. Khan Academy wouldn't be here without Khan himself and the world would be lesser for it. I see absolutely no reason why the CEO of such an organizations shouldn't paid in the same manner as for-profits.

I'm snarky, because the implied notion of "people doing good instead of chasing profits don't deserve the same pay/good life" is nothing short of crazy to me.

Re: Khan Academy requests for donations as their servers are at 250% normal load

#68
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Jimmy Wales takes $0. I know they're not in the same situation, but even half that salary provides an extravagant lifestyle. I don't think he should be poor, I just think that if he's asking people to give up their money to pay him to do what he's doing, than he should be more frugal with the money he's asking for

He may ask for the money, you may consider his salary and decide not to donate and everybody goes his way. The comments here smell like there is a lot of acute jealousy floating around...

I don't think its jealousy. Millions of people became unemployed in the last 2-3 weeks, so it feels disingenuous to ask for money when he's making $800k when people are living off their savings.

It might be better to donate to a local school, food bank, or neighbors who are having a hard time instead.

Re: Khan Academy requests for donations as their servers are at 250% normal load

#69
post #37
post #27

(Replying to a trollish comment, but don't want to push it to the top). There was a comment about the salary that CEO Sal Khan takes, with is over $800,0000 per year. I think Khan Academy is fantastic, and was going to donate until I saw this figure (verified). I think that it's entirely inappropriate to extract that much from the donations.

Yes, truly terrible that non-profit organisations serving the common good should provide high salaries. Founder and employees should just go into banking, because those guys absolutely deserve their high pay. Imagine, just imagine a society, where doing non-profit could be a valid career option without a disadvantage in the income department. The horror.

But Khan Academy is a non-profit. In a business, the relationships between various parties are structured in a locally rational manner. When someone offers $1000 to a business they expect value back.

Khan Academy is soliciting donations, an avenue of human interaction which asks us to suspend this local rationality and instead transact on hope and trust. That's the difference to me between a business transaction and a donation.

Re: Khan Academy requests for donations as their servers are at 250% normal load

#70
post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you not the one trolling? So will the figure be less of it's he is doing the same work for a company?

Why run KA as a non-profit at all then? If you run something for the common good, you extract whatever you need to live and to run the thing — not $800k. At least, that's what I would do if I ran a non-profit, I would take only the money I need to live/perform my duties in the upkeep of the service. Which would not be anywhere near $800k.

Well, sadly NGO are just financial investment types for people like that, they see they can get away with no IRS and donations and go for it...
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