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Wikipedia is not short on cash

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Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#111

Post by Karunamon »

EdwardDiego wrote: post #96
akolbe wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Costs don't increase by a factor of 50 in ten years. Note I made the same argument in Wikipedia's community newspaper: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2... Read the comments from Wikipedians underneath. No one claimed it was a dishonest argument to make.

They don't? Why not? Have the unique users peaked? Are people accessing it less? I'm pretty happy to wager real money that Wikipedia has had to scale significantly in the last ten years. But, hey, if you've got evidence to the contrary, I'll happily read it.

No doubt they have had to scale significantly.

… But have they had to scale to a degree commensurate with the amount of money they are spending? Absolutely not. The "Wikipedia has cancer" article makes that point handily.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#112

Post by scandox »

rippercushions wrote: post #74
scandox wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their communications about donations are just awful. As long as I get these sappy, puppy-dog-eyes appeals I will never donate to them again.

Yeah man, and how dare the Red Cross manipulate people with pictures of starving children in their famine relief ads? A graph showing the intersection between available calories trending down and required calories staying constant would land so much better on HN.

Wikipedia isn't a human in desperate plight. That's kind of the point I'm making.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#113

Post by akolbe »

_glsb wrote: post #55
akolbe wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue is that they make it sound like they are struggling to have enough money to keep Wikipedia running when they are actually wealthier than ever before. The whole premise of Wikipedia (or aspiration, at least, and yes, not always fulfilled ...) is that people should have information so they can't be manipulated. It kind of sucks to see the very organisation hosting the site do the opposite, don't you think?

They don't though. The banner has a whiny tone, but never do they say that they are struggling to keep the site up.

I agree with the other replies.

Also, last year, the then-Wikimedia CEO Katherine Maher was on The Daily Show with Trevor Noah. (The wife of the WMF’s PR consultant, the Clinton Foundation’s Craig Minassian, works on the show as a producer.)

In the interview, Noah put it to Maher that the downside of being a non-profit is that “you often struggle to have enough money to keep Wikipedia up and running. So, two parts. One, is that true and how does it affect you, and then, two, why would you make this thing if it’s not going to make you money?”

Maher’s cheerful answer made no reference to the WMF’s vast money reserves, but emphasised that Wikipedia’s lack of ads was responsible for the site being so trusted today.

https://www.dailydot.com/debug/wikipedia-endownemnt-fundrais...

If you are in the US, you can view the interview clip here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKdn1s9Sjfo&t=270s

If you're in the UK or Europe, use a VPN (Opera e.g. has got one built in).

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#114

Post by EdwardDiego »

ghusto wrote: post #59
mgamache wrote: post #42

It’s not just they are flush with cash. It’s they are funding and fanning the culture war despite claiming to be a neutral party. Some of their funds are being routed to political entities that are not neutral. Edit: here’s a link to a thread about what I mean: https://twitter.com/echetus/status/1579776106034757633?s=46&...

This. I stopped donating when I saw how politicised they were. People are people, and will have opinions about things. People of a kind will naturally group together. This is all fine, but it becomes a problem when one of the things that make what you produce worthwhile is neutrality, and you can't keep your politics in your pants.

I don't really believe these claims of "Wokepedia", because no-one making these claims has presented actual evidence.

I'm sure you have some though, otherwise commenting as you did would mean you'd be as guilty of "not keeping your politics in your pants" as you accuse Wikipedia of being.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#115

Post by weberer »

phpisthebest wrote: post #52
rippercushions wrote: post #21

Eh. If you don't want to donate, don't, but I don't quite get the outrage here. The Wikimedia Foundation is still small as far as charities go and is visibly making Wikipedia better: the new UI is a breath of fresh air, and given the insane complexity of MediaWiki markup, the visual editor is a piece of unimaginable technical wizardry. Wiktionary is an unheralded gem and even Wikidata is starting to be genuinely usef…

In some ways Charity Navigator is like the BBB, and people need to take those ratings with a grain of salt. What is not said here, but I think it was started this article there was a break-down on Twitter [2] recently where someone broke down the grants Wikimedia Foundation gives to other charities, A lot of Wikimedia has become advocacy for social issues not the spread of free information. Some of those Social issue…

>In the videos they discuss issues in science like objectivity (they're against it) and bias (they're in favour).

Its a shame so much money is being funneled to these groups since that's exactly the opposite goal of most donators to Wikipedia.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#116

Post by bombcar »

phpisthebest wrote: post #86
navaati wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hey, what is "the BBB" here ?

BBB == Better Business Bureau a private organization in the US that "rates" business based on certain factors and customer complaints. It is often confused with having some kind of governmental authority, approval, or validity when in reality they just a non-profit trade organization. Very similar to charity navigator but rating for-profit businesses

And it can become a bit of a scam where if you’re a “paying member” of the BBB you can “respond” to complaints and they disappear.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#117

Post by emptyfile »

rippercushions wrote: post #74
scandox wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their communications about donations are just awful. As long as I get these sappy, puppy-dog-eyes appeals I will never donate to them again.

Yeah man, and how dare the Red Cross manipulate people with pictures of starving children in their famine relief ads? A graph showing the intersection between available calories trending down and required calories staying constant would land so much better on HN.

You might be confused, we're talking about Wikipedia not the Red Cross.

Wikipedia doesn't help starving children in any way.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#118

Post by Tepix »

jmyeet wrote: post #99

Let's look at the numbers and compare the 2020-2021 (the latest audited results) financial statements [1] to 2010-2011 [2]. All of this is publicly available as it is for any 501(c)(3) non-profit. Some selected numbers: 2021 2011 Current Assets 208,678,345 20,784,992 Donations 153,096,642 23,020,127 Salaries 67,857,676 7,312,120 Internet Hosting 2,384,439 1,799,943 So the WMF has ballooned in staff. I'm reminded of c…

I agree that it feels a bit like Mozilla: An organization that got too much money and tries to figure out what to do with it.

Mozilla ended up wasting an insane amount of money on things other than Firefox.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#119

Post by katzeilla »

andrewstuart wrote: post #61

Is this the same person who every now and then appears on HN utterly outraged by Wikipedia's fundraising? I donate to Wikipedia. And I am glad they have lots of money. I do not feel outraged about it, I feel happy about it. I do not feel outraged that they use whatever persuasive tactics that they use - this is necessary in the modern world. Wikipedia is a great service, it should be valued. They should not always be…

> this is necessary in the modern world.

Could you elaborate on that? I really don't want to believe this is true, WMF is clearly being manipulative and a world where being manipulative is necessary sounds...extremely dystopian.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#120

Post by lupire »

rippercushions wrote: post #21

Eh. If you don't want to donate, don't, but I don't quite get the outrage here. The Wikimedia Foundation is still small as far as charities go and is visibly making Wikipedia better: the new UI is a breath of fresh air, and given the insane complexity of MediaWiki markup, the visual editor is a piece of unimaginable technical wizardry. Wiktionary is an unheralded gem and even Wikidata is starting to be genuinely usef…

Charity Navigator is very narrow. They check that paperwork is up to date and that fundraising expenses are low. They don't check for effectiveness or if "program spending" is doing anything.

A low CN rating is bad, but a high CN rating isn't good.

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