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Wikipedia is not short on cash

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Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#171

Post by Arkhaine_kupo »

dm319 wrote: post #151
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…

Be wary of the cogs grinding in the background that can lead to an article like this hitting popularity. There are many people with axes to grind with wikipedia - disagreements with the way certain topics are represented, and the way wikipedia has become a huge resource for information and news is not good news for everyone. I spend way more money on entertainment being piped into my TV, or deliveries happening a day…

> There are many people with axes to grind with wikipedia

Check the wikipedia page for the author of the article, he has been against wikipedia for 20 years now. Got his job in the Daily Telegraph by insulting Google and wikipedia repeatedly about how woke they are.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#172

Post by shkkmo »

KennyBlanken wrote: post #126
phpisthebest wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

That twitter thread is garbage start to finish. It starts with 'wikipedia started out in a basement on a shoestring, so clearly all the millions spent two decades later is being pissed into the wind', which is absurd. ...then attacks SERCH claiming they've done nothing but release 'youtube videos with 50 views', attacks them for not having produced any within the last year (maybe their grant ended?) when if one googl…

Yet the point overall of that twitter thread seems valid to me.

If widipedia is asking me to donate to support it, but most of the money isn't going to support wikipedia, then that is a bit deceptive. It's especially deceptive when that money isn't just going to the wikimedia foundation's other projects, but as grants to a variety of other organizations that have very different missions.

I think much of the criticism of SeRCH is valid. Their "signature program" hasn't released a video in over 5 years and none ever got over a thousand views. The unclearly related "Vanguard Stem" (I think it is a parent or partner organization) hasn't put out video in over a year. To be clear, a quick google isn't enough to write this organization off, but it did fail to find any information that made SeRCH seem like a legit organization to fund.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#173

Post by cxr »

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…

> I donate to Wikipedia.

Have you? Wikipedia doesn't accept money. Wikimedia does, though.

> I do not feel outraged that they use whatever persuasive tactics that they use - this is necessary in the modern world.

Necessary how? For what?

I donate to Wikipedia—as a Wikipedian. I've contributed a bunch of time editing content and doing lots of gnomish things to create value so that Wikipedia is a "great service". Millions of others have, too. But neither I nor any of the other people have anything to do with your donations.

Don't misunderstand: this is not a call-to-action for revenue sharing in the vein of the articles constantly appearing about the sustainability of FOSS; I'm not saying "give us a cut". What I am saying is that the Wikimedia fundraising tactics are thoroughly unnecessary to the actual production costs of Wikipedia that Wikimedia is responsible for.

Am I outraged? No. Do I recognize what WMF is doing as borderline slimy? Yes.

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Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#174

Post by nerdponx »

akolbe wrote: post #6

Note that the fundraising banners are currently only shown to a small percentage of readers – these are the October pre-tests : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Village_pump_(WMF)#W... The actual fundraiser will come at the end of the year, when the banners will follow everyone visiting Wikipedia around for over a month (29th of November – 31st of December). https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising#Current_…

I assume the small % of readers are also heavy users who don't make edits, like me. And honestly I would be thrilled to donate many many times if it wasn't for their ridiculous messaging. It's like Mozilla, stop spending my donation money on stupid doomed-to-fail projects and then I'll donate more.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#175

Post by cxr »

shadowgovt wrote: post #169
cxr wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they were running ads that said, "Hey we sort of have the money we need to keep doing this for a while, but you can give us some more money if you want to help", then we wouldn't be having this conversation. Wikipedia's current ads are both misleading and more intrusive than ever. 550 employees is huge, especially for an organization that doesn't even pay those employees to create and edit the content on the site…

If they were running ads like that, they wouldn't make any money. The psychology of fundraising is extremely well researched.

> If they were running ads like that, they wouldn't make any money.

Bullshit.

To repeat: the ads today are more misleading and more intrusive than ever. In years past there were ads that were unlike the ones used today. (People complained about them, but I was not among them.) Those ads were successful. There's no evidence to argue that they wouldn't be successful today, too.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#176

Post by Arkhaine_kupo »

phpisthebest wrote: post #102
rany_ wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get the outrage either. It's almost like people want Wikipedia to be barely scrapping by which isn't good. Having some money in your reserves is fine.

I want Wikimedia, and Wikipedia to be a Neutral historian of world data and events, to preserve facts and promote the free access of those facts to everyone in the world. They have strayed far far far far far from that goal

1) Is there a neutral historian version of world events?

2) Who chooses which facts show up, or how do we know if certain critical facts are missing?

3) In what way are they strayed far away from it?

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#177

Post by phpisthebest »

akolbe wrote: post #165
KennyBlanken wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that you didn't verify, even slightly, anything that tweet-thread author said. Either that, or like the author, you agree with their claim that grant money going to journalists who are people of color is 'furthering the inescapable American culture war.' Jeez, how dare those black people engage in journalism that isn't about white culture. They're declaring war on American (whi…

I agree, in part. That Twitter thread starts of really well but jumps the shark right towards the end.

Only if you read it in the most uncharitable way, and ignore the very real aspects of the "Culture War" around things like CRT, Anti-Racism, DEI, ESG, etc that have very real political and partisan aspects to them. Often intersecting with the very concept of what role government should play in people's life, what authority government should have, and how government should regulate both behavior and economies

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#178

Post by philipwhiuk »

EdwardDiego wrote: post #104
revolutukr wrote: post #9

I've never been offered a higher salary than I was offered by wikimedia. I turned it down because their corporate culture is helllla creepy. I'm a private guy, and they expect everybody in the company to be somewhat public figures, down to the recruiters and office managers.

So, the culture wasn't a good fit for you. That's fair. But "hel×4a creepy"? That feels like it's, just, you know, your opinion man.

I guess he missed the site rule saying you couldn't share your opinion.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#179

Post by andrewstuart »

andrejguran wrote: post #160
bjourne wrote: post #156

> Top tier managers earn between $300,000 and $400,000 a year, and dozens are employed exclusively on fund-raising. Can someone corroborate this claim? Cause any way you look at it, these salaries are unethical for a non-profit organisation.

What is an ethical salary for a non-profit organisation?

Apparently not for profits are obligated to pay under market to be ethical. Not something I'd heard of.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#180

Post by jmyeet »

Tepix wrote: post #118
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.

Mozilla is a great comparison. Compare how CEO pay goes up while Firefox users are down 85% [1].

The Red Cross has also been mired in controversy (eg [2]). Eventually such organizations just seem to collapse under the weight of their bloat and have very little effective spending on the things they fund raise off.

I'm also reminded of Yes, Prime Minister [3].

[1]: https://calpaterson.com/mozilla.html

[2]: https://www.propublica.org/article/disturbing-things-about-t...

[3]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ke9ec_Ua3x0

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