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Wikipedia is not short on cash

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Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#231

Post by Turing_Machine »

klelatti wrote: post #217
Turing_Machine wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If he's presenting a factual summary of what's going on, his "motivations" are irrelevant. If he's not presenting a factual summary of what's going on, his "motivations" are likewise irrelevant. If you can refute his claims, by all means do so, but vague ad hominems don't impress me.

Not sure why accurately reporting his track record of attacking Wikimedia with a clear - and self admitted - right wing bias is a 'vague ad hominem'.

His "track record" has nothing to do with whether his claims are true, either.

Either his claims are factual, or they aren't.

If they are not factual, they should be refuted, but appealing to his "motivations" or "track record" is not a refutation. It is an ad hominem attack, i.e., a logical fallacy.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#232

Post by klelatti »

CoastalCoder wrote: post #223
klelatti wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's relevant because he's not really disclosing his motivations. He clearly has other reasons for disliking wikipedia but he fails to disclose them in this article.

I think the GP's point is that the motivations aren't relevant. Nothing in our discussion hinges on, e.g., the author's trustworthiness.

So when an oil company writes a report on the viability of solar power then that doesn't affect how we should view the report?

His motivation absolutely affects how he reports on this issue. He's not a neutral observer and so he picks and chooses which facts he includes and puts his own spin around the issues.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#233

Post by concordDance »

civilized wrote: post #211
apexalpha wrote: post #95

Man, Wikipedia is like the best website I can think of. No joke. No silly 25MB framework, no hype, no popup banners (except the donation), no ads, no tracking, doesn't ask to sign up when I scroll down, no paywall... Just doing it's thing providing all the world with all knowledge for free, in a lot of languages. These managers can earn $4 million for all I care. Hell, I work for a mid-sized company that doesn't even…

Agreed. So let's take a look at why the columnist, Andrew Orlowski, has such a problem with Wikipedia. It's not hard to find out why - it's on Wikipedia [1]. With direct links to Orlowski's own work, of course, should anyone make unfounded accusations of bias. > "It's the Khmer Rouge in diapers," observes one regular Register reader, which seems as good a description as any to us. https://www.theregister.com/2004/09/…

> With all claims backed by citations of course, should anyone make unfounded accusations of bias.

Note that citations don't make bias impossible or claims true, they just make it easier to decide whether to trust information. E.g. If I cite the BBC in my statement and you trust the BBC you're more likely to trust my statement.

A lot of right wingers believe that most news sources (and particularly a lot of the ones the wikipedian collective thinks of as reliable) are grossly misleading or lying, so they won't be very convinced by, say, a Vogue citation.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#234

Post by Levitz »

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.

It's not about usage going up. It's about the cost of usage going up v the cost of operations going down.

As an example, if we are to trust this site (https://jcmit.net/diskprice.htm), a 2TB HDD was sold for about 160 dollars in 2012. You can purchase 8TB for 130 dollars now.

From this wikipedia article (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Statistics) we can see the amount of English articles has about doubled since then. Chances are that storage costs have not only not gone up, they have gone down.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#235

Post by cxr »

peter_retief wrote: post #78

I thought they were struggling and donated even though I was struggling at the time. It feels a bit sordid and dishonest how they go about getting money.

It's not just you.

> While I am a very low income Senior [ live in Gov't. H.U.D. Apt.], I do still try to contribute to certain causes. Wikipedia is 1 such Group. I believe that I have given Wikipedia small donations for about 3 years now. While I do not have much to give, It is important that You know we appreciate the great work you undertake.

> I do, respectfully, need to point out 1 "process" that Wikipedia implements that "disturbs/upsets" me. I just, accidentally, got rolled over to Wikipedia on a matter I am researcing. The Wikipedia "overlay" writing asking for Donations said this was 4th time You have asked me.

> THAT "NOTICE" MADE ME FEEL VERY "GUILTY/BAD"....... Right now, I have $18.00 in my bank account ! That's It !

> Soon, I will get my only source of Income [ a monthly Social Security Check] & will try to make a donation at that time.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Help_desk/Archives/2...>

Previously: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32713978>

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#236

Post by blagie »

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…

Having worked at non-profits a lot, more money doesn't make them better. It brings in exactly the wrong sort of people.

I would never donate to the university I went to, because the endowment is too !@#$$ big. It's more than enough to sustain itself, and the remainder goes into wacky financial schemes which hurt the whole organization.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#237

Post by concordDance »

i_like_apis wrote: post #196

I give money to Wikipedia occasionally and will gladly continue, thanks. Wikimedia makes the world a much better world place. They should have the funds to do whatever they want. You’re mad at them for some reason because they have 400 mil? That’s not even half a billion. I want a world where the Wikimedia foundation is a multi-billion dollar entity.

Note that wikipedia is 99.9% the volunteers selflessly putting in their time, not the 0.1% who are getting your money.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#238

Post by EdwardDiego »

philipwhiuk wrote: post #178
EdwardDiego wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

That's not what I was saying, but go hard.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#239

Post by klelatti »

Turing_Machine wrote: post #231
klelatti wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure why accurately reporting his track record of attacking Wikimedia with a clear - and self admitted - right wing bias is a 'vague ad hominem'.

His "track record" has nothing to do with whether his claims are true, either. Either his claims are factual, or they aren't. If they are not factual, they should be refuted, but appealing to his "motivations" or "track record" is not a refutation. It is an ad hominem attack, i.e., a logical fallacy.

No one has said it's a refutation but it's entirely relevant and not an ad hominem at all - unless you think that his record is something to be ashamed of?

As I said above:

> So when an oil company writes a report on the viability of solar power then that doesn't affect how we should view the report?

> His motivation absolutely affects how he reports on this issue. He's not a neutral observer and so he picks and chooses which facts he includes and puts his own spin around the issues.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#240

Post by criley2 »

kordlessagain wrote: post #189
LightG wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So. Marketing?

It is possible to raise interest in something without lying about it. Whether you will fully understand it or not is up to you.

This is loser logic. It's possible to play by self-imposed self-hindering rules, sure, but your competitors probably aren't. In business, you play the game that exists, not the game you want to exist. Politics is how you do the "game you want to exist" part.
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