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Wikipedia is not short on cash

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Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#401

Post by akolbe »

shadowgovt wrote: post #309
cxr wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is plenty of evidence[...] that whatever they're doing now works better than what they were doing in the past. You just moved the goalposts. (In this case, moved them such that your "argument" is just restating the substance of the complaint.) Wikimedia is bringing in a lot more money doing this sort of thing. That's well understood—by all, i.e., those on both sides of the issue. Your job is not to defend the…

I thought "any" would be understood to be rhetorical exaggeration; my apologies. My actual position I've posited is an org loses support of the hacker community when it becomes successful even if nothing about what it's doing fundamentally changes. If their ads are different now, it's because they refined their approach; the goal was always to get people to give them money to be used as they saw fit.

The banners have become more intrusive and obnoxious as the organisation has become richer. Ten years ago, they were quite mild by comparison. You wouldn't get ten reminders, the banners didn't cover your entire screen, and they didn't beseech you not to scroll away.

A couple of years ago a Wikimedia Foundation fundraising report explained why that "Don't scroll away" phrase was added:

------------

“Don’t Scroll Away”

A simple, yet effective phrase that we were surprised to see resonate with readers worldwide was simply asking readers not to “scroll away” from or “scroll past” the fundraising message in the banner. We believe that addressing the context in which people donate helps improve the donation rate.

------------

Quoted from this report: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising/2019-20_Report

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#402

Post by Ensorceled »

Blikkentrekker wrote: post #395
Ensorceled wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When they flung some banner about soliciting more female contributors in my face which reeked of Americana it was the last straw. What was this ad that was so objectionable?

Mostly because I'm tired of these U.S.A. “diversity” efforts which come down to “more persons from the U.S.A.” overlooking most of the world. That they apparently think gender defines perspectives more than ethnicity and cultural background is the problem. Apparently they can make an effort towards gender but not toward the issue that plagues English-Language Wikipedia that only English-language sources are used in t…

Wikipedia definitely has a gender problem. And a racial problem. And numerous cultural problems.

That they decided to highlight the gender problem first doesn't mean that Wikipedia thinks the other problems are ok as is.

Someone having different priorities for fixing problems is not necessarily your enemy.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#403

Post by mint2 »

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…

It’s a free service with no advertising and people don’t like that it asked them for money a few weeks out of the year.

If they listen to the radio NPR pledge drives must irritate them to the point of flames coming out their ears.

Or if they read free newspapers like the guardian online they must loath it as much as Wikipedia, or more because it doesn’t just do ask a few weeks out of the year.

No one is forced to use Wikipedia. If Being occasionally asked to chip in is too much to bear then don’t use it.

I’ll confess I’m not totally enthused by the way they frame it, but I’ve used it for decades so I have donated one time. I mean it’s free and useful and I’d feel cheap if I use something for decades and never chip in

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#404

Post by naasking »

Arkhaine_kupo wrote: post #390
naasking wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 3) In what way are they strayed far away from it? Even if you agree with the spirit of these grants, I'm sure this is not what people thought they were funding when they donated to Wikipedia: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_Equity_Fund#Grant_... Edit: consider spending on the above vs. hiring more people to translate some of the 6.5 million English articles to other languages that typically number only ~1…

> I'm sure this is not what people thought they were funding when they donated to Wikipedia I do not think your argument follows. Wikipedia as a whole is untrustworthy because at one point they donated 1 million bucks divided between 5 NGOs through their fundation? It would be like arguing that Exxon has strayed far far far away from their mission because they donated 20 million to the Amazon conservation. Exxon is s…

Firstly, you asked how they strayed far from their goal of being a "neutral historian of world events", at least in idealistic terms. Those grants are specifically funding activism which many would argue is not neutral, so your question has been answered.

Secondly, Exxon is not a charitable organization so you're drawing a false equivalency. Wikimedia is asking for donations with ads that suggest donating is about keeping Wikipedia running. Most people donating then arguably think they're keeping Wikipedia running and/or expanding its usefulness, such as with translations. I think most people would be quite surprised to see some of that money going to activist DEI initiatives that many would consider to be far from the goal of increasing Wikipedia's utility.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#405

Post by akolbe »

jevgeni wrote: post #352
sokoloff wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Read the donation page and see if you feel the same way: https://donate.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Landi... We ask you, humbly, to help. We'll get straight to the point: Today we ask you to defend Wikipedia's independence. We're a non-profit that depends on donations to stay online and thriving, but 98% of our readers don't give; they simply look the other way. If everyone who reads Wikipedia gave just a…

Yes, it's in a whiny tone. The fact that it will go down is your interpretation. An alternative interpretation could be "98% of people get asymmetric value out of Wikipedia, please make it less asymmetric". In fact, if they stop begging, what percentage of their users will contribute? Will it remain at 2%?

You mean, what percentage of users will pay for using a website advertised as "The Free Encyclopedia", written by unpaid volunteers?

Just saying. If the WMF were working flat out on serving the volunteer community it would be a different matter. But it's taken on a life of its own, with Wikipedia as its cash cow.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#406

Post by Arkhaine_kupo »

naasking wrote: post #404
Arkhaine_kupo wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm sure this is not what people thought they were funding when they donated to Wikipedia I do not think your argument follows. Wikipedia as a whole is untrustworthy because at one point they donated 1 million bucks divided between 5 NGOs through their fundation? It would be like arguing that Exxon has strayed far far far away from their mission because they donated 20 million to the Amazon conservation. Exxon is s…

Firstly, you asked how they strayed far from their goal of being a "neutral historian of world events", at least in idealistic terms. Those grants are specifically funding activism which many would argue is not neutral, so your question has been answered. Secondly, Exxon is not a charitable organization so you're drawing a false equivalency. Wikimedia is asking for donations with ads that suggest donating is about ke…

> you asked how they strayed far from their goal of being a "neutral historian of world events",

I asked him how they strayed far far far away from being free, neutral and preserving facts.

> Those grants are specifically funding activism which many would argue is not neutral, so your question has been answered.

this does not follow again. I mean first of all, free and preserving facts would be fulfilled so the only part that could be compromised as you said is neutrality. But their grants affect future events not the ones recorded and wikimedia aren't even the people writting the text on wikipedia, they are unpaid moderators. So you would have to prove how the parent company donating to some company can affect volunteers in a way so blatant they would stray "far far far away" from those three missions.

> Exxon is not a charitable organization so you're drawing a false equivalency.

how so? The non voting shareholders of exxon and the donators in wikimedia have the same role, financing the operation.

> I think most people would be quite surprised to see some of that money going to activist DEI initiatives that many would consider to be far from the goal of increasing Wikipedia's utility.

Sure, but that is still not proof of them not being neutral though. You are implying things and letting people read between the lines but even if you try and prove ideological bias in the grants given, there is not logical throughline into the unpaid moderation of the content of the pages.

At most you could argue they betrayed the trust of donors by using those donations for paying for things beyond the server costs of wikipedia. Which is fair, but from that to calling their mission compromised seems a leap a tad far

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#407

Post by jerf »

gibolt wrote: post #342
otherme123 wrote: post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The banner shown in the article has a subtle tone of demise: if you don't donate, Wikipedia itself stops being independent, could not thrive, could not give reliable or independent info. And then the money is primarily spent in things other than Wikipedia. They never state or at least insinuate where the money go.

This sounds like the exact CTA of countless YouTubers asking for Patreon support. No level of coffers or ever increasing support changes their ask. (which to me is ok)

Patreon supporters generally know where their money is going: Straight into the YouTuber's (or whatever) pocket. That's the goal of the contributor and there's generally no particular deception on the YouTuber's part either. I want to give them $5 even if they already have a lot of other $5, because that's the value I'm getting or whatever.

I agree with others that Wikipedia very carefully makes it sound like they've got a sob story where if you don't donate they're going to shut down, so they probably get a lot of donations made with the belief that they're funding Wikipedia, but instead it gets shunted out to something else. Maybe something the donor is OK with, but maybe something not.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#408

Post by jasonlotito »

blululu wrote: post #343
jasonlotito wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://wikimediafoundation.org/ How is this misleading? They provide an incredibly large amount of information. And more information can be found here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation#Disputes

There are laws against fine print for a reason. The front page pop up ad tells a different story than a stack of text heavy articles that require no small amount of technical expertise to figure out.

They haven't broken any laws. And "text heavy articles" are bad now? They share this information, and it's very public.

Prove to me they are lying. Nothing on their donation page seems to be a lie.

Your comment on the other hand is very misleading.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#409

Post by jasonlotito »

Macha wrote: post #367
shadowgovt wrote: post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Elsewhere" in this case is the FAQ link at the bottom of the donation page. If a person has questions, that's what an FAQ is for. Calls to action are kept intentionally short because the research on human psychology is clear: every additional sentence beyond the first few decreases the odds of a conversion (that's adspeak for "closing the deal").

Yes, this is also why it lies, lying to make the situation seem more ominous also increases the odds of a conversion. But effectiveness doesn't imply ethicality, so "but it's effective" is not a defense against criticism of ethics.

In that case, your comment is a lie, and I can freely dismiss it.

Re: Wikipedia is not short on cash

#410

Post by SanjayMehta »

bensonn wrote: post #396
SanjayMehta wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> very high standards Maybe in the pure STEM subsections but anything to do with humanities is highly subjective and biased. Even in the hard sciences I find that Wikipedia is a just good starting point: scan the references for the real material. It helps if you have access to real libraries, both physical and digital. Personally I stopped donating to them when I discovered how difficult it was to correct errors in l…

Wikipedia being a starting point is one of my favorite things about it. I really like that all their sources are cited and linked to. It always amazes me that news organizations don't cite their sources or have links to the original source. On that same note, could that be why your family history gets rolled back? No doubt it would be frustrating to have a change you know is real get rolled back but it would make sen…

The first time the excuse was some gibberish about "primary sources."

The second time was something more esoteric, which I can't remember.

Then Wikipedia deleted my account during some transition and I lost interest in the whole thing.

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