Should you donate to the Wikimedia Foundation? (2015)
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Should you donate to the Wikimedia Foundation? (2015)
1–10 of 76 posts
Re: Should you donate to the Wikimedia Foundation? (2015)
#2It should be noted that WMF had a significant management shake up since then. The lila era management is basically all gone.
However im glad that this is the article posted, and not the rediculous "cancer" article that compares amount spent on servers when the site was smaller, slow and constantly going down to the modern day site when its fast, stable and a bigger site.
[Disclaimer: used to work for wmf. Do not anymore. My opinions are solely my own]
Edit: i initially just read the intro to the article. The article is long and says a lot more things as well other than just lila/knowledge engine.
Re: Should you donate to the Wikimedia Foundation? (2015)
#3It should be noted that WMF had a significant management shake up since then. The lila era management is basically all gone. However im glad that this is the article posted, and not the rediculous "cancer" article that compares amount spent on servers when the site was smaller, slow and constantly going down to the modern day site when its fast, stable and a bigger site. [Disclaimer: used to work for wmf. Do not anym…
What was the work culture like inside of wmf?
Gender balanced?
Cooperative?
I'm curious because my experience of editing, and that of other people I heard from at an editor meet up, was that the culture is heavily male dominated, and unnecessarily adversarial in a bullying way. That said, the CEO at the time (2007 - 2014), Sue Gardner, seemed enlightened, progressive, smart and highly capable.
Re: Should you donate to the Wikimedia Foundation? (2015)
#4It should be noted that WMF had a significant management shake up since then. The lila era management is basically all gone. However im glad that this is the article posted, and not the rediculous "cancer" article that compares amount spent on servers when the site was smaller, slow and constantly going down to the modern day site when its fast, stable and a bigger site. [Disclaimer: used to work for wmf. Do not anym…
Did someone think that the higher server bill meant you guys were embezzling money?
Re: Should you donate to the Wikimedia Foundation? (2015)
#5It should be noted that WMF had a significant management shake up since then. The lila era management is basically all gone. However im glad that this is the article posted, and not the rediculous "cancer" article that compares amount spent on servers when the site was smaller, slow and constantly going down to the modern day site when its fast, stable and a bigger site. [Disclaimer: used to work for wmf. Do not anym…
People should donate to where they think it will do the most good. No NGO is perfect.
[ Same disclaimer :-) ]
Re: Should you donate to the Wikimedia Foundation? (2015)
#6Honestly I read through the article and wasn’t a fan of the authors points. Eg wiki only has four years of excess reserves - compare that to many other foundations and endowments and that number looks low. And he thinks its okay for them to get more money from larger donors vs their attempt at targetting small individual donations which allow wikipedia to maintain neutrality. Really don’t know why he made that argument...
Re: Should you donate to the Wikimedia Foundation? (2015)
#7It should be noted that WMF had a significant management shake up since then. The lila era management is basically all gone. However im glad that this is the article posted, and not the rediculous "cancer" article that compares amount spent on servers when the site was smaller, slow and constantly going down to the modern day site when its fast, stable and a bigger site. [Disclaimer: used to work for wmf. Do not anym…
Did someone think that the higher server bill meant you guys were embezzling money?
The article claimed that they were wasting money on high paid executives and software that nobody used, meanwhile the pages are maintained by unpaid volunteers. I don't know if it's true or not, but I've also never donated money to them, so I don't really have a dog in the fight.
Re: Should you donate to the Wikimedia Foundation? (2015)
#8It should be noted that WMF had a significant management shake up since then. The lila era management is basically all gone. However im glad that this is the article posted, and not the rediculous "cancer" article that compares amount spent on servers when the site was smaller, slow and constantly going down to the modern day site when its fast, stable and a bigger site. [Disclaimer: used to work for wmf. Do not anym…
What was the work culture like inside of wmf? Gender balanced? Cooperative? I'm curious because my experience of editing, and that of other people I heard from at an editor meet up, was that the culture is heavily male dominated, and unnecessarily adversarial in a bullying way. That said, the CEO at the time (2007 - 2014), Sue Gardner, seemed enlightened, progressive, smart and highly capable.
. Is the non profit to gate people from editing if arbitrary diversity requirements aren't met?
The best part about Wikipedia is that anyone can edit it, anyone can run it, and nobody can lock up its content (for whatever reason). Look no further to Mozilla to see what happens when a non profit fails to meet it's mandate and is stuck with "peacocks" (folks who prioritize status or signaling > substance) instead of practitioners.
Re: Should you donate to the Wikimedia Foundation? (2015)
#9I donate to Wikipedia every year because I use the product almost every day, and I consider it paying for a good product, not a donation.
They happen to be set up as a foundation where I can look at their financials, but in my mind I treat them more like a private company.
If they want to waste my money then so be it. I pay what I think is a fair price for the amount of value I get from the product.
Re: Should you donate to the Wikimedia Foundation? (2015)
#10It should be noted that WMF had a significant management shake up since then. The lila era management is basically all gone. However im glad that this is the article posted, and not the rediculous "cancer" article that compares amount spent on servers when the site was smaller, slow and constantly going down to the modern day site when its fast, stable and a bigger site. [Disclaimer: used to work for wmf. Do not anym…
It's more than a bit ironic that people complain about the knowledge engine initiative, when Wikidata is now one of the more successful Wikimedia projects and pretty much the same thing.