Re: [Wikimedia-l] Most obnoxious banner yet

[Liam Wyatt]

*TL;DR summary: I don't want the discussion about fundraising principles to
be forgotten for another year until we do the whole thing again in 11
months... We need to finish the discussion about whether it is acceptable
for all other values to be made secondary to the goal of maximising
fundraising efficiency.*

Now that the 2014 Fundraising campaign has finished and which, according to
a WMF blogpost from a week ago, "surpassed our goal of $20 million"
(receiving donations from 2.5 million people in 4 weeks) [1], I hope that
the fundraising team has had the time to get some well-earned rest and
relaxation over the new-year period.

With that "busiest time of year" now over, but with all the discussions
still fresh in our mind, I was hoping that the Fundraising team or
Executive would have the time to respond to the various concerns that were
raised here (and elsewhere) about the theory and practice of WMF fundraising.
If responding here isn't appropriate, then at least over on Meta at [[Talk:
Fundraising Principles]] where a fair amount of detail has been compiled,
particularly by WMF Board of Trustees member SJ [2].

There were some practical/specific questions, including:
- why isn't fundraising using the same software to receive bug reports (
phabricator) as everyone else?
- why haven't the crowdsourced banner text suggestions been A/B tested?
- why were new banners shown to people who had chosen to dismiss previous
ones, and why were they allowed take up such a large proportion of the
screen/obscure content?
- has anyone responded to the Russian community yet to their polite and
important question?
[This is a non-exhaustive list, of course]

But there were also more fundamental/theoretical questions, including:
- what degree of 'urgency' is morally acceptable in a donation request,
especially when the financial situation of the WMF has never been
healthier/stable? (e.g. threatening phrases like "keep us online and
ad-free for another year")
- Is the practice of "finishing the fundraiser period as fast as possible
by any means" the correct interpretation of the the official fundraising
principle of "minimal disruption"?
- Is the official fundraising principle of "maximal participation" being
adhered to? That principle calls for "empowering individuals to
constructively contribute to direct messaging, public outreach..." Does the
WMF Board believe this has happened?
- Is the current "we don't like asking for money so just give it to us and
we'll stop annoying you" approach to fundraising (implied by the final
phrase in the final 2014 campaign email "Please help us forget fundraising and
get back to improving Wikipedia.") potentially damaging to the Wikimedia
brand value, even if it does raise the money in the short term? Lila said
that there has been "sentiment analysis" done about this, what was the
result?

-Liam

[1] http://blog.wikimedia
.org/2015/01/05/thank-you-for-keeping-knowledge-free-and-accessible/
[2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Fundraising_principles
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Most obnoxious banner yet

[Steven Zhang]

I've little to add to this thread than my personal point of view and take on 
how I would fundraise. 

I've been very involved in organisational work with Wikimedia Australia (the 
comments here are mine and mine alone) so haven't been logging on and editing 
as much as of late but continue to refer to Wikipedia daily. I found the 
fundraising banners (I actually first typed out "ads") intrusive, and they do 
follow you down the screen. I realise WMF needs to fundraise but I preferred 
the personal appeal from Brandon, GorillaWarfare and other users. It allowed 
readers to learn about the people that keep Wikipedia going and why they do it. 
I don't fundraise. But if we are trying to get people to donate to us I don't 
agree giant banners that nag them into donating or reminder emails that, when 
you boil it down, read along the lines of "zomg donate to us or we will have no 
money and have to put up ads"

I've never really spoken out about the Foundation and I don't really plan about 
continuing to do so. But this fundraiser bothered me and while this likely 
won't be read, I felt it should be said.

Steven Zhang
Sent from my iPhone

> On 12 Jan 2015, at 11:25 pm, Liam Wyatt  wrote:
> 
> *TL;DR summary: I don't want the discussion about fundraising principles to
> be forgotten for another year until we do the whole thing again in 11
> months... We need to finish the discussion about whether it is acceptable
> for all other values to be made secondary to the goal of maximising
> fundraising efficiency.*
> 
> Now that the 2014 Fundraising campaign has finished and which, according to
> a WMF blogpost from a week ago, "surpassed our goal of $20 million"
> (receiving donations from 2.5 million people in 4 weeks) [1], I hope that
> the fundraising team has had the time to get some well-earned rest and
> relaxation over the new-year period.
> 
> With that "busiest time of year" now over, but with all the discussions
> still fresh in our mind, I was hoping that the Fundraising team or
> Executive would have the time to respond to the various concerns that were
> raised here (and elsewhere) about the theory and practice of WMF fundraising.
> If responding here isn't appropriate, then at least over on Meta at [[Talk:
> Fundraising Principles]] where a fair amount of detail has been compiled,
> particularly by WMF Board of Trustees member SJ [2].
> 
> There were some practical/specific questions, including:
> - why isn't fundraising using the same software to receive bug reports (
> phabricator) as everyone else?
> - why haven't the crowdsourced banner text suggestions been A/B tested?
> - why were new banners shown to people who had chosen to dismiss previous
> ones, and why were they allowed take up such a large proportion of the
> screen/obscure content?
> - has anyone responded to the Russian community yet to their polite and
> important question?
> [This is a non-exhaustive list, of course]
> 
> But there were also more fundamental/theoretical questions, including:
> - what degree of 'urgency' is morally acceptable in a donation request,
> especially when the financial situation of the WMF has never been
> healthier/stable? (e.g. threatening phrases like "keep us online and
> ad-free for another year")
> - Is the practice of "finishing the fundraiser period as fast as possible
> by any means" the correct interpretation of the the official fundraising
> principle of "minimal disruption"?
> - Is the official fundraising principle of "maximal participation" being
> adhered to? That principle calls for "empowering individuals to
> constructively contribute to direct messaging, public outreach..." Does the
> WMF Board believe this has happened?
> - Is the current "we don't like asking for money so just give it to us and
> we'll stop annoying you" approach to fundraising (implied by the final
> phrase in the final 2014 campaign email "Please help us forget fundraising and
> get back to improving Wikipedia.") potentially damaging to the Wikimedia
> brand value, even if it does raise the money in the short term? Lila said
> that there has been "sentiment analysis" done about this, what was the
> result?
> 
> -Liam
> 
> [1] http://blog.wikimedia
> .org/2015/01/05/thank-you-for-keeping-knowledge-free-and-accessible/
> [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Fundraising_principles
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[Wikimedia-l] Fwd: [WikiEN-l] (Cross-post) METRO Wikipedia webcast on Reference and Citation today 1/12 at 2-3:15pm EST

[Pine W]

Forwarding in case anyone wants to tune in to this event live.

Pine
-- Forwarded message --
From: "Elias Friedman" 
Date: Jan 12, 2015 9:51 AM
Subject: [WikiEN-l] (Cross-post) METRO Wikipedia webcast on Reference and
Citation today 1/12 at 2-3:15pm EST
To: "English Wikipedia" , "Wikipedia mailing
list" 
Cc:

Cross-posting from the Wikimedia-NYC list for wider audience.

Sent from my Droid 4
Elias Friedman A.S., CCEMT-P
אליהו מתתיהו בן צבי
elipo...@gmail.com
"יְהִי אוֹר"
-- Forwarded message --
From: "Dorothy Howard" 
Date: Jan 12, 2015 12:20 PM
Subject: [Wikimedia-US-NYC-Discuss] METRO Wikipedia webcast on Reference
and Citation today 1/12 at 2-3:15pm EST
To: "Wikimedia New York City Discussion list" <
wikimedia-us-nyc-disc...@lists.wikimedia.org>, "New York City Wikimedians" <
wikimedia_...@lists.wikimedia.org>
Cc:

Dear All,



A reminder that today METRO is hosting a Wikipedia webcast on Reference and
Citation from 2-3:15pm EST with:

-  Andy Mabbett, Wikipedian-in-Residence atORCID
<
http://blog.scholasticahq.com/post/87810012013/interview-with-andy-mabbett-orcid-ambassador-and#.U_Jvc_ldV4U
>
(the
Open Researcher and Contributor ID, an authority control) and the Royal
Society of Chemistry
;

-  Jake Orlowitz and Patrick Earley of the Wikipedia Library
;

-  and Maximilian Klein, member of the “WikiProject Open
Access/Signaling OA-ness (Open Access)
<
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Open_Access/Signalling_OA-ness
>
."



To tune in, go to our event page right at 2pm to find the live link:
http://metro.org/events/562/ or visit METRO’s Youtube channel between
2:00pm and 3:15pm. The video will also be archived on Youtube after the
webcast finishes.

Thanks, and let me know if you have any questions!


Best wishes,


Dorothy Howard


--
Dorothy Howard, Wikipedian-in-Residence and Open Data Fellow
Metropolitan New York Library Council (METRO)
212.228.2320 x127



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[Wikimedia-l] March is WikiWomen's History Month

[Richard Ames]

 Forwarded Message 
Subject:March is WikiWomen's History Month
Date:   Mon, 12 Jan 2015 10:12:48 -0800
From:   Sarah Stierch 
To: wikimedia-l-ow...@lists.wikimedia.org

Hello! Can you please forward the following message to your mailing list
- thank you!

---

Hi everyone!

The 4th annual WikiWomen's History Month is in March, coinciding with
Women's History Month. This event is cross-cultural, international, and
multi-lingual.

Please start planning your events (offline and online) to contribute
content to Wikipedia and related Wikimedia websites about women's
history! You can post your events and find resources on how to implement
edit-a-thons and workshops here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiWomen's_History_Month

Any questions just let me know!

I look forward to your participation!

Sarah






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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Most obnoxious banner yet

[Andreas Kolbe]

>
> > On 12 Jan 2015, at 11:25 pm, Liam Wyatt  wrote:
> > Now that the 2014 Fundraising campaign has finished and which, according
> to
> > a WMF blogpost from a week ago, "surpassed our goal of $20 million"
>


According to the data provided at https://frdata.wikimedia.org/ the
Foundation seems to have taken $30.6 million over the period from December
2 2014 to December 31 2014.

This is $10.6 million more than the $20 million fundraising goal indicated
in the blog post. (At any rate, that's the sum I get; I'd welcome anyone
double-checking my math.)


> (receiving donations from 2.5 million people in 4 weeks) [1], I hope that
> > the fundraising team has had the time to get some well-earned rest and
> > relaxation over the new-year period.
>


> > But there were also more fundamental/theoretical questions, including:
>
> - what degree of 'urgency' is morally acceptable in a donation request,
> > especially when the financial situation of the WMF has never been
> > healthier/stable? (e.g. threatening phrases like "keep us online and
> > ad-free for another year")
>


This is my main concern too.



> > - Is the practice of "finishing the fundraiser period as fast as possible
> > by any means" the correct interpretation of the the official fundraising
> > principle of "minimal disruption"?
>


As for the fundraiser's duration, I believe the 2014 fundraiser ran for 30
days (December 2 to December 31, 2014). This is longer than last year, and
at any rate much longer than 2012, right?

Because according to https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_2013 –

"In 2012, we were able to shorten the fundraiser down to nine full days,
the shortest fundraiser we've had."

Andreas




> > - Is the official fundraising principle of "maximal participation" being
> > adhered to? That principle calls for "empowering individuals to
> > constructively contribute to direct messaging, public outreach..." Does
> the
> > WMF Board believe this has happened?
> > - Is the current "we don't like asking for money so just give it to us
> and
> > we'll stop annoying you" approach to fundraising (implied by the final
> > phrase in the final 2014 campaign email "Please help us forget
> fundraising and
> > get back to improving Wikipedia.") potentially damaging to the Wikimedia
> > brand value, even if it does raise the money in the short term? Lila said
> > that there has been "sentiment analysis" done about this, what was the
> > result?
> >
> > -Liam
> >
> > [1] http://blog.wikimedia
> > .org/2015/01/05/thank-you-for-keeping-knowledge-free-and-accessible/
> > [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Fundraising_principles
>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Most obnoxious banner yet

[Lilburne]

On 12/01/2015 20:59, Andreas Kolbe wrote:

As for the fundraiser's duration, I believe the 2014 fundraiser ran for 30
days (December 2 to December 31, 2014). This is longer than last year, and
at any rate much longer than 2012, right?



You need to get the most out of the Goose as it nears the end of its egg 
laying and

you switch to stuffing it for Foie gras.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Most obnoxious banner yet

[Risker]

On 12 January 2015 at 15:59, Andreas Kolbe  wrote:

> >
> > > On 12 Jan 2015, at 11:25 pm, Liam Wyatt  wrote:
> > > Now that the 2014 Fundraising campaign has finished and which,
> according
> > to
> > > a WMF blogpost from a week ago, "surpassed our goal of $20 million"
> >
>
>
> According to the data provided at https://frdata.wikimedia.org/ the
> Foundation seems to have taken $30.6 million over the period from December
> 2 2014 to December 31 2014.
>
> This is $10.6 million more than the $20 million fundraising goal indicated
> in the blog post. (At any rate, that's the sum I get; I'd welcome anyone
> double-checking my math.)
>
>
There is no scenario I can come up with where this is actually a good
result.  Sure, an extra $10.6 million might be nice in the bank, but it
massively exceeds budget.  The fundraiser met its goal, with plenty to
spare, on December 17.  And yet we put our readers and our users through
another two weeks of fundraising.  Given that we were already really
pushing the goodwill of the broad Wikimedia community (that includes the
users of our products)well, as I say, this is not a good result.
People were putting Wikipedia on Adblock because of those banners, and they
were doing it long after the goal had been reached.

I'd say I was speechless, but actually I am working extremely hard to hold
my tongue here, awaiting an explanation for this.  And yes, I think the
Wikimedia community deserves to know why this happened.

Risker/Anne
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Most obnoxious banner yet

[Andreas Kolbe]

On Tue, Jan 13, 2015 at 12:59 AM, Risker  wrote:

> On 12 January 2015 at 15:59, Andreas Kolbe  wrote:
>
> > >
> > > > On 12 Jan 2015, at 11:25 pm, Liam Wyatt  wrote:
> > > > Now that the 2014 Fundraising campaign has finished and which,
> > according
> > > to
> > > > a WMF blogpost from a week ago, "surpassed our goal of $20 million"
> > >
> >
> >
> > According to the data provided at https://frdata.wikimedia.org/ the
> > Foundation seems to have taken $30.6 million over the period from
> December
> > 2 2014 to December 31 2014.
> >
> > This is $10.6 million more than the $20 million fundraising goal
> indicated
> > in the blog post. (At any rate, that's the sum I get; I'd welcome anyone
> > double-checking my math.)
> >
> >
> There is no scenario I can come up with where this is actually a good
> result.  Sure, an extra $10.6 million might be nice in the bank, but it
> massively exceeds budget.  The fundraiser met its goal, with plenty to
> spare, on December 17.  And yet we put our readers and our users through
> another two weeks of fundraising.  Given that we were already really
> pushing the goodwill of the broad Wikimedia community (that includes the
> users of our products)well, as I say, this is not a good result.
> People were putting Wikipedia on Adblock because of those banners, and they
> were doing it long after the goal had been reached.
>


According to the yeardata-day-vs-sum.csv spreadsheet at
https://frdata.wikimedia.org/ the daily takings for December 2 through
December 16 were:

1,210,953.952,496,366.461,933,765.581,632,523.431,180,293.931,074,943.09
1,163,741.971,226,279.841,425,927.691,437,084.271,464,091.511,145,236.28
1,076,753.101,086,034.231,048,222.37

This makes $20.6 million, meaning the $20 million target mentioned in the
blog post was met on December 16.

Moreover, from November 1 through December 1 inclusive, the Foundation took
another 8.4 million, based on the numbers in that spreadsheet.

The total for the two-month period from November 1 through December 31 is
just north of $39 million.



> I'd say I was speechless, but actually I am working extremely hard to hold
> my tongue here, awaiting an explanation for this.  And yes, I think the
> Wikimedia community deserves to know why this happened.
>


The automated thank-you note to donors apparently[1] said,

---o0o---

“Over the past year, gifts like yours powered our efforts to expand the
encyclopedia in 287 languages and to make it more accessible all over the
world. We strive most to impact those who would not have access to
education otherwise. We bring knowledge to people like Akshaya Iyengar from
Solapur, India. Growing up in this small textile-manufacturing town, she
used Wikipedia as her primary learning source. For students in these areas,
where books are scarce but mobile internet access exists, Wikipedia is
instrumental. Akshaya went on to graduate from college in India and now
works as a software engineer in the United States. She credits Wikipedia
with powering half of her knowledge.

“This story is not unique. Our mission is lofty and presents great
challenges. Most people who use Wikipedia are surprised to hear it is run
by a nonprofit organization and funded by your donations. *Each year, just
enough people donate to keep the sum of all human knowledge available for
everyone. Thank you for making this mission possible.*”

---o0o---

Looking at the numbers, it hardly seems defensible to say that "just enough
people donate to keep the sum of all human knowledge available for
everyone".

Not when the Foundation

– had tens of millions in reserves in July 2014,
– has just taken close to $40 million in two months, and
– reported spending only $2.5 million on Internet hosting in the 2013/2014
fiscal year.[2]

And there is one other thing. This is a much more minor issue in
comparison, but there is something irksome about the first sentence of that
message, about readers' donations powering the Wikimedia Foundation's
"efforts to expand the encyclopedia in 287 languages".

A slide at Wikimania 2014, titled "Reality Check",[3] reported that of the
(then) 284 language versions of Wikipedia,

12 are "dead" (locked)
53 are "zombies" (open, no editors)
94 are "struggling" (open, < 5 editors)
125 are "in good or excellent health" (5 editors or more)

Note here the classification of all Wikipedias with 5 or more editors as
"in good or excellent health". I believe the example of the Croatian
Wikipedia, widely reported to have become the fiefdom of fascists a little
over a year ago[4], demonstrates that a Wikipedia needs a lot more than 5
editors to be viewed as "healthy" by the public.

And if readers were left with the impression that their money funds crucial
efforts by the Wikimedia Foundation to build content in these smaller
Wikipedias, or to perform a quality assurance function there, then I
believe that impression, too, would be almost completely mistaken.



[1]
http://capegazette.villagesoup.com/p/revealing-

Re: [Wikimedia-l] Most obnoxious banner yet

[Wil Sinclair]

I think it's a matter of common sense that we shouldn't ask for more
money unless we can credibly demonstrate with stuff like success
metrics and improving trends that we can spend the money we've already
been given effectively.

Risker's comments made me wonder, however, about the more specific
issue of how the WMF is measuring the cost/benefit of banner displays.
The benefit should be fairly easy to figure out as denominated in
dollars- roughly speaking, it would probably look something like the
total amount raised over a defined period divided by the number of
banner displays during that period. But what about those much more
subtle and potentially lagging costs? I assume that the WMF is
measuring stuff like session lengths and return rates. Is the WMF
tracking on anything else for non-logged in users?

In any case, what I would most like to see is a comparison of graphs
of such metrics over the course of a full campaign. It seems like we
all agree that the banners are annoying, but is there really a
measurable "banner fatigue" phenomenon among our readers? For example,
can we point out a distinct point of diminishing returns, beyond which
the slopes of one or both graphs significantly steepens? If anyone has
this data for the current or past campaigns, please forward it to me.
I'll try some different visualizations that get past the dollars signs
to the true cost of prolonged panhandling.

Alternatively, we could pivot to a street performance model by getting
the article on Thomas Jefferson to juggle fire batons and spray
painting the article on Popping silver. After Jimmy finishes his
extended plastic-bucket drum solo and we've warmed them up with a few
mediocre jokes, we could pass around the banner for donations. It
would probably only work on the tourists, tho.

,Wil

>> This is $10.6 million more than the $20 million fundraising goal indicated
>> in the blog post. (At any rate, that's the sum I get; I'd welcome anyone
>> double-checking my math.)
>>
>>
> There is no scenario I can come up with where this is actually a good
> result.  Sure, an extra $10.6 million might be nice in the bank, but it
> massively exceeds budget.  The fundraiser met its goal, with plenty to
> spare, on December 17.  And yet we put our readers and our users through
> another two weeks of fundraising.  Given that we were already really
> pushing the goodwill of the broad Wikimedia community (that includes the
> users of our products)well, as I say, this is not a good result.
> People were putting Wikipedia on Adblock because of those banners, and they
> were doing it long after the goal had been reached.
>
> I'd say I was speechless, but actually I am working extremely hard to hold
> my tongue here, awaiting an explanation for this.  And yes, I think the
> Wikimedia community deserves to know why this happened.

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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Most obnoxious banner yet

[MZMcBride]

Andreas Kolbe wrote:
>As for the fundraiser's duration, I believe the 2014 fundraiser ran for 30
>days (December 2 to December 31, 2014). This is longer than last year, and
>at any rate much longer than 2012, right?
>
>Because according to https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_2013 –
>
>"In 2012, we were able to shorten the fundraiser down to nine full days,
>the shortest fundraiser we've had."

I'm not sure about that Meta-Wiki page's claim specifically, but
traditionally the annual Wikimedia Foundation fundraiser has lasted from
about the end of November to the end of December (roughly Thanksgiving to
Christmas), typically with a thank you campaign in the week between
Christmas and New Year's Day.

I strongly agree with Liam that the donation advertising practices should
be clarified. But, as stated on this list already, I believe, the
underlying concern is that the Wikimedia Foundation fundraising staff is
becoming increasingly aggressive and tactless, while the current Wikimedia
Foundation Board of Trustees seems to be quietly nodding, praising, and
encouraging the good work. Because after all, the fundraising team _is_
bringing in a lot of money. The detachment from Wikimedia's values is
clearly unacceptable, but there seem to be limited options for recourse
aside from convincing the Board of Trustees that money isn't everything.

What's needed, in my opinion, are hard limits (an updated Board
resolution) set on the Wikimedia Foundation fundraising team that provide
very strict parameters for how obnoxious donation advertising can be.
While such a resolution would be unusual, the fundraising team has
repeatedly demonstrated that it's incapable of self-regulation or even
basic decency toward our readers. As for specific examples, the following
are never acceptable: banners that don't respect opting out (clicking the
"X"), pop-ups (even in the same browser window), and lying.

MZMcBride



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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Most obnoxious banner yet

[Andreas Kolbe]

On Tue, Jan 13, 2015 at 4:09 AM, MZMcBride  wrote:

> >Because according to https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_2013 –
> >
> >"In 2012, we were able to shorten the fundraiser down to nine full days,
> >the shortest fundraiser we've had."
>
> I'm not sure about that Meta-Wiki page's claim specifically [...]



The claim in question was added to the page on November 7 2013[1] by Megan
Hernandez, "Director of Online Giving, Wikimedia Foundation".[2] At the
time the edit was made, her title was "Head of the Annual Fundraiser for
the Wikimedia Foundation".[3]

The paragraph read in full:

*To briefly recap this year so far, banners have been up at a low level
worldwide since the beginning of the current fiscal year on July 1, 2013.
This does not mean that readers have been seeing banners all the time since
July. We have our banners set to show to each reader just one time. This
testing has been valuable to improve our banners while also to reach more
readers. In 2012, we were able to shorten the fundraiser down to nine full
days, the shortest fundraiser we've had. That's great. But we know that
there are plenty of people who use Wikipedia and would be happy to donate
who didn't happen to visit Wikipedia in those nine days that the banners
were running. We started running banners in July to reach more people
outside a of campaign that lasts just a few days. This year, we have the
goal of raising the budget while showing readers fewer banners than
previous years. We think this new schedule of running banners throughout
the year will help us reach that goal.*

Given that the statement came from the WMF Head of the Annual Fundraiser, I
assume it's accurate (and it matches the 2012 donations pattern in the
daily donations spreadsheet).

As for the December 2013 fundraiser, if you look at the December 2013
figures in the spreadsheet, it is quite apparent that the money dropped off
on December 17, about the same date that the fundraising target was met
this year.

Furthermore, in the July 2014 Wikimedia Metrics Video[4] it was reported
that the year-round continuous campaign model had "relieved some of the
pressure on the December campaign".

So I do think the 2014 year-end fundraiser was considerably more intense
than in previous years – oddly so, given that the money raised ended up
being massively in excess of the fundraising target, as described in the
recent blog post:[5]

*Thank you for keeping knowledge free and accessible*


*A month ago, the Wikimedia Foundation kicked off its year-end contribution
campaign on English Wikipedia. Thanks to the generosity of everyday readers
from around the world, we’re very happy to share that we’ve surpassed our
goal of $20 million. Your support for this critical campaign helps cover
operating expenses of the Wikimedia sites and global outreach programs in
order to keep the largest free knowledge resource accessible to the world.*

Again, the wording "keeping knowledge free and accessible" in the title of
that blog post does not sit easily with the fact that over 90% of the money
is spent on other things than keeping the sites "free and accessible".

Given the Foundation's present financial status, I would like to see a
clear repudiation of the "keeping Wikipedia online and ad-free" wording for
future fundraisers. This wording may have been appropriate in 2005, when
Jimmy Wales said,[6]

*“So, we’re doing around 1.4 billion page views monthly. So, it’s really
gotten to be a huge thing. And everything is managed by the volunteers and
the total monthly cost for our bandwidth is about 5,000 dollars, and that’s
essentially our main cost. We could actually do without the employee … We
actually hired Brion [Vibber] because he was working part-time for two
years and full-time at Wikipedia so we actually hired him so he could get a
life and go to the movies sometimes.”*

This is a lo-o-o-ng way from what the Wikimedia Foundation with its approx.
250 paid staff (more if you count chapter staff) is today.

It's not okay – ethically, morally not okay – to pretend the Wikimedia
Foundation is still the same animal as it was ten years ago, just because
this "online and ad-free" punchline "works" in terms of getting donors to
part with their money.

Andreas

[1]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Fundraising_2013&diff=6291649&oldid=5935668
[2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:MeganHernandez_(WMF)
[3]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:MeganHernandez_(WMF)&oldid=5926489
[4] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=993lpGrittg#t=3364
[5]
http://blog.wikimedia.org/2015/01/05/thank-you-for-keeping-knowledge-free-and-accessible/
[6] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQR0gx0QBZ4#t=275
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