On Thu, Dec 4, 2014 at 9:26 PM, MZMcBride <z...@mzmcbride.com> wrote:
> I checked my inbox today to find a note from a friend asking if > Wikipedia was okay. My reply was essentially "Wikipedia is fine, if you > want to donate, make an edit or two." > > I wonder how many Wikimedians are getting the same notes of concern. I'd > be quite surprised, for example, if Wikimedia Foundation department heads > weren't getting these types of notes right now. It's a bit sad. And I > wonder how others reply to sincere concerns about Wikipedia's health. > (Again, nobody knows what Wikimedia is, for better or worse.) > > Meanwhile, also in my inbox, the author of this piece sent me a link to > <http://newslines.org/blog/stop-giving-wikipedia-money/>, which was silly > in parts, but an interesting perspective to read. > > Lila Tretikov wrote: > >I recommend those of you who would like to come up with some test wording > >assuming the current word count do so and after you pick top 3-5 we can > >pilot with one of our next user groups. > > Eh, fair play. I've started a page here: > <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_banners/December_2014>. I'm > busy today, but I'll try to brainstorm some better options. If we must > have donation advertising (a necessary evil, for now, we assume), we can > probably at least stop shouting at and misleading our readers/donors. :-) > > MZMcBride > > I gave it a go. It's not good, but it's a wiki, so someone go make it good :) As a positive (non-statistically significant) datapoint, I did some asking around with people who didn't know I was a wikipedian what their general impressions on the banners were (from memory, everybody did indeed see them), and what they thought the financial health of the Foundation was like. They didn't feel that the text implied that the foundation was in financial trouble/crisis or anything like that. When I explained the financial situation of the Foundation, and the distribution of money to development, operations/keeping the lights on and programmatic work (roughly), they were fine with it, and didn't find the copy misleading. One of them told me he donated again after I told him why I was asking those questions, and that we're so concerned we're not being honest enough with our readers/donors. A couple did however note that they've seen banners earlier this year, and started questioning the honesty of the statement that it was a once a year thing to raise sufficient funds for another year now they were seeing banners again a few months later. That possibility never really occurred to me. Turns out the Quantum Mechanical idea that you can't measure something without affecting its outcome holds for A/B testing in fundraising. -- Martijn > _______________________________________________ > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines > Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, > <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe> > _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
