On Tue, Jan 13, 2015 at 4:09 AM, MZMcBride <z...@mzmcbride.com> 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 _______________________________________________ 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>
