Do you donate to Wikipedia? Why or why not?
Do you donate to Wikipedia? Why or why not?
Every so often I give a few bucks(far less than the worth of knowledge I got from it)
Absolutely not. They have way more money than they can sensibly spend, keep begging for more as if they could barely keep the lights on (they could probably easily keep the core mission going with about 10% of the money they're getting), and then expand their spending to match the donations they collected.
They then created an endowment (i.e. a pile of wealth that generates enough interest to sustain them indefinitely), using both additional donations and some of the money given to Wikimedia (which reduces the apparent amount of money they spend and is not listed as money Wikipedia/Wikimedia has, as it is accounted for separately). The $100M endowment was planned to take 10 years to build, got completed in 2021, five years before schedule. Wikimedia also has a separate cash hoard of almost a quarter billion dollars.
It's actually all in their article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation#Finances
Wow I didn't know about this, thanks for the reading! I always feel morally in debt for using Wikipedia without giving back much and assume they were struggling a bit to operate, but wow they have received millions of dollars already!
edit: I'm still willing to donate though, and I just did, like I'm happy to pay for what I've learned from it, even if it doesn't mean much to them.
This is the most interesting thing I realize(thanks to you) this week so far
Yes. People won't understand the value of something until they lose it.
Yes, every month. Why? Because in my opinion it is one of the greatest collective projects of mankind (even with the flaws it has).
I've never seen it like that. And I've never paid anything for it because I don't use it enough. I might change my mind now. Thanks!
Nope, I've donated to the internet archive because I have infinity more respect for them and they actually need more funding.
Wikipedia has more than they know what to do with, the money just falls out of their pockets
Came here to say the same thing. The Internet Archive needs the money a lot more and are constantly battling legal threats. I donate to them every now and then. Librarians and archivists rule.
They need it more since all these lawsuits they are facing
Giving 10 bucks a year, even though I use it very little. But sometimes it's just easy and quick to look something up or read an interesting article, and I know that there are many people (students, etc.) who rely on it more than I do and have less money to spend
Yup. $20 every year.
I just like that it’s there and I’ve used it a lot, and I want it to be there for the next generation.
Plus, they’ve maintained staying ad free, sub free, and bullshit free. I can’t think of another site that’s kept that level of decency.
Basically the same here, £2 a month, and for the same reasons as you.
I think once a year they show the donation banner, then I donate something like 10 dollars. I use Wikipedia almost daily, so I'm glad to contribute something.
Yes, sporadically but usually once I year I give them a donation.
Wikipedia is an insanely valuable resource we as a society just take for granted, especially those that grew up with it. Instant access to nearly infinite information is an absurd luxury we have, and it's a resource I want to see continue without being tied to corporate interests or abusive government regulation.
It's never much mind you, but I try to contribute a little around Christmas time if I can.
I think Wikipedia is a valuable common good and should be maintained. Because I can afford it, I donate monthly, even if I only use it a few times each month.
I heard that the wiki foundation is pretty well off and the saleries they pay the executives are rising pretty fast. Havent donated myself but in principle I should, eventho the higher ups are earning this much.
Yes, and I even have it as an automatic scheduled payment so I don't forget. Even with its flaws, it remains one of the shining gems of the Internet, and a resource I use frequently in both my professional life and my personal one. I remember how it was to suddenly want to learn more about a random topic before Wikipedia and I don't want to go back.
I also donate to The Internet Archive.
No because I already donate to the EFF and Internet Archive and I figure that's enough. And apparently Wikipedia already has enough money according to the comments here
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Fundraising_statistics
they could run an extra year on $0 of donations. Whether one considers that enough or not might be down to personal viewpoint.
No. I did donate once and then they illegally spammed my email for a year. I had to threaten them with a lawyer to stop. It was senseless.
This happened to me as well. I just didn't go as far as the lawyer bit. I just sent all of their emails to spam for auto deletion.
I donate to them sometimes depending on how money is, but yeah holy hell do they spam you once you donate. Just a non-stop stream of increasingly passive-aggressive emails.
Do you donate to Wikipedia? Why or why not?
I did and ever since have been rewarded with an endless barrage of "you gave once before so do it aga--a-a--aa-a-a-a-a-a-a-in" banners. Given the ecomonics of fundraising I wouldn't be surprised if donors were badgered more than non-donors.
I did once. Then I don't because Wikipedia is currently in a stable financial situation so I can donate to another entity that needs resources.
Absolutely. What a ridiculous amount of information for free, if you use it at all, it deserves $2-3 every now and then to keep it free. If someone buys it, they will fuck it up.
I can't realistically afford it due to various factors but if I had a proper "western" wage, I surely would donate.
I used to use it for free when I was broke. Now I give a little extra per month to hopefully offset that. It's invaluable to me. That and public radio.
I gave to them once or twice before the pandemic showed up. It was something I wanted to do, but never could since I was never financially able to.
I stopped once I found an article showing that Wikipedia is not hurting for money at all, yet they kept groveling for money. I think it also said the CEO/owner was keeping a lot of the money for themself which I was not a fan of.Wikipedia has an endowment that can pay for their servers for the rest of civilization. Meaning they have such a huge pile of stocks, that just the interest generated off of it can pay for everything.
From what I remember, their parent company also has a fat stack of liquid cash that it’s just sitting on, so even if the economy implodes tomorrow and their endowment stops paying out enough, they can still run the servers as long as there’s electricity.
Don’t bother donating money to already rich organizations. Wikipedia asking me for money is like if one of the Rockefeller kids started panhandling after getting choppered to the street corner. They have enough money to last them practically forever. While I value their contribution to knowledge, i also know my money can better help other organizations like the internet archive, who don’t have the benefit of an obscene endowment and are currently facing very serious lawsuits.
Wikipedia is one of the great achievements of humanity and the Internet. Ofc I donate. If their management's salary is high -- that's good. It should be a well-paid job. Everyone should be compensated appropriately for their time. With money or (preferably: and) with the satisfaction that their job is important and appreciated.
I did once or twice. I also donated to Signal and couple smaller projects I used. I always plan to donate more but a man has to eat and fly on vacations to Canary Islands...
I used to, but then they removed crypto because of propaganda efforts by reactionary idiots masquerading as progressives. Now, I have no way to donate to them.
This exactly. But also because of my self interest. When they accepted crypto I was donating crypto, to encourage people to use crypto. Specifically monero, which they never accepted, but I used a transactional exchange to give them money from monero.
Since they got political about how they accept money, I can in relationship be political about not giving them money. I support their mission. I just wish they'd make it easier to give them money
My dudes, the fact that cryptos are fundamentally fucked and unusable by design is nothing to do with politics, it's to do with technology. You don't get to brush it off as "oh they're just being woke", it's a business decision necessitated by the fact that it's really annoying to get paid in crypto.
There's a lot to say about this, but in this case specifically, the value of all major coins fluctuates massively, so if you accept them as payment then you have to look at it as getting paid with a speculative asset. It's like getting paid with a barrel of oil hoping that the price will go up. I guess some businesses would be willing to make that bet, but maybe not a 501c like Wikimedia.
And the reason the prices fluctuate is because miners validators and holders straight up want it to, they want the price to fluctuate because they want to speculate and get rich, not actually use it as a currency. Even if normies were to require payment in stablecoins, enthusiasts don't tend to use those because the price fluctuation is part of the point.
We could have a thread about it
They do make it easy to give them money.
They just don't want unstable scam bullshit where they have to go through the slog of going to an exchange, selling the coin, and cashing out.. hoping all the while it doesnt crash in the mean time. Everyone tried to cash in on it when it was hot, before the vast majority knew or realized that crypto was nothing but a pump and dump scam, and they all dropped it due to instability and the fact that its a scam.
I've been donating to the Wikimedia foundation regularly since 2016 since I believe it's a resource everyone should have access to.
The Wikipedia is not perfect but, for several topics, it's a great starting point or recap. I've used it for science related queries and, even if the style is not uniform and some entries are hard to read, it is an amazingly useful project which doesn't get old (and the phone app is fantastic)
When I was younger my friend group got in a heated debate about something semantic for fun. The opposite side from me tried to prove their point by editing Wikipedia and showing it to me. They had to show a screen shot because it had changed back in the time they ran from the computer lab to the lunch room, I used this in my arguments every time we argued about it after that.
Yes, once a year or so. I've gotten a lot of value out of it and i like the idea of paying it forward for people who aren't in a position to donate
I do regularly.
Knowledge, bitch!
I did a few times but not in the recent years. I don’t know exactly why.
Same here. I believe it's worth it, I can afford it.
I support not only Wikipedia, but also Signal and my local Mastodon-instance.
I do, at least once a year (nothing excessive), mainly because I use the website occasionally. It's the same reason I bought 'reddit coins' or whatever that used to be. I just wanted to contribute to a useful service, especially given that there is so much garbage out there
I'm cycling through multiple open source projects, the last one was signal. I tried to donate to Mozilla once, but they have the worst UX on their form and I'm not giving them my money AND my data.
Absolutely, I've been using it since my teens and it's been an invaluable resource to me.
I am planning on giving more monthly in the future once my finacial situation changes.
You should consider giving a tiny amount that you can afford. Some people think that establishing outflows to charity reinforces a frame of abundance.
Maybe you could do $1/mo
(though I understand if your situation is such that the $1 might become $35 when it hits a negative account — in that case you gotta solve that first)
Among other projects I belive is beneficial to the world. It's Libre software and provides free (CC-by-SA) knowledge without making you a product. I only made a one time 3$ donation but I might donate more in the future.
You can’t donate to Wikipedia, only to wiki media, which spends it on all kinds of shit.
I've donated once, but never again after i found out how they hoard the money and use it for all kinds of politically motivated stuff.
I need more context.
Me too, and preferably not "A youtuber said so"
Yes. As a frequent user, I donate $10 from time to time. I also use my editing rights to fix mistakes when/if I see them.
I give them £12/year.
Used to use them a lot as a student, so now that I can, I donate occasionally. I don't have a problem with them basically gaming the system like SHITPOSTING_ACCOUNT said in another comment, and I'm aware of it.
I have before, but I was crippled by a conservative pedo ran corporation called The Home Depot. So it's not in the budget currently. Hide yo kids if you go in there.
May I ask what the story is there?
Spread awareness wherever possible. Unless you approve of a billion dollar corporation that deals in trafficking and illegal firearm sales between managers at work. Hint: most states have a 20 plus stores. This one is the second largest and has 6 that's controlled by a ring.
Whenever they put that "Dear reader, if everyone reading this sent $X, etc" notice at the top of an article, I send whatever the amount they mention in the notice is.
I've only ever noticed it like 5 times since I started doing that a bunch of years ago - not sure if that means they don't ask that often, or if it means I don't visit them often enough to always see it.
Have just signed up for monthly donations (only £1.40)
Not anymore.
Several times. I think now they have more than enough money so I haven't in a while.
I haven't donated since getting bothered with atrocious banner campaigns.
I do regularly. I used it a lot and I think knowledge should be free.
Yes because people are dumb enough as it is
I donate 3$ monthly. Not an insane amount, but there's a lot of great information on there.
not donating yet, might start soon
Absolutely! I use it all the time and the more resources they have, the more all my old teachers will have to eat their words.
Yes. But not very much as I am still a student.
No, I don’t donate to it. I don’t use it.
No. Let them ask their pals at the CIA for some money. They've got plenty.
I used to give $39 every few months, but like Solomon, it became too bendable by higher powers, something I mean generally and in more ways than one, so I now advocate it just adopt ads or something.
If they adopt ads, it'll not be long before the articles themselves are influenced by who their advertisers are. Can't offend Advertiser A, so let's just delete that line in the article about them.
I think it's important that it remains ad free.
That brings me to the issue I was referring to though. It's already influenced. The advertising catch-22 isn't the only way to fall into this trap.