I remember seeing about it in a show from the German public broadcast which presents their journalistic work in a satirical way.
In short: People who do the actual work on wikipedia (writing articles, admins, moderators) do not get paid. The Wikimedia Foundation (WMF), an NGO from America, gets the donation money. Managers in that NGO are rich and earn a lot of money every year. They don’t need the donation money to run the website. With the money available to them right now, they could host Wikipedia (with its high traffic) for many more years.
I didn’t find the episode of the show, unfortunately, but many articles covering it.
It’s good that they fund projects aimed to create more equality and meet human rights. Personally, I’d choose different organisations supporting the same causes which seem to better handle donation money.
We really don’t need rich managers as middle men, especially when the aim is equity.
Being able to run a site without donations for years without any incoming donations is a great thing, but years isn’t really that long, and what would happen when that money ran out? There would be a last minute funding push for a company with a proven record of financial malpractice, who would want to donate to it then?
You’re right that the editors don’t get money, but they do get a reputable unbiased platform that they can share their knowledge on, and for many people that’s more than enough. (Source: Wikipedia, Reddit, Lemmy)
I find it very dishonest that they design their donation banners in a way to paint themselves as people who are in a dire, needy situation when in reality they could run that high-traffic website for several more decades with their current capital. This article claims it could even be 75 years.
In case the rich managers will actually run down the website, I think another website like it would pop up really quick. The Wikipedia software is open-source and there are many other Wikis already. Creating another “general” instance seems trivial. People who do the work would not lose a permanent paid employment because they don’t have one, they would just switch over to the next instance. Wikipedias data (and many other Wikis) are already being backed up by third parties. The knowledge will not be lost.
Oftentimes, doing a job for the “good will” really doesn’t pay off. Being an admin or moderator can take a huge mental toll. That’s one reason we are not on reddit anymore: They also don’t pay their moderators while the CEO is a rich asshole. Another current example is the reason of the shutting down of the lemm.ee instance (explained in their stickied post). A lot of workers in non-digital jobs get abused in the same way: No or low salary but too much working hours. They, too, are expected that “doing something good” would somehow prevent the excessive mental and physical stress they experience. Examples are hospital and nursing staff and animal welfare and shelter staff.
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I remember seeing about it in a show from the German public broadcast which presents their journalistic work in a satirical way.
In short: People who do the actual work on wikipedia (writing articles, admins, moderators) do not get paid. The Wikimedia Foundation (WMF), an NGO from America, gets the donation money. Managers in that NGO are rich and earn a lot of money every year. They don’t need the donation money to run the website. With the money available to them right now, they could host Wikipedia (with its high traffic) for many more years.
I didn’t find the episode of the show, unfortunately, but many articles covering it.
Here’s one I think sums it up well: https://unherd.com/newsroom/the-next-time-wikipedia-asks-for-a-donation-ignore-it/
Here’s a thread on Hacker News with more links and comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34106982
I recommend doing some research yourself. There are many articles on various websites. Search for “wikipedia donation scam” or something similar.
They fund interesting projects anyways. It’s not like all donations go into managers pockets. But yes it is something to keep in mind for sure.
It’s good that they fund projects aimed to create more equality and meet human rights. Personally, I’d choose different organisations supporting the same causes which seem to better handle donation money. We really don’t need rich managers as middle men, especially when the aim is equity.
Being able to run a site without donations for years without any incoming donations is a great thing, but years isn’t really that long, and what would happen when that money ran out? There would be a last minute funding push for a company with a proven record of financial malpractice, who would want to donate to it then?
You’re right that the editors don’t get money, but they do get a reputable unbiased platform that they can share their knowledge on, and for many people that’s more than enough. (Source: Wikipedia, Reddit, Lemmy)
I find it very dishonest that they design their donation banners in a way to paint themselves as people who are in a dire, needy situation when in reality they could run that high-traffic website for several more decades with their current capital. This article claims it could even be 75 years.
In case the rich managers will actually run down the website, I think another website like it would pop up really quick. The Wikipedia software is open-source and there are many other Wikis already. Creating another “general” instance seems trivial. People who do the work would not lose a permanent paid employment because they don’t have one, they would just switch over to the next instance. Wikipedias data (and many other Wikis) are already being backed up by third parties. The knowledge will not be lost.
Oftentimes, doing a job for the “good will” really doesn’t pay off. Being an admin or moderator can take a huge mental toll. That’s one reason we are not on reddit anymore: They also don’t pay their moderators while the CEO is a rich asshole. Another current example is the reason of the shutting down of the lemm.ee instance (explained in their stickied post). A lot of workers in non-digital jobs get abused in the same way: No or low salary but too much working hours. They, too, are expected that “doing something good” would somehow prevent the excessive mental and physical stress they experience. Examples are hospital and nursing staff and animal welfare and shelter staff.