What the "donors" are saying..., A continuing series.... Options

The best comments off of the public donors list

Anonymous - The proof that people is better without been ruled

Anonymous- "Knowledge Brings Fear"

<===Excuse me? Am I missing something here?

Anonymous -The Standard repository for all knowledge. Screw Douglas Adams

Michael Purvis - Please stop deleting articles!

<===Why did you give them money then???

Anonymous- 2012 is coming; free the info! Tue, 10/23/2007 - 02:11 USD 100

<===When Apocalypse theories and Free source software meet....

Anonymous - Most people don't realise how entertaining Wikipedia is! Tue, 10/23/2007 - 00:12 AUD 20 17.

<==Entertaining???

Anonymous - JIMBO'S EYES ARE REALLY SCARY Mon, 10/22/2007 - 23:33 USD 10

Anonymous - Heh heh heh, "autofellatio" Tue, 10/23/2007 - 11:19 NZD 10 7.

This post has been edited by the fieryangel:

In London, "2012 is coming" means the 2012 Olympics.

In London, "2012 is coming" means the 2012 Olympics.

And the end of the world according to the Mayan calendar.

In London, "2012 is coming" means the 2012 Olympics.

And the end of the world according to the Mayan calendar.

Yeah, I think that's what they refering too...but you never can tell!

More gems

Anonymous
Information craves freedom.

<==File this one under "unfounded platitudes"....

Anonymous
Wikipedia is OUR encyclopedia, keep it free!

<==Except if you're banned...

Anonymous
let knowledge of the world bring happiness to every sentient being

<==I guess that explains why so many admins are unhappy then?

The best comments off of the public donors list

Make sure you click the "filter contributions" link, and lower the threshold from $5 to $1. The $1 donors are a lot funnier. Example:

Jimmy Wales is a consummate liar and scam artist. Stop donating to his Wikia project vicariously through the WMF. Oust Wales from the Board of Directors!

That's worth a buck, don't you think?

Greg

The best comments off of the public donors list

Make sure you click the "filter contributions" link, and lower the threshold from $5 to $1. The $1 donors are a lot funnier. Example:

Jimmy Wales is a consummate liar and scam artist. Stop donating to his Wikia project vicariously through the WMF. Oust Wales from the Board of Directors!

That's worth a buck, don't you think?

Greg

Here's one that's worth 20 quid :

Anonymous
Let the misinformation flow like wine into the mouths of people who never check references everywhere! I mean, with plenty of moderation, what are you, an alcoholic? Tue, 10/23/2007 - 13:28 GBP 20 40.

Now, who could that be???

More gems :

Anonymous
To achieve a dream, you must wake up. Wikipedia is the worlds alarm clock to a better society.

<===I'd say that WP is more like the World's snooze button, myself....

Anonymous
I like big butts and I cannot lie, you other brothers can't deny.

Anonymous
Thanks for keeping the dream alive, Jimbo! Remember, admins, zoosexuality is harmful, and is antithetical to NPOV. And we have to get rid of the notability requirement—verifiablity=way more importan

In London, "2012 is coming" means the 2012 Olympics.

And the end of the world according to the Mayan calendar.

Dec. 21, 2012 to be exact. At least we know WP won't be around after that!

Manny Mamakas
To be absolutely certain about something, one must know everything or nothing about it

<====Indeed!

Emanuel Mamakas
A love affair with knowledge will never end in heartbreak. -Michael Garrett Marino

Anonymous
Wikipedia is reliable because of the standards of neutrality and verifiability; plus the implicit approval of every person who views an article and makes no changes to it.

<===Would you like another delicious glass of Koolaid??

Clemens van der Lelie
heal the world

<===Wikipedia + New Age = ???

Anonymous
BUNNIES GO RAWR

nicholas johnson
John 3:16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

<====Yes, but what about Ayn Rand??

* edited by Nathan: typo

This post has been edited by Nathan:

Anonymous: To all the mods who delete good articles: f... you! ($4.00) USD 4.00

This came off of the donation IRC channel, #wikimedia-donations. This is where the funds are keep on being tracked. At the time of this message, here are the unofficial stats:

Total donations: 5,375 (5.4%) -- Total USD: $139,266 -- Avg/person $25.91 -- Past 5 hours: $3,046 -- Total Anonymous: 3,375 ($88,070) -- Projected total: $2,591,000

This came off of the donation IRC channel, #wikimedia-donations. This is where the funds are keep on being tracked. At the time of this message, here are the unofficial stats:

Total donations: 5,375 (5.4%) -- Total USD: $139,266 -- Avg/person $25.91 -- Past 5 hours: $3,046 -- Total Anonymous: 3,375 ($88,070) -- Projected total: $2,591,000

This is lining up with my initial suspicions. This campaign is not going to reach their goal. And, I believe they are fooling themselves that a campaign in 2007 is going to have the same legs as the one started in late 2006 -- before Essjay, before university bans, before Wikiscanner, before Andrew Keen, etc. Annual campaigns get tedious for those who've already donated before in the past.

The fact that they've only gotten about 6,000 of the 100,000 donors yet tells me that they're way behind. Most of the eager-beaver donors will make their contribution on first sight of Jimbo's blinky eyes and wringy hands. They've already donated! That leaves everybody else, who isn't so eager, who is more suspicious, more tired of this "Wikipedia craze".

Sure, they'll drum up some big-donor support in November, when they see they're going to miss projections by 50%. But it still isn't going to cover the budget. Which means the budget will have to be cut. And maybe some heads will roll.

Greg

This came off of the donation IRC channel, #wikimedia-donations. This is where the funds are keep on being tracked. At the time of this message, here are the unofficial stats:

Total donations: 5,375 (5.4%) -- Total USD: $139,266 -- Avg/person $25.91 -- Past 5 hours: $3,046 -- Total Anonymous: 3,375 ($88,070) -- Projected total: $2,591,000

This is lining up with my initial suspicions. This campaign is not going to reach their goal. And, I believe they are fooling themselves that a campaign in 2007 is going to have the same legs as the one started in late 2006 -- before Essjay, before university bans, before Wikiscanner, before Andrew Keen, etc. Annual campaigns get tedious for those who've already donated before in the past.

The fact that they've only gotten about 6,000 of the 100,000 donors yet tells me that they're way behind. Most of the eager-beaver donors will make their contribution on first sight of Jimbo's blinky eyes and wringy hands. They've already donated! That leaves everybody else, who isn't so eager, who is more suspicious, more tired of this "Wikipedia craze".

Sure, they'll drum up some big-donor support in November, when they see they're going to miss projections by 50%. But it still isn't going to cover the budget. Which means the budget will have to be cut. And maybe some heads will roll.

Greg

Even on the site, there isn't a target goal of donors wanted, and from my chats with some of the Foundation folks, they didn't want a money tracker like last year. I wish I could break things down by currency, but those stats are being kept by few people. Our highest donation, to my knowledge, is about 1,500 USD from an anon. who gave his comment as a security hash.

Wow I never knew that some of the people who donate are so stupid.

Keep in mind that, with this going on for about two months, tons of things can happen. I suspect that donations from my neck of the woods (it's on Brandt's site if you really wish find out), it is going to the fire relief effort. I am also seeing people in the US prepare for holiday shopping, so I don't huge donations to the extent of thousands. This is a constant problem I saw last year, not sure about 2005, since I did not pay attention to much of the Foundation matters then.

Anyways, the latest unofficial stats from the same IRC channel mentioned earlier:

Total donations: 6,379 (6.4%) -- Total USD: $166,247 -- Avg/person $26.06 -- Past 5 hours: $4,962 -- Total Anonymous: 3,959 ($103,268) -- Projected total: $2,606,000

Keep in mind that, with this going on for about two months, tons of things can happen. I suspect that donations from my neck of the woods (it's on Brandt's site if you really wish find out), it is going to the fire relief effort. I am also seeing people in the US prepare for holiday shopping, so I don't huge donations to the extent of thousands. This is a constant problem I saw last year, not sure about 2005, since I did not pay attention to much of the Foundation matters then.

Anyways, the latest unofficial stats from the same IRC channel mentioned earlier:

Total donations: 6,379 (6.4%) -- Total USD: $166,247 -- Avg/person $26.06 -- Past 5 hours: $4,962 -- Total Anonymous: 3,959 ($103,268) -- Projected total: $2,606,000

Interesting, I didn't even think about the wildfires impacting potential fund raising but I imagine it will to some degree.

Keep in mind that, with this going on for about two months, tons of things can happen. I suspect that donations from my neck of the woods (it's on Brandt's site if you really wish find out), it is going to the fire relief effort. I am also seeing people in the US prepare for holiday shopping, so I don't huge donations to the extent of thousands. This is a constant problem I saw last year, not sure about 2005, since I did not pay attention to much of the Foundation matters then.

Anyways, the latest unofficial stats from the same IRC channel mentioned earlier:

Total donations: 6,379 (6.4%) -- Total USD: $166,247 -- Avg/person $26.06 -- Past 5 hours: $4,962 -- Total Anonymous: 3,959 ($103,268) -- Projected total: $2,606,000

Interesting, I didn't even think about the wildfires impacting potential fund raising but I imagine it will to some degree.

Probably the same effect with Hurricane Katrina and the Tsunamis in Asia; donations will be slow, but can still be large from non-affected areas. I also do recall that such events like that have been put in the sitenotice to where people should send money. With both of those cases, the English Wikipedia chose the Red Cross. I know the French Wikipedia did something similar for Darfur, but I am not sure what organization they asked funds to be sent to.

Probably the same effect with Hurricane Katrina and the Tsunamis in Asia; donations will be slow, but can still be large from non-affected areas. I also do recall that such events like that have been put in the sitenotice to where people should send money. With both of those cases, the English Wikipedia chose the Red Cross. I know the French Wikipedia did something similar for Darfur, but I am not sure what organization they asked funds to be sent to.

Hi Zscout! glad that you're here! I'm really sorry about your problems, but maybe our moral support will make you feel better?

Anyway, Jimbo claims that the rate of donations has never been better...

He might be stretching things a bit there...but their budget has never been larger and their operating expenses are way up over 2006 level. So, even if everybody who gave in 2006 gives more, they are not going to meet their goal...and their budget will have to be cut.

Maybe Floflo will have to pay for her own babysitter?

I think that relief for fire victims, Darfur and the like are probably a bit more important than buying baudwidth so that the Cabal can have unlimited flamewars, in the greater scheme of things....

This post has been edited by the fieryangel:

Yet more :

William Magowan * I wouldn't pay a corporation, but I will donate to Wiki

<===Just ignore that man behind the Wikia curtain...

Jose M Guzmán Ibarra * The biggest event since Diderot

<===Never mind that atomic bomb business....

Anonymous * Genuflect before the mother brain!

<===Somebody's been watching too much Star Trek...

things are tricky - help me wiki!

Thanks from my unborn child.

<===He already has a credit card??

I am a poor college student. I barely pay my tuition. But I am willing to give up a meal to make the world a better place.

<===Oh, you're so kind. Here, have a glass of koolaid on us!...

Wikipedia is humanity's greatest achievement.

I am most likely to turn to Wiki for all of life's answers

(Are these people serious??? Man, how sad....)

Keep in mind that, with this going on for about two months, tons of things can happen. I suspect that donations from my neck of the woods (it's on Brandt's site if you really wish find out), it is going to the fire relief effort. I am also seeing people in the US prepare for holiday shopping, so I don't huge donations to the extent of thousands. This is a constant problem I saw last year, not sure about 2005, since I did not pay attention to much of the Foundation matters then.

Anyways, the latest unofficial stats from the same IRC channel mentioned earlier:

Total donations: 6,379 (6.4%) -- Total USD: $166,247 -- Avg/person $26.06 -- Past 5 hours: $4,962 -- Total Anonymous: 3,959 ($103,268) -- Projected total: $2,606,000

I want to thank zscout370 for these invaluable updates on the Foundation's efforts to reach $4.6 million for 2008's budget. It isn't going to happen. Let's do the numbers...

They obtained 8,000 donors in the first week of a nine-week campaign. Average donation is $26. So, simply put, 8,000 donors x 9 weeks x $26 = $1.87 million. Nowhere near $4.6 million. It's even well short of the $2.6 million "projected" above. (Note, also, that the campaign has expressed that 100,000 donors is the goal, and the size of their "thermometer" matches that number. If we forecast the first-week tally through nine weeks, they're only going to hit 72,000 donors.)

Furthermore, I'd like to add in the concept of attrition. People tire of fundraising campaigns -- both longitudinally from year to year, and fatigue sets in within the campaign over each subsequent week. The "eager beavers" have already made their donations. This leaves behind the apathetic masses, bored of being asked to donate to something they regard as their "own" free creation. Let's imagine that over week-to-week, we'll see a conservative 5% attrition rate.

A 5% attrition rate will yield a grand total of $1.54 million.

A 10% attrition rate will yield a total of only $1.27 million.

How will the Foundation possibly make up the difference without completely slashing the budget?

Oh, here's the answer!

If I send you a huge donation, do I get anything special?
Yes. This year, people who donate between USD 10,000 and 24,999 will get a personal phone call from Jimmy Wales, the founder of Wikipedia. (You will need to include your phone number with your donation.) People who donate USD 25,000 or more will be treated to dinner with Jimmy.

Anyone want to venture a guess where that dinner might be held?

Another way you can get a personal phone call from Jimmy Wales is to set up a website similar to Wikipedia Review.com, and use the word "Wikipedia" in your sales pitch. That worked for me, anyway. I got a call real quickly.

Greg

This post has been edited by thekohser:

Keep in mind that, with this going on for about two months, tons of things can happen. I suspect that donations from my neck of the woods (it's on Brandt's site if you really wish find out), it is going to the fire relief effort. I am also seeing people in the US prepare for holiday shopping, so I don't huge donations to the extent of thousands. This is a constant problem I saw last year, not sure about 2005, since I did not pay attention to much of the Foundation matters then.

Anyways, the latest unofficial stats from the same IRC channel mentioned earlier:

Total donations: 6,379 (6.4%) -- Total USD: $166,247 -- Avg/person $26.06 -- Past 5 hours: $4,962 -- Total Anonymous: 3,959 ($103,268) -- Projected total: $2,606,000

I want to thank zscout370 for these invaluable updates on the Foundation's efforts to reach $4.6 million for 2008's budget. It isn't going to happen. Let's do the numbers...

They obtained 8,000 donors in the first week of a nine-week campaign. Average donation is $26. So, simply put, 8,000 donors x 9 weeks x $26 = $1.87 million. Nowhere near $4.6 million. It's even well short of the $2.6 million "projected" above. (Note, also, that the campaign has expressed that 100,000 donors is the goal, and the size of their "thermometer" matches that number. If we forecast the first-week tally through nine weeks, they're only going to hit 72,000 donors.

Furthermore, I'd like to add in the concept of attrition. People tire of fundraising campaigns -- both longitudinally from year to year, and fatigue sets in within the campaign over each subsequent week. The "eager beavers" have already made their donations. This leaves behind the apathetic masses, bored of being asked to donate to something they regard as their "own" free creation. Let's imagine that over week-to-week, we'll see a conservative 5% attrition rate.

A 5% attrition rate will yield a grand total of $1.54 million.

A 10% attrition rate will yield a total of only $1.27 million.

How will the Foundation possibly make up the difference without completely slashing the budget?

Oh, here's the answer!

If I send you a huge donation, do I get anything special?
Yes. This year, people who donate between USD 10,000 and 24,999 will get a personal phone call from Jimmy Wales, the founder of Wikipedia. (You will need to include your phone number with your donation.) People who donate USD 25,000 or more will be treated to dinner with Jimmy.

Anyone want to venture a guess where that dinner might be held?

Another way you can get a personal phone call from Jimmy Wales is to set up a website similar to Wikipedia Review.com, and use the word "Wikipedia" in your sales pitch. That worked for me, anyway. I got a call real quickly.

Greg

I'll bet that the telephone conversation would have been worth at least a USD 25,000 donataion....at least if you had taped it and sold it to the Enquirer or something....

Anyway, the numbers just don't add up. There ain't no well in Hell that they're going to come up with over four million bucks at this rate, even with "matching grants" which have yet to be announced.

So, who gets fired first?

Interesting little tidbit

* Can I give you a targeted or restricted donation -- meaning, can I give you money to do something very specific, that can't be used for other purposes?

Charities based in the United States -- like the Wikimedia Foundation -- are required to honor restrictions requested by donors. That means if you specify your donation needs to be restricted for a specific use, we will either honor your request or return your donation. But before you decide to do that, please consider that unrestricted donations are much more useful for us. As quickly as Wikimedia's projects evolve, Wikimedia needs unrestricted donations to remain agile.

I wonder how many people actually read this. If people really didn't want their money going toward legal fees and trustee salaries they would request their donations only be used for hardware and bandwidth costs.

Oh and as for donor sayings, I particularly like this one...

"My college students depend on Wikipedia" — Anonymous

Arrrrrggghhh

This post has been edited by Derktar:

I'd like to see a fund set up to retain a genuinely independent Ombudsman.

I'd like to see a fund set up to retain a genuinely independent Ombudsman.

Any independent dispute resolution would be a major step toward social responsibility. It would be a curb on the unquestioned dominance of the dysfunctional social networking "community" and the blow to the last vestiges of the Cult of the God-king.

I'd like to see a fund set up to retain a genuinely independent Ombudsman.

Any independent dispute resolution would be a major step toward social responsibility. It would be a curb on the unquestioned dominance of the dysfunctional social networking "community" and the blow to the last vestiges of the Cult of the God-King.

It would only go toward shoring up the fundamental delusion that Wikipedia Is Some Kinda Goobermint, instead of some kind of edited publication.

And that is the Φantasy that got them into the mess they're in.

Jonny (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/cool.gif)

I'd like to see a fund set up to retain a genuinely independent Ombudsman.

Any independent dispute resolution would be a major step toward social responsibility. It would be a curb on the unquestioned dominance of the dysfunctional social networking "community" and the blow to the last vestiges of the Cult of the God-King.

It would only go toward shoring up the fundamental delusion that Wikipedia Is Some Kinda Goobermint, instead of some kind of edited publication.

And that is the Φantasy that got them into the mess they're in.

Jonny (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/cool.gif)

Better to take your chances with a professional trained to listen than 2,000 pseudonymous adolescent amateurs playing social networking games. It would be nice if it was Magister Ludi 's Castalia all academic and monastic but it's more like Lord of Flies and some GooberMint seems like a good idea.

I would like to see Wikipedia craft a functional social contract for establishing a more congenial climate for achieving and maintaining consensus on the issues which divide conflicted parties. The present architecture, which operates more like a high-intensity chess game than an orderly and sober process of civil negotiation, has proven to be needlessly aggravating, contentious, and interminable. I believe the Wikipedians would benefit from a more suitable framework, along the lines of a functional social contract, including some more functional protocols for conflict management and conflict resolution.

A social contract is a written document setting forth mutually agreeable terms of engagement and therefor (by definition) cannot be considered to be fiat imposed by one faction over another. A social contract represents a collection of promises that the parties have freely committed to, because they believe that it's in their mutual interest to adopt that framework. That is, a social contract is a consensus — a consensus on the terms of engagement. In the absence of mutually agreeable terms of engagement, the interpersonal dynamics of a cast of characters embroiled in conflict typically devolves into some form of a liminal social drama.

I would like to see Wikipedia craft a functional social contract for establishing a more congenial climate for achieving and maintaining consensus on the issues which divide conflicted parties. The present architecture, which operates more like a high-intensity chess game than an orderly and sober process of civil negotiation, has proven to be needlessly aggravating, contentious, and interminable. I believe the Wikipedians would benefit from a more suitable framework, along the lines of a functional social contract, including some more functional protocols for conflict management and conflict resolution.

A social contract is a written document setting forth mutually agreeable terms of engagement and therefor (by definition) cannot be considered to be fiat imposed by one faction over another. A social contract represents a collection of promises that the parties have freely committed to, because they believe that it's in their mutual interest to adopt that framework. That is, a social contract is a consensus — a consensus on the terms of engagement. In the absence of mutually agreeable terms of engagement, the interpersonal dynamics of a cast of characters embroiled in conflict typically devolves into some form of a liminal social drama.

This is interesting. What would/might the contents of the contract be? Who would put it forward? How would it be enforced?

What would/might the contents of the contract be? Who would put it forward? How would it be enforced?

A social contract typically includes a mission statement setting forth the purpose of the organization or project. This is typically followed by a pledge to work cooperatively toward the common goals. In addition to the express goals of the project, the social contract typically includes social and interpersonal goals for establishing a congenial climate of community. These would include goals of treating each other with courtesy and respect, fostering cooperation, and peaceable resolution of conflict in accordance with express conflict resolution protocols spelled out in the social contract.

It's crafted by the leadership of the community and ratified by the members of the community who agree to subscribe to it.

The concept of enforcement does not apply to a social contract, as the philosophy is not one of rules and punishments, but of peer promises and protocols for handling breaches of expectations in a non-judicial manner.

In terms of the Kohlberg-Gilligan Ladder, social contracts operate at Stage 5 of Kohlberg's Ladder, several rungs above the Rules-and-Punishment paradigm. Social contracts thus require a level of maturity and responsibility a notch or two above the norm.

Lawrence Kohlberg's Six Stages of Moral Reasoning
Plus Carol Gilligan's Seventh Stage of Ethical Care

Stage 1: Punishment-avoidance and obedience — Individuals make moral decisions on the basis of what is best for themselves, without regard for the needs or feeling of others. They obey rules only if established by more powerful individuals; they disobey when they can do so without getting caught.

Stage 2: Exchange of favors — Individuals begin to recognize that others also have needs. They may attempt to satisfy the needs of others if their own needs are also met in the process. They continue to define right and wrong primarily in terms of consequences to themselves.

Stage 3: Good boy/good girl — Individuals make moral decisions on the basis of what actions will please others, especially authority figures. They are concerned about maintaining interpersonal relationships through sharing, trust, and loyalty. They now consider someone's intentions in determining innocence or guilt.

Stage 4: Law and order — Individuals look to society as a whole for guidelines concerning what is right or wrong. They perceive rules to be inflexible and believe that it is their "duty" to obey them.

Stage 5: Social Contract — Individuals recognize that rules represent an agreement among many people about appropriate behavior. They recognize that rules are flexible and can be changed if they no longer meet society's needs.

Stage 6: Universal Ethical Principle — Individuals adhere to a small number of abstract, universal principles that transcend specific, concrete rules. They answer to an inner conscience and may break rules that violate their own ethical principles.

Stage 7: Ethics of Care — An obligation of care rests on the understanding of relationships as a response to another in terms of their special needs. Focuses on the moral value of being empathetic toward those dearly beloved persons with whom we have special and valuable relationships, and the moral importance of responding to such persons as unique individuals with characteristics that require custom-crafted responses to them that we do not normally extend to others.

A social contract typically includes a mission statement setting forth the purpose of the organization or project. This is typically followed by a pledge to work cooperatively toward the common goals. In addition to the express goals of the project, the social contract typically includes social and interpersonal goals for establishing a congenial climate of community. These would include goals of treating each other with courtesy and respect, fostering cooperation, and peaceable resolution of conflict in accordance with express conflict resolution protocols spelled out in the social contract.

Don't many organizations, good, bad, otherwise, have such statements? Don't they usually have little or no impact on the behavior of these organizations? Remember just how deeply dysfunctional this community currently is, how feeble it's normal institutions, such as it Board of Trustees has become. Also is there any way that this contract can provide for meaningful participation for stakeholders that are not currently at the table at all?

Don't many organizations, good, bad, otherwise, have such statements? Don't they usually have little or no impact on the behavior of these organizations? Remember just how deeply dysfunctional this community currently is, how feeble it's normal institutions, such as it Board of Trustees has become. Also is there any way that this contract can provide for meaningful participation for stakeholders that are not currently at the table at all?

Mission Statements are much more common than full-fledged Social Contracts. And there are plenty of organizations in which their charter documents (e.g. Constitution, By-Laws, etc) are mere window dressing. Corrupt and dysfunctional organizations are the norm, and have been since the dawn of civilization. In the Theory of Community Building, there are Communities of Interest, Communities of Practice, Communities of Commitment, and Centers of Excellence. Wikipedia might have become a world-class Center of Excellence, but it failed to become a Communty of Commitment. Instead, it has devolved into a dysfunctional Community of Malpractice.

It need not have been that way.

I'd like to see a fund set up to retain a genuinely independent Ombudsman.

Any independent dispute resolution would be a major step toward social responsibility. It would be a curb on the unquestioned dominance of the dysfunctional social networking "community" and the blow to the last vestiges of the Cult of the God-King.

It would only go toward shoring up the fundamental delusion that Wikipedia Is Some Kinda Goobermint, instead of some kind of edited publication.

And that is the Φantasy that got them into the mess they're in.

Jonny (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/cool.gif)

Better to take your chances with a professional trained to listen than 2,000 pseudonymous adolescent amateurs playing social networking games. It would be nice if it was Magister Ludi 's Castalia all academic and monastic but it's more like Lord of Flies and some GooberMint seems like a good idea.

BTDT, too many times already.

Wrote it all down for Larry Sanger while he still had a chance of doing a NewPedia instead of the SameOleSameOleTedia. Will try to save some of that time on my hands by going off to look up what I wrote before.

Don't know why you can't see that Your Third Coming Saviour And All Round Young Virgin Omnibusman will end up looking indiscernible from Your First Messiah and Your Second Co-Flounder before the Year is Out.

Jonny (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/cool.gif)

This post has been edited by Jonny Cache:

There are a few examples of open source projects that adopted the framework of a social contract, adhered to it, and developed into a world-class center of excellence. The Debian Linux Project is one that comes to mind. Google also has a social contract with its employees.

There are a few examples of open source projects that adopted the framework of a social contract, adhered to it, and developed into a world-class center of excellence. The Debian Linux Project is one that comes to mind. Google also has a social contract with its employees.

I thought from the title of this thread — oh, sorry, I forgot where I was for a moment there, nevermimd — that y'all were talking about a course correction for the brain-drain-train already in motion. Nope, too much MimboJimboMomentum there to keep it from going over the falls without a barrel — poor monkeys!

But if you are talking about starting from scratch, dumping that sorry site entire, well, dream on, dream on!

Jonny (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/cool.gif)

This post has been edited by Jonny Cache:

Wikipedia Review should totally raise $30k - enough for a retired somebody to act as an ombudsman for a year, and enough to force Jimbo to meet with a couple people from here. Only $100 from each registered member!

Rather than hire a negotiator, I think we would be better served by stepping up to a professional level of investigative journalism. I'd like to see an article in a prestigious magazine like Atlantic Monthly which fairly reported the issues that Wikipedia is confronting as a function of its structural problems.

Wikipedia Review should totally raise $30k - enough for a retired somebody to act as an ombudsman for a year, and enough to force Jimbo to meet with a couple people from here. Only $100 from each registered member!

I don't understand the "force Jimbo to meet" part. Also I don't think Mr. Wales is the appropriate person to engage in any negotiations. Perhaps WMF B/T could designate a representative though.

Rather than hire a negotiator, I think we would be better served by stepping up to a professional level of investigative journalism. I'd like to see an article in a prestigious magazine like Atlantic Monthly which fairly reported the issues that Wikipedia is confronting as a function of its structural problems.

BTDT. Ask Greg Kohs to tell you what Marshall Poe is up to lately. A year ago you might have excused Yet Another Gee Whiz MainDream Journalist for writing what MP wrote then, but now he appears even more clueless than he did before.
No, I'm afraid the information will have to flow from places like this to places like that.

Jonny (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/cool.gif)

This post has been edited by Jonny Cache:

There is a progression in these observations that goes from disappointment to frustration to cynicism to bitterness.

Mebbe I should leap-frog you, Jonny, and go straight to bitterness.

There is a progression in these observations that goes from disappointment to frustration to cynicism to bitterness.

Mebbe I should leap-frog you, Jonny, and go straight to bitterness.

I prefer to think of it as Dis-Illusionment.

And, y'know, that can be A Good Thing.

Well, after you get out of the Wiki-Pokey.

Jonny (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/cool.gif)

Then again, there's the option of writing yet another comic opera.

Then again, there's the option of writing yet another comic opera.

That is so last year. There are sites-a-plenty that celebrate the absurdity of Wikipedia — came to act but only catharted — and leave you too weak from laughter to do anything about the threat to society. Sure, I would hate it if we couldn't keep our faculties intact, humour-wise, but I am of late less and less of a mind to believe that Wikipedia is Wikiφunny anymore.

Jonny (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/cool.gif)

This post has been edited by Jonny Cache:

Don't many organizations, good, bad, otherwise, have such statements? Don't they usually have little or no impact on the behavior of these organizations? Remember just how deeply dysfunctional this community currently is, how feeble it's normal institutions, such as it Board of Trustees has become. Also is there any way that this contract can provide for meaningful participation for stakeholders that are not currently at the table at all?

Mission Statements are much more common than full-fledged Social Contracts. And there are plenty of organizations in which their charter documents (e.g. Constitution, By-Laws, etc) are mere window dressing. Corrupt and dysfunctional organizations are the norm, and have been since the dawn of civilization. In the Theory of Community Building, there are Communities of Interest, Communities of Practice, Communities of Commitment, and Centers of Excellence. Wikipedia might have become a world-class Center of Excellence, but it failed to become a Communty of Commitment. Instead, it has devolved into a dysfunctional Community of Malpractice.

It need not have been that way.

I spent a good part of the last decade of the last millennium thinking a lot and writing a little about the relation between Democracy and Inquiry. I have already spent a good part of the first decade of this millennium discussing the same issue in numerous online forums. The topic is a Perennial Hot One in Pragmatic Philosophy and a major theme in the works of Peirce, James, Dewey, Mead, and Company. The list of contemporary lights who have lit on it is too numerous to exhaust, but Richard J. Bernstein, Noam Chomsky, Jürgen Habermas, and Hilary Putnam come to mind as having supplied memorable insights.

Trying to have intelligent discussions about these issues in Wikiputia — well, there is an old song about trying to roller skate in a buffalo herd that now comes to mind.

Jonny (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/cool.gif)

I'd like to see a fund set up to retain a genuinely independent Ombudsman.

Suppose there were an Ombudsman, and people went to him with a complaint of blocking as alleged sockpuppets. He'd ask for the CheckUser. No, he can't have it because of confidentiality rules or (WP:BEANS) because it might disclose information enabling people to sockpuppet more effectively.

They obtained 8,000 donors in the first week of a nine-week campaign. Average donation is $26. So, simply put, 8,000 donors x 9 weeks x $26 = $1.87 million. Nowhere near $4.6 million. It's even well short of the $2.6 million "projected" above. (Note, also, that the campaign has expressed that 100,000 donors is the goal, and the size of their "thermometer" matches that number. If we forecast the first-week tally through nine weeks, they're only going to hit 72,000 donors.)

Furthermore, I'd like to add in the concept of attrition. People tire of fundraising campaigns -- both longitudinally from year to year, and fatigue sets in within the campaign over each subsequent week. The "eager beavers" have already made their donations. This leaves behind the apathetic masses, bored of being asked to donate to something they regard as their "own" free creation. Let's imagine that over week-to-week, we'll see a conservative 5% attrition rate.

A 5% attrition rate will yield a grand total of $1.54 million.

A 10% attrition rate will yield a total of only $1.27 million.

It's Friday morning, which means we're half-way through Week 2 of the Jimbo Blinks, You Donate campaign. Remember that they hoodwinked 8,000 donors in Week 1? Remember that I suggested there would be attrition in subsequent weeks? We're half-way through Week 2, which would mean a steady donation flow should have added another 4,000 donors to the 8,000 from Week 1, or a current straight-line total of 12,000.

Instead, it looks like we haven't even hit 11,000 yet. Is there any possible way this campaign will be at 16,000 donors by Tuesday morning (the end of Week 2)? I'm saying "no way". Might even have to threaten to eat some liverwurst if they make it.

God, I'm lovin' Tuesdays now.

So, they're at about $275,000 currently. That's a far cry from $4.6 million. GOOD JOB, Wikipedia Review. I dare say that our efforts are actually having a real-world impact on the hearts and minds of people with "closed-source" wallets.

Greg

Anybody else see the Signpost blurb about the fundraising?

Fundraiser continues

The Wikimedia Foundation fundraiser continued this week. In the first seven days of the fundraiser, about 8,280 people had donated, and the Foundation had raised about US$212,000.[1] This amount is slightly less than the $261,000 donated during the first seven days of last year's drive. Interestingly, only three contributions of $1,000 or more have been recorded so far during this drive; during the last drive, 20 contributions of $1,000 or more were recorded, discounting two large contributions that appeared to have been mailed independent of the fundraising drive. Last year's drive, however, began during the holiday season, which may explain decreased giving so far.

So, they admit that the first-week capital is about 19% LESS than the previous fund-drive, and thousand-dollar-plus donations are down a full 85%, but Jimbo proudly proclaims it's "the highest we have ever seen". More lies (or is it just careless, misinformed hucksterism?) from the Sole Flounder. Anyone surprised?

RED ALERT! The "Blinky Jimbo" video and thermometer-goal graphic have been replaced! I'm sure THAT will fix the problem. Muuu-wah-ha-ha-haaaaah!

Greg

This post has been edited by thekohser:

Anybody else see the Signpost blurb about the fundraising?

Fundraiser continues

The Wikimedia Foundation fundraiser continued this week. In the first seven days of the fundraiser, about 8,280 people had donated, and the Foundation had raised about US$212,000.[1] This amount is slightly less than the $261,000 donated during the first seven days of last year's drive. Interestingly, only three contributions of $1,000 or more have been recorded so far during this drive; during the last drive, 20 contributions of $1,000 or more were recorded, discounting two large contributions that appeared to have been mailed independent of the fundraising drive. Last year's drive, however, began during the holiday season, which may explain decreased giving so far.

So, they admit that the first-week capital is about 19% LESS than the previous fund-drive, and thousand-dollar-plus donations are down a full 85%, but Jimbo proudly proclaims it's "the highest we have ever seen". More lies (or is it just careless, misinformed hucksterism?) from the Sole Flounder. Anyone surprised?

RED ALERT! The "Blinky Jimbo" video and thermometer-goal graphic have been replaced! I'm sure THAT will fix the problem. Muuu-wah-ha-ha-haaaaah!

Greg

Yes, it has been replaced by a very ugly banner too!

They obtained 8,000 donors in the first week of a nine-week campaign. Average donation is $26. So, simply put, 8,000 donors x 9 weeks x $26 = $1.87 million. Nowhere near $4.6 million. It's even well short of the $2.6 million "projected" above. (Note, also, that the campaign has expressed that 100,000 donors is the goal, and the size of their "thermometer" matches that number. If we forecast the first-week tally through nine weeks, they're only going to hit 72,000 donors.)

Furthermore, I'd like to add in the concept of attrition. People tire of fundraising campaigns -- both longitudinally from year to year, and fatigue sets in within the campaign over each subsequent week. The "eager beavers" have already made their donations. This leaves behind the apathetic masses, bored of being asked to donate to something they regard as their "own" free creation. Let's imagine that over week-to-week, we'll see a conservative 5% attrition rate.

A 5% attrition rate will yield a grand total of $1.54 million.

A 10% attrition rate will yield a total of only $1.27 million.

It's Friday morning, which means we're half-way through Week 2 of the Jimbo Blinks, You Donate campaign. Remember that they hoodwinked 8,000 donors in Week 1? Remember that I suggested there would be attrition in subsequent weeks? We're half-way through Week 2, which would mean a steady donation flow should have added another 4,000 donors to the 8,000 from Week 1, or a current straight-line total of 12,000.

Instead, it looks like we haven't even hit 11,000 yet. Is there any possible way this campaign will be at 16,000 donors by Tuesday morning (the end of Week 2)? I'm saying "no way". Might even have to threaten to eat some liverwurst if they make it.

God, I'm lovin' Tuesdays now.

So, they're at about $275,000 currently. That's a far cry from $4.6 million. GOOD JOB, Wikipedia Review. I dare say that our efforts are actually having a real-world impact on the hearts and minds of people with "closed-source" wallets.

Good morning, class. Today's number is... 15,350. Remember, last week's number was 8,000 donors. If we subtract 8,000 from 15,350, we get 7,350. That means 650 fewer people donated to Wikipedia this week than they did last week. This is what we call attrition. Therefore, I am putting this two-pound block of liverwurst back in the refrigerator, since I am not obligated to eat it to fulfill my double-dog-dare of last week.

In fact, what we have just witnessed is a weekly attrition rate of 8.125%. Quite presciently, last week I offered you all projected grand totals based on either a 5% or a 10% weekly attrition rate. We are about in the middle between the two, aren't we? This would suggest a final fundraising total of about $1.43 million -- sixty-nine percent short of the $4.6 million goal to overpay Sue Gardner and Mike Godwin. However, that's the best-case scenario, if the Wikimedia Foundation can sustain an attrition rate of only 8%. I am going to predict right here and now that this attrition rate will increase over the remaining weeks, by as much as 1 or 2 percentage points per week! They're running out of "eager beavers", which leaves only non-donating visitors who are simply annoyed by the banner ad.

Of course, the predicted total depends on the average donation amount remaining near $26. We did have a nutter donate $10,000 this week, but that has the algebraic effect of boosting the average overall donation amount by about 75 cents. Perhaps the average donation is up to $27 now. Big deal.

I hope that Zscout returns with more Foundation-sourced totals from the IRC chat which I don't frequent. Those values would corroborate my estimates here, but I would say that the fundraiser is now at the $414,000 mark.

My prediction for next Tuesday morning's (9:00 AM Eastern) donor tally is: 22,040 donors, coughing up $584,000. It still sickens me, but clearly, it's a failure on the Foundation's part.

Greg

If we forecast the first-week tally through nine weeks, they're only going to hit 72,000 donors.)

My gut reaction is, "what's with the counting of donors?".

You count amounts, not number of donations.

Unless the amounts are not impressive.

Then putting forth 70k donors, many of which donated 1 dollar, sounds impressive.

See?

They shouldnt even be mentioning number of donors. No one does that, unless they are:
1) Doing an analysis
2) Masking the amounts, and going for positive spin.

DL

With the recent analysis of Dragons Flight I believe he hypothesized they would miss their margin by quite a bit, Let me see if I can dig his quotes up.

Judson Bagley AntiSocialMedia.net AntiSocialMedia.net Mon, 11/12/2007 - 05:14 USD 5.00

Possibly the best $5.00 I've ever spent.

Judson Bagley AntiSocialMedia.net AntiSocialMedia.net Mon, 11/12/2007 - 05:14 USD 5.00

Possibly the best $5.00 I've ever spent.

You're a class act, Judson. If I were you (lol), I would have gotten a bit nastier. Isn't WP fortunate that someone who knows (and can show!) so much dirt on them is such a nice guy?

Nevermind that WP got their Wordbomb timeline all wrong. My wayback machine checks on WP show that you weren't a employee of the Big O when you were Wordbomb, or when you started ASM. So I guess your "corporate smear campaign" eminated from that great big evil monopoly, "Business Jive dotcom".

No match for the barrells of ink flowing from the poison pens of Wall Street sychophant newspapers, several billion dollar hedge funds, Wall Street firms, and stock clearing houses and the people that work for them on wikipedia, eh?

[yadda yadda]

Hi Mr Lackey, could you please take that godawful screenshot of "Durova" off your avatar? It's ruining my meal. Put up one of JzG's page 3 girls or something.

I'll never forget the first time I googled Brandt after stumbling into that hornets nest on WP, and see ing the sideshow of humanity on his hivemind page. I hadn't been that nauseous and ashamed of my species's propagation since the last Piper Family reunion. Just thinking about Hivemind compels me to search JzG's W-R babes thread from the Kohser to restore my faith in the future of mankind, artificial or big and natural.

Some goodies:

"I can't imagine being able to do the job I do without Wikipedia." — Anon.
- I can't imagine a job that you can do with Wikipedia, Anon.

"Wikipedia is my fountain of knowledge" — Anon.
- Don't drink that knowledge! It's filthy!

"college would be impossible without wikipedia!" — katy tull
- I worry about U.S. higher education now.

"A great, reliable, constantly-updated online encyclopedia!" — Dave Britz
- Well, you got the "constantly-updated" part right. And it is "online."

"This model of information transfer will change humanity." — Anon.
- Yeah, but into what?

"Go baby go, go!" — Anon.
- Go away, you mean?

"Even my cats like it!" — Anon.
- Alright, did someone from Uncyclopedia hack the Foundation donation banner?

"I love philanthropy" — Anon.
- Me too, but what does that have to do with Wikipedia?

"For not deleting at least some articles" — Vladimir Mozhenkov
- Angry inclusionist? Well, those deletionists are [deleted by WP Deletionist Cabal].

"Probably the best thing modern world has ever achieved." — Frei Klaus
- No, no it's not. What about the Internet and its WWW? Or nuclear power? Or the Nintendo Wii?

You can see the pattern out of my random sample here: ignorance! They do not understand the crazy Community and unreliable nature that is WP.

I'm tempted though to think some people donate to WP but obviously aren't thinking of the consequences of said donation. I hope that mad Russian gets his articles undeleted though.

I could go on and on, but I think theKohser was hoping for commentary from the big donors.

I would like to add some other questions, if I may: Do corporations donate to WMF? If so, what companies have been known to do so? And, if someone can explain, why?

I would like to add some other questions, if I may: Do corporations donate to WMF? If so, what companies have been known to do so? And, if someone can explain, why?

I could almost see a joke forming before my mind's eye that involved the puzzle pieces : «Man» … «Off» … «Tax» … «Woe» … «Write» — but then I lost it.

Oh well, off to see the sandwoman …

Jonny (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/cool.gif)

This post has been edited by Jonny Cache:

I would like to add some other questions, if I may: Do corporations donate to WMF? If so, what companies have been known to do so? And, if someone can explain, why?

I don't know if this helps you or not, but there is this list of the most foolish people and organizations on our planet.

Once I saw that list, I closed my accounts at Fidelity and moved them to Vanguard. I'll never buy a Dell computer, either.

Greg

I would like to add some other questions, if I may: Do corporations donate to WMF? If so, what companies have been known to do so? And, if someone can explain, why?

I don't know if this helps you or not, but there is this list of the most foolish people and organizations on our planet.

Once I saw that list, I closed my accounts at Fidelity and moved them to Vanguard. I'll never buy a Dell computer, either.

Greg

Uh Oh, we're getting into dangerous territory here. You see, I don't personally think that Wikiabuse was shut down because of all the dirt that we dug up about admins and incidents. I think that WMF could really care less about that.

I think it got shut down because we had started organizing wikipages using this page and had started making pages with each of these "benefactors" and their corporate giving policies and issues that they supported. Since the evil admins were being sorted by perceived bias, the next step would have been to match the corporate benefactor's issues with the number of admins who were working against their policies. This could have been deadly to any WMF funding campaign, so I think that's when the bells started going off...

Anyway, I wonder if they all know that they're funding the Cleveland Steamer article?

I would like to add some other questions, if I may: Do corporations donate to WMF? If so, what companies have been known to do so? And, if someone can explain, why?

I don't know if this helps you or not, but there is this list of the most foolish people and organizations on our planet.

Once I saw that list, I closed my accounts at Fidelity and moved them to Vanguard. I'll never buy a Dell computer, either.

Greg

Uh Oh, we're getting into dangerous territory here. You see, I don't personally think that Wikiabuse was shut down because of all the dirt that we dug up about admins and incidents. I think that WMF could really care less about that.

I think it got shut down because we had started organizing wikipages using this page and had started making pages with each of these "benefactors" and their corporate giving policies and issues that they supported. Since the evil admins were being sorted by perceived bias, the next step would have been to match the corporate benefactor's issues with the number of admins who were working against their policies. This could have been deadly to any WMF funding campaign, so I think that's when the bells started going off...

Anyway, I wonder if they all know that they're funding the Cleveland Steamer article?

Anyone is welcome to test (re-test?) that theory on Centiare.com.

Greg

I thought the scraper sites that take text from WP and use it for the for-profit sites were the ones most angered by WikiAbuse?

They have the most to lose dollar-wise if WP is brought down.

I thought the scraper sites that take text from WP and use it for the for-profit sites were the ones most angered by WikiAbuse?

They have the most to lose dollar-wise if WP is brought down.

Well, that was one theory, but I really think that WMF got a few phone calls by the subjects of thse pages who didn't like to see their foundations attached to this kind of site and prompted them to take out the trash....

that's just my theory, but it seems to be confirmed by what was posted after that site went down....

William Magowan * I wouldn't pay a corporation, but I will donate to Wiki

<===Just ignore that man behind the Wikia curtain...

that's all too easy to do for the majority. A lot of people don't seem to notice that Jimbo Wales has got rich off the back of WIKIPEDIA not Wikia, and that the foundation is ran by a for-profit company. :/

They obtained 8,000 donors in the first week of a nine-week campaign. Average donation is $26. So, simply put, 8,000 donors x 9 weeks x $26 = $1.87 million. Nowhere near $4.6 million.

...snip...

...snip...

GOOD JOB, Wikipedia Review. I dare say that our efforts are actually having a real-world impact on the hearts and minds of people with "closed-source" wallets.

Good morning, class. Today's number is... 15,350. Remember, last week's number was 8,000 donors. If we subtract 8,000 from 15,350, we get 7,350. That means 650 fewer people donated to Wikipedia this week than they did last week. This is what we call attrition.

...snip...

My prediction for next Tuesday morning's (9:00 AM Eastern) donor tally is: 22,040 donors, coughing up $584,000. It still sickens me, but clearly, it's a failure on the Foundation's part.

Week 3 out of 9 is complete. Who shall we believe? The English Wikipedia main page that proclaims 23,535 donors? Or the seemingly official summary being kept by the Foundation, which says 21,351 as of this morning?

Either way, I'm going to have to give Week 3 to the Foundation. They seem to have boosted donors back up over 8,000 (if you take the main page tally), and they seem to have boosted average donation amount to $29.82 (if you believe the official summary, which does exclude donations less than $1 -- probably foreign currencies, since PayPal won't let you give less than a buck).

Anyhow, it would appear that they have hoodwinked the over-score thousand donors of $636,726 worth of money that could have gone to clean water programs, interfaith education programs, famine relief, or any number of other projects that would actually save lives. Instead, that money will go to sustain the efforts of Durova, Hochman, Chapman & Co. in their unending quest to interactively service (but not publish!) a reputable encyclopedia.

If the scam artists can keep up this pace, their fund-drive is going to top $1.9 million. Still a 59% shortfall from the insanely greedy proposed budget of $4.6 million, so while Wikipedia may have won the Week 3 battle, they are still projected to lose the war.

Greg

Week 3 out of 9 is complete. Who shall we believe? The English Wikipedia main page that proclaims 23,535 donors? Or the seemingly official summary being kept by the Foundation, which says 21,351 as of this morning?

Something strange happened tonight. The English Wikipedia main page count has back-pedaled down to 21,775, even though it was at 23,535 this morning. I guess they even monkey with the donors to their encyclopedia as much as they monkey with the editors of their encyclopedia.

Seriously, how do you get "off count" by nearly 2,000 donors when all you're doing is counting donors?

Maybe Week 3 wasn't a victory for them at all.

Greg

Week 3 out of 9 is complete. Who shall we believe? The English Wikipedia main page that proclaims 23,535 donors? Or the seemingly official summary being kept by the Foundation, which says 21,351 as of this morning?

Something strange happened tonight. The English Wikipedia main page count has back-pedaled down to 21,775, even though it was at 23,535 this morning. I guess they even monkey with the donors to their encyclopedia as much as they monkey with the editors of their encyclopedia.

Seriously, how do you get "off count" by nearly 2,000 donors when all you're doing is counting donors?

Maybe Week 3 wasn't a victory for them at all.

Greg

Maybe it was just a case of Durovacounting?

Or maybe Guy Chapman φerretted out a business of sockdonors (darnersocks?) and was No-Bliss Oblithed by The Rule Of Argyle («Banded Are Banded») to send their donations back?

Jonny (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/cool.gif)

This post has been edited by Jonny Cache:

The collapsed side says almost 24,000, the blown up version shows around 21,777. Which should we believe, hmm....

http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikie...ber/085150.html

"FYI -

we're filtering out $0.01 donations from the various statistics on the
fundraiser from now on. This means e.g. that
http://donate.wikimedia.org/en/node/22 shows much more accurate data
now, but also that the sitenotice counter has dropped significantly.

Please, if you see people asking about this in various places on the
wikis or mailing lists, explain to them what is going on.

These tiny donations are, apparently, people testing credit cards;
they don't give us anything, but they also don't cost us anything. We
already have a JavaScript to block them at the donation form; I don't
know if there's much else we can do about it.
--
Toward Peace, Love & Progress:
Erik"

These tiny donations are, apparently, people testing credit cards; they don't give us anything, but they also don't cost us anything. We already have a JavaScript to block them at the donation form...

Well, at least they figured out a way to block them. Hooray! It's the Wikipedia Way!

Still, the credit-card testers will probably just "ramp up" by contributing $0.02 at a time instead, giving a whole new meaning to the term "just my two cents." And let's see, 2,000 donors at $0.02 a pop, that's $40.00... You could register a domain for almost five years with that much money.

Great...

These tiny donations are, apparently, people testing credit cards; they don't give us anything, but they also don't cost us anything. We already have a JavaScript to block them at the donation form...

Well, at least they figured out a way to block them. Hooray! It's the Wikipedia Way!

Still, the credit-card testers will probably just "ramp up" by contributing $0.02 at a time instead, giving a whole new meaning to the term "just my two cents." And let's see, 2,000 donors at $0.02 a pop, that's $40.00... You could register a domain for almost five years with that much money.

Great...

Hmm, "credit card testers"? They really want us to believe that?

I think that it's just the Wikipedia propaganda machine pumping up the stats!

This post has been edited by the fieryangel:

Hmm, "credit card testers"? They really want us to believe that?

I think that it's just the Wikipedia propaganda machine pumping up the stats!

My theory -- a few people (and by that, I mean hundreds) may have deduced that PayPal would hit the Wikimedia Foundation with a minimum fee of 25-30 cents per transaction, so if they donated only a penny, it would actually cost the foundation a quarter. They may have done this a few dozen times, just for kicks. Imagine, spending 40 cents to make the Foundation lose $10. Sounds fun.

As I said earlier, though -- I thought that US Dollar minimum donations were set from the first week at $1, so I'm unclear how these $0.01 donors were getting through, unless it was on a foreign currency.

"Testing" their credit cards, my ass.

Greg

This post has been edited by thekohser:

Week 4 update. I grabbed the stats at 9:00 AM Eastern, as is my Tuesday morning custom, and here are the (somewhat belated) results:

Week 1 = 8,000 donors, yielding $208,000
Week 2 = 7,350 donors, yielding $206,000
Week 3 = 6,001 donors, yielding $222,726
Week 4 = 4,189 donors, yielding $135,374

Cumulative total after 4 weeks is 25,540 donors, yielding $772,100.

Attrition is back, and in a big way. In fact, this past week's decline is monumental. I hope the Foundation Board is already dusting off their Plan B, because they're going to need it.

Even if they could sustain Week 4's numbers perpetually (which would be impossible), it would still take another 28 weeks for them to hit their original budget goal. Five more weeks remaining to accomplish 28 weeks' worth of work. Happy Holidays, WMF!

Greg

You might be interested in this, Greg

WS: How do you feel the current fundraiser is going? Are there any current plans to team up with large donors or corporate organizations, either through matching funds donations or individual donations, during this drive?

FD: The fundraiser began October 23 and runs until December 23. In its first 25 days, we brought in USD 708K. If we continue to receive donations at the same average rate of ~28K per day, we will total just a little more than 1m in donations by December 23. However, we have at least two commitments for major donations expected, matching donation type. Some more in the works.
Currencies 16th of november 2007
Currencies 16th of november 2007

Change in the sitenotice (more attention-grabbing, brighter, bolder) made a significant visible change. Therefore, we continue to make small changes/improvements, with the hope of maintaining people's interest and keeping donations. Some communication initiatives are also planned before the end of the fundraiser (new fundraising landing pages, more translations, bloggers outreach, information package for big donors, fundraising blog, more press releases, Edit Wikipedia Week, holidays gift certificates etc...).

My suggestion for a full fundraising report would be for the Signpost to interview Sue Gardner for an update on this very topic for the anniversary of one-month-fundraiser (<---- is not that cool ? I am setting up next week SignPost agenda)

But overall, my personal feeling is that it is not terribly successful. Though I do not have any actual figures to support this, I fear that the current pretty bad financial situation in the USA is impacting our fundraiser. My hope is that all the ongoing initiatives will in particular catch the attention of big donors.

You might be interested in this, Greg

And this too:

WS: What is the current status of the Wikimedia Foundation's audit? When do you expect a public release of financial statements for FY2007?

FD: The audit officially began on September 17, 2007. It is expected to be finished by the end of the calendar year (hopefully).

The audit is being conducted by a St. Petersburg firm called Gregory Sharer and Stuart. This is the same firm that conducted our ‘first-three-years’ audit report that was published last year.

On the Wikimedia side, the people involved are Oleta McHenry, preparing the books on behalf of the Foundation. Mona Venkateswaran, a financial consultant to the Foundation and a former auditor, is providing oversight and guidance to Oleta. Various others are helping Oleta by providing information and/or supporting documentation. We are also now actively looking for a new treasurer.

It is hard to plan completion date. It depends on the size of the organization, number of transactions, inherent risk in the audit work, and overall complexity of performing audit procedures. It’s fairly normal for audits to take longer to complete than was initially predicted. The Foundation’s projects (and their popularity) grew significantly over the past year, which meant that spending (number of transactions) increased. So there is more work to be done. Also, there has been some turnover in Foundation staff (e.g., the accountant), which has resulted in some loss of institutional memory that makes it harder to do the audit preparation. So it isn’t really all that surprising that the audit is fairly time-consuming.

I have participated in single audits of non-profit organization as large and much larger than WMF. I can tell you that this is an unusually long time, unless she means she's just waiting to get the auditor to produce the document. If they are actually sampling for all that time it is just weird. Maybe they could not verify by sampling and have resorted to examining every transaction? I have never seen happen.

Also it is a bad time to be without a Treasurer. Worse Oleta is local person who probably got the job by answering an ad. She is unlikely to follow them to high cost of living San Francisco. One might assume she is not going to take any professional risks for the benefit of WMF. The audit might actually produce interesting results.

Oh how even the faithful lament!

One solution? Watch out for the door-to-door WikiDonations Nerd Brigade!

Er, maybe not, maybe not.

Well, at least in one regard the 2007 Wikimedia fundraiser is breaking all previous records!

According to Danny Wool:

Actually, penny donations were quite high <in 2006> too. We simply did not list them. Brad Patrick did quite a bit of research into what they were, and it seems that in most cases, it is simply people testing stolen credit card numbers.

Greg

These tiny donations are, apparently, people testing credit cards; they don't give us anything, but they also don't cost us anything. We already have a JavaScript to block them at the donation form...

yes, they cost you nothing, but the people's who's cards were stolen? What about that?

This is wrong on so many levels. First of all, their first response to such an event was not "guess what - this was happening, so we reported it to the Feds".

It is to use this as good news to show that the small donations added up to a lot.

Of course, the funds weren't real.

In fact, they were fraudsters using our site to check card viaibility.

But it didn't cost us anything.

(IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/wacko.gif)

I have participated in single audits of non-profit organization as large and much larger than WMF. I can tell you that this is an unusually long time, unless she means she's just waiting to get the auditor to produce the document. If they are actually sampling for all that time it is just weird. Maybe they could not verify by sampling and have resorted to examining every transaction? I have never seen happen.

See http://www.nabble.com/Report-board-meeting...r-t4606216.html:

The auditors started their field work, then it was
suspended in the expectation of information still missing. I am not sure
when they come back. Next monday ? or the one after ?

October 11, 2007. Sounds to me like their books weren't in order before the audit began.

Also it is a bad time to be without a Treasurer.

As they don't plan on paying the Treasurer anything, and considering all the problems I'm sure they're having, I imagine it'll take a long before they find someone dumb enough to accept the position.

My prediction is that they'll either accept someone who doesn't meet the qualifications they described, or else they'll change their mind and decide to pay someone for the position.

Week 5 update. I grabbed the stats at 9:00 AM Eastern, as is my Tuesday morning custom, and here are the results:

Week 1 = 8,000 donors, yielding $208,000
Week 2 = 7,350 donors, yielding $206,000
Week 3 = 6,001 donors, yielding $222,726
Week 4 = 4,189 donors, yielding $135,374
Week 5 = 4,360 donors, yielding $142,250

Cumulative total after 5 weeks is 29,900 donors, yielding $914,350.

Were it not for some generous sheep feeling the spirit of Thanksgiving on Thursday and Friday, I believe we would have seen the attrition continue to depress donors. I severely doubt that the Foundation will capture the attention of more than 4,000 donors in a week again. Especially if the media gets cracking on the "sooper seekrit" mailing list fiasco.

I hope the Foundation can get by on $1.45 million, because even with the ghostly corporate donations that have to come forward at some point, that's what I'm predicting we'll see at the end of Week 9. Only 68% short of the optimistic budget figure. Good thing they're moving to San Francisco! I hear the cost of living is really manageable there.

Greg

Week 6 update. I grabbed the stats at 9:15 AM Eastern, as is my Tuesday morning custom, and here are the results:

Week 1 = 8,000 donors, yielding $208,000
Week 2 = 7,350 donors, yielding $206,000
Week 3 = 6,001 donors, yielding $222,726
Week 4 = 4,189 donors, yielding $135,374
Week 5 = 4,360 donors, yielding $142,250
Week 6 = 3,280 donors, yielding $107,925

Cumulative total after 6 weeks is 33,180 donors, yielding $1,022,275.

Those are some pretty weak numbers, folks. The weakest week yet. I notice on Facebook, Jimbo himself is actually begging recruiting his Facebook friends to donate to the "cause". His stats show that he's personally recruited about $650 in Facebook donations so far. Wow. Stop the presses. The man is a fundraising dynamo.

Now that The Register has reported on the secret mailing lists (which are also now mentioned in Wikipedia's article about Wikia), donations can only continue to shrink.

The donors are dwindling to less than 400 per day recently, so this coming week should be interesting. Will we see less than 2,600 donors, when Week 1 launched with 8,000? Did someone here on this board talk about the problem of "attrition" back in the beginning? Is that same someone banned from talking about Wikipedia's problems on Wikipedia?

Makes perfect sense, doesn't it, folks?

Greg

I hope the Foundation can get by on $1.45 million, because even with the ghostly corporate donations that have to come forward at some point, that's what I'm predicting we'll see at the end of Week 9.

From Sue Gardner: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wik...rdner_interview

Yes, the online fundraiser will not cover our operating costs - nor did we expect it to. And that's okay. We have a couple of major donations coming in within the next few weeks: they’ve been committed to, and will arrive in the bank before the new year. I will be going on a mini-tour of potential major donors, starting in the middle of December. We’ll probably do another one in January. And the German chapter is doing its own fundraising, and will be pitching in to buy 15 new squid servers for Amsterdam – which is fabulous and will be very helpful.

In the short term, I will need to focus quite a bit of my energy on fundraising, to ensure we’re okay for the coming year. In the medium and long term though, I am not particularly worried. We are going to have a head of fundraising, whose job will be –mainly- to cultivate major donations.

Without revealing anything confidential, can you give us an idea of how much these donations will be for?

Sure. The total is expected to be over US$1 million. I don't want to say anything more specific than that though - since some of the donors have asked to be anonymous, and others haven't specified.

This post has been edited by anthony:

Anonymous donors of large sums of money to a supposedly upstanding organization are kind of fishy. Yet, those who proudly name themselves are going to be on my (and others') boycott list, so I can see the point of an anonymous donation.

Still, they're going to be far, far short of $4.6 million.

Greg

So in the days after Durova-gate, the fundraising drive finally collapsed. WP is now hemorraging money.

Seems like a good time for Google or someone else to pick up the pieces...for pennies.

I wouldn't mind if Google acquired Wikipedia. I have more faith in the leadership talents of Larry Page and Sergey Brin than in Jimmy Wales.

Plus Google has a Social Contract with its own paid staff. If Google acquired Wikipedia, I would anticipate a comparable Social Contract with Wikipedians (who might even get paid for producing professionally crafted articles).