I've followed the money trail, and just as I had suspected, the recent Essjay and Sinbad scandals are having what appears to be a substantial negative impact on the amount of financial donations being made to the Wikimedia Foundation.

Rather than go into the details here, I'd like to point you to a page I made at Centiare, which will tell the story with a lovely graphic. I would be very appreciative if you forward this link to allies, and maybe even promote it on sites like del.icio.us, Digg, and Slashdot.

Just follow this link.

Greg

This is good -- very good. "Starve the beast". We need to keep the scandals coming, one every 2-3 weeks.

It's very good.

What is centiare.com? a wiki? Do you own it?

I would prefer not to be making the scandals. I would prefer to expose them and report on them. If we start making the scandals, then we are not stopping the menace of Wikipedia, but rather we are just being trolls.

Starve the beast... That works for me.

Creating scandals appears to be pretty easy. That may be the soft underbelly of Wikipedia, the generation of scandals. Considering the hundreds of semi-notable biographies This makes Wikipedia extremely vulnerable to this type of attack.

The fact that the administrators are chasing down sock puppets, in trying to hit them like whack a mole, make such a strategy extremely viable.

Thank you.

Bliss, to answer your questions, Centiare.com is a wiki-based directory of businesses and individuals, running the Semantic Mediawiki software. It is different from Wikipedia in that legal entities take ownership of and protect their own article space. That way, Sinbad won't "die" on Centiare -- until the day that he or his authorized agent say that he's dead. An accountant based in Huntington Beach, California, is the founder of Centiare. I joined him in late October to co-develop Centiare and take on the marketing effort. If the site crosses certain growth thresholds, we will incorporate, and I will have a small minority stake in the site.

I am assuming that it is this personal "conflict of interest" that you are suggesting might make my recent page itself a "scandal"? Or, are you saying that the data I presented is somehow a "manufactured scandal"? If your concerns about "making the scandals" surround the first point, then I'm sorry for having self-promoted here -- but Daniel Brandt promotes his site on here occasionally, and it's clearly to the benefit of Wikipedia Review. If your concerns surround the second point, I assure you, the data is genuine, having come directly from a Wikimedia Foundation page itself.

I just don't understand what you mean by "making the scandals".

Greg

Your chart needs to show the same dates a year ago. Hopefully, that data is still available.

Re the Centiare article entitled "Wikipedia scandals"... rather poor article naming. With a general title like that, one would expect it to discuss all scandals that have ever occurred involving Wikipedia (e.g., the Seigenthaler matter), not just one recent issue (the Essjay affair). In Wikipedia-style naming conventions, "Wikipedia scandals" would give a disambiguation page linking to more specific articles like "Wikipedia Essjay scandal of 2007". And somebody would probably argue for changing "scandal" to "controversy" in order to be more NPOV.

That data is available. It shows most days ranging between about $500 and $800, with occasional spikes up to $1200 to $1600.

What does this tell us, in your opinion?

The main way Wikipedia gets the lion's share of its annual donations is when it promotes a fund drive campaign. What I'm suggesting is that off-campaign time fundraising is flagging at the very same time as these scandals are embarrassing the Foundation. I think the proof will really be in two batches of pudding -- (1) how this trend pans out over the next two or three weeks, and (2) how the next fund drive campaign goes. (I.e., how long will it take them to cross the $1MM mark, or will they even reach it?)

Greg

Actually, with all of the media coverage in the past six months (Time Magazine's person of the Year thingee and all of that), I don't think that last year's figures would have any real correlation. Since there's only ONE year available, it doesn't give any sort of repeating yearly pattern.

....and the fact remains that the events do correspond to dates where giving goes down. I think that the "cause and effect" is pretty clear here...

Ah, Mr. Tobias... that's the beauty of Centiare. No hive mind controlling what people want to say in our wiki space. We draw the line at libel (which Wikipedia often does not). We encourage "advocate point of view" in Directory spaces. And, if I should want (at some point) to expand this article so that it meets "your" conventions of naming, by listing all available scandals that Wikipedia finds itself a part of, I'm free to do that. Likewise, I am free to rename or move the article, should I choose to do that.

You see, that's what makes Centiare "better" than Wikipedia. Libertarian freedom, rather than collective authoritarianism. Also, personal accountability for what's said. Gregory Kohs is responsible for what was posted at "Wikipedia scandals". (Granted, I probably should have created the page in Directory space, rather than Main space. But, I felt that for this promotional blitz, it would be less confusing to the uninitiated to have a more simple link. Eventually, I'll probably move it to a sub-page of my Directory:Gregory_J._Kohs space. Thanks for the tip!)

I'm glad you're using Wikipedia Review in this way. The fact that you would look at that Centiare article and come away from it worrying most about "article naming conventions" shows policy wonkery at its most humorous.

Anyone who wants to give the financial graphic some love, you can Digg it here.

Greg

I think you are absolutely correct. The more scandal plagued Wikipedia is the more the donations will dry up because no one wants to fund a corrupt organization. This is the way to go. The result though probably won't be the end of Wikipedia but rather a speeding of its slow move towards a advertising-based revenue model.

I think that people who use their real names on Wikipedia need to start recognizing that their User Page and User Talk Page constitute a type of Wikipedia Biography. When some Administrator libels you in your Wikipedia Biography by calling you pejorative names like contentious, disruptive, troll, vandal, wikilawyer, or whatever else they happen to please, then that is a serious form of libel. These vague but pompous-sounding notices are frequently signed as if they came from ostensible authorities like "per ruling of administrators, Jimbo Wales, and/or the Arbitration Committee", even though we all know that the vast majority of them never get even that much of a Kangaroo Court hearing, but are generated by a spontaneous lynch mob of one or two Administrators who found themselves annoyed once or twice by somebody who had the audacity to criticize their Holinesses.

If you seek a Class Action Suit of major proportions, then that is the place to look.

Jonny

The Mantanmoreland/Gary Weiss bomb has yet to detonate. That is surely an even bigger scandal than Essjay's

I bring the chocolate, the graham crackers, and the marshmallows. The warmth of that fire should be very pleasant.

Jonny:

Only lawyers can give "legal advice," but admins certainly throw around reckless accusations. I don't see where they're coming from exactly, but the Wikipedia Review seems to provide some insight.

I've also made legitimate requests for public information from them, and they don't even respond. Along with a question of libel, I wonder if that would provide another basis: the Wikimedia Foundation's lack of compliance with IRS rules. I'd also like to know where they receive and spend their funds.

Also along with a question of libel, I'd argue they've invaded my privacy, flame warring even on the USENET. I wonder if there are some bases for a suit and whether it would be worthwhile? They're also real sensitive to discussing legal matters on Wikipedia.

Vincent

Well, something happened this week that hasn't happened since August of 2006. The Wikimedia Foundation didn't break the $1,000 mark on 6 out of 7 days, in terms of daily donations.

Oh, and Danny Wool resigned.

Somey, you asked what it might look like if Wikipedia were to collapse? I think we're seeing the first signs this week. You know when they implode a building, the first thing you see in the initial microseconds are little flashes of light where the charges are going off, but the building is (to any person's eye) still standing, and you're really too far away to hear the "pops"? Danny's exit and the low-tide donations are two such flashes of light. That Wikipedia is still standing is only a deceptive illusion.

Greg

In my humble opinion, this is what it will look like when Wikipedia collapses.

First, and you are already seeing this - the diminishing quality and reputation of Wikipedia due to scandals. Scandals which cannot be ignored by the civilians and mainstream media.

Second, you're just beginning to see this, it will become very unfashionable and negative PR for anybody, and/or corporations to give money to Wikipedia. What then will happen is they will start having trouble making their bills and maintaining their servers. While at the same time, the load on those servers as people start coming in, and editing, vandalizing and the like, and the pressures to those unpaid staff of administrators will not be able to keep up and will get tired of up and stop participating.

The third thing that will happen with the inability for for the administrative staff to keep up with maintaining the biographies will cause another crisis when someone semi-notable with a great deal of money is unhappy with their biography and figures that they are going to shut it down for good. Bam... there will inevitably be a class-action lawsuit filed against them to bust through section 230 at which case their credibility, in the eyes of those donators; donations for Wikipedia will completely dry up to just a trickle.

This probably will happen within the next 12 to 18 months in which case Wikipedia goes dark. And some domain scab grabs the wikipedia.com domation and uses it for promoting Viagra pills.

That's just what I think, as I contemplate the inevitable scenario which is now beginning to play out.

Any rate, that's just my rambling musing.

Make that three flashes of light, now that Brad Patrick is stepping down.

Notice that NOWHERE in Brad's resignation note did he mention the CO-founder of Wikipedia, the God-King, Jimmy Wales. In the one 10-minute telephone conversation I had with Mr. Patrick, I got the distinct sense that he was himself taxed by the numerous challenging legal "situations" that Jimmy Wales would create for the Foundation. I think I see the pattern here.

Look for a pile of rubble by July.

Greg

Time to make popcorn!

Curtis LeMay, and the eighth Air Force is now approaching the Reichstag. And he ain't Spiderman.

Which means the Russians can't be far behind. Gott in Himmel!

Wikipedia in shambles - what a great birthday present for me (July)!
That'll have to force the powers that be to rethink a few things.

Cue Herb Morrison: