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Wikipedia Almost Reaches $6 Million Target
Posted by
CmdrTaco
on Wed Dec 31, 2008 09:01 AM
from the i-remember-what-heat-felt-like dept.
from the i-remember-what-heat-felt-like dept.
An anonymous reader noted a story discussing the aftermath of the Wikipedia fundraiser and says "The writer suggests that Wikipedia can earn $50-100 million a month by a simple text ad. He also suggests that contributors should be financially rewarded and that the lack of financial reward is the reason why 98.3% of registered Wikipedia users are inactive.
What do you think? Should Wikimedia Foundation put ads on Wikipedia? Should contributors be financially rewarded? What compensation structure would be best?" Personally I think the independence of Wikipedia is great, and any advertising would not only compromise that integrity, but give contributors a sense of entitlement that the site is better off without.
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Submission: Wikipedia Almost Reaches $6 Million Target - Just by Anonymous Coward
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Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:5, Interesting)
I would be happy to have EVERYTHING advertiser-free (including the street full of annoying billboards near my house,
If you live in california, you might just be in luck. There was a recent article in the LA Times (I think, I ran across it in google news) about just how poorly billboard codes are enforced and how a bunch of regular citizens have had to take up the slack to get illegal billboards taken down. So it may well be that some of those annoying billboards really are illegal and all it takes is bitching loud enough to get them removed.
Or, you could move to Hawaii where no billboards are allowed anywhere.
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Re:Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:5, Insightful)
I think a lot more people would donate both time and money to Wikipedia if they just sorted out a few of their policies.
The fact that a lot of good articles are getting deleted at the moment due to "not being notable enough" prevented me from giving them a penny.
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Re:Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, the 'notability' guidelines are for crap, really. Its completely arbitrary as to what the mod of the day thinks is 'notable' or not.
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Re:Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:5, Funny)
Which was great, because the owner most definitely did not want the article on the site. He signed up and politely requested the article removed (Something along the lines of:"I'd rather have a cactus shoved up my ass then see an article about me and my website on wikipedia. Did I mention the cactus would be on fire and covered in bees?")
Almost immediately many of the moderators started rethinking their original decision and decided the topic was notable enough after all.
So, I don't really see how it's arbitrary. It's clearly a spite based system.
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Re:Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:4, Insightful)
Why not? Just curious. Especially if Wikipedia develops into something everlasting it will be a way to document that you were here. I may not give a damn about you, but why not have the information there in an autobiography type layout.
Parent
Re:Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Sigh... every time any article on Slashdot mentions Wikipedia, there's always a flood of people saying "oh, no, I don't dare write anything lest my poor little article get deleted". Yes, there are cases of admins abusing power and deleting articles that never should be deleted. However, these cases are few and far between compared to the number of articles that are deleted for the legitimate reason that no one except the author would ever want to read about the topic.
Have you actually even read WP:N [wikipedia.org]? The third sentence of the page begins "Notability is distinct from 'fame,' 'importance,' or 'popularity'...". For the most part, there is a very simple rule for deciding what is notable: if someone independent of the specific community of people related to the topic has written about the topic, it is notable; otherwise, it is not notable. Many stubs can automatically be saved from deletion by spending five minutes Googling for references.
In short: the few unusual cases of articles being deleted improperly has caused everyone to believe that there are no solid criteria for deletion. There are. Read them [wikipedia.org]. And, of course, there's always Deletion Review [wikipedia.org].
Finally, I refer you to one of my previous comments [slashdot.org].
Parent
Re:Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:5, Informative)
The fact that a lot of good articles are getting deleted at the moment due to "not being notable enough" prevented me from giving them a penny
I don't suppose you're doing something about this, like for instance dropping by WP:AFD and commenting on discussions of articles you don't think should be deleted? Or commenting on the discussion pages of WP:N and the other notability guidelines that you think they should be more relaxed?
If a critical mass of users started doing this (and I see more than enough pissed off people _outside_ of the site to achieve this) then we could change the situation. As it is, I only see myself and one or two others. Plus the people who only seem to care about one or two articles. We need people committed to the cause of keeping all these articles.
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Re:Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Why? Why should a large group of random people over the internet fight to keep pages up on Wikipedia? I've browsed a number of talk pages and any disputes over policy come down to a single person's complaint and a bunch of WP regulars pounding on him/her for being wrong.
So if the community most involved in WP doesn't want the articles, and the foundation running the site doesn't want to change their policies, then why should a group gather with pitchforks and fight? The site is obviously not interested, so go elsewhere. (Developers, for example, can follow the link in my sig.)
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Re:Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:5, Informative)
I've browsed a number of talk pages and any disputes over policy come down to a single person's complaint and a bunch of WP regulars pounding on him/her for being wrong.
Exactly. I put up what I thought was the good fight, but it came down to me versus a regular, so I lost by default. My interest in repeating the process is nil, especially since I'm powerless to have any real say in the end result.
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Re:Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:5, Interesting)
The issue there in my experience is the same problem we have with US politics - too many people who care far too much about their own interpretation of the notability policy are in positions of influence. We're talking the kind of people who live on wikipedia the same way some of us live on /. or IRC or WoW or AIM.
It doesn't matter if we're right. What matters to them is we don't agree with them. So they'll stomp on us and shit on us and delete entries anyway, out of spite or some twisted logic that what was originally founded as a public resource is somehow divinely theirs.
The wikipedia editors that push this crap are the internet equivalent of The Religious Right in american politics, and are about as open to reason. The only way to change the situation is to effectively usurp or remove the ruling influence.
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Re:Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:5, Interesting)
In a lot of ways it is like online communism.
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Re:Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:5, Insightful)
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NPR for the Web (Score:5, Interesting)
That long end of the "Free Lunch Buffet" is starting to catch up to us.
Anything sufficiently large eventually accumulates overhead costs from vendors who want to be paid.
We're all talking about ads here; Wikipedia recently went more the "Please Donate" NPR route. Other than creating another layer to manage, I'm almost smelling a fork. Maybe there's room for a Wiki variant paid for by ads, but also less strict on notability, etc. It would be known as a more rough&tumble cousin site, but if you liked Original Research blended into articles it could be interesting.
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Re:Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Man everyone assumes malice and being able to be influenced by advertisers. You can be both ad sponsored AND not have an agenda. Newspapers do this by having a separate ad/biz department and news department... even the Editor In Chief at a newspaper has no say on the ads content. Wikipedia could produce a similar policy.
They shouldn't pay contributors though, and they should only accept enough money to handle operations.
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Re:Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Newspapers do this by having a separate ad/biz department and news department... even the Editor In Chief at a newspaper has no say on the ads content. Wikipedia could produce a similar policy.
You say this like somebody who has never worked for a magazine or a newspaper. In practice, the effectiveness of keeping ads as a separate department varies from place to place.
Even in the places where it's strongest, the advertising is still a consideration. A journalist writing a major negative story on a major advertiser will know it. Their editor will know it too. Even if nobody says a word about it, there is still a conflict of interest, and conflicts of interest are incredibly hard to manage.
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Re:Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't see how putting a little Google display ad at the top of every Wikipedia page would make the site in any way influenced by Google or anyone else. Yeah, it would be nice if there was an alternative to Google, and maybe the ads could be split (1/3 of pages get a Google ad, the other 2/3s split amongst the next 3 or 4 largest suppliers of display ads).
What I do see as a problem is that if Wikipedia stopped running on a shoestring and started having $100M per year in revenue, it would change the controlling culture drastically, and that could be a big problem. Volunteers are there for the sharing of information, paid staffers are there for the paycheck, and (modern American) executives are there for the massive perks.
I think a good compromise plan would be to establish a projected required operating budget (maybe $10M / year, growing at 10% per year until reaching $100M / year), and put up the display ads, rake in the cash far faster than they need it, set the excess aside in an endowment (hopefully invested wisely, whatever that means), and when the endowment can fund future operations from interest alone, kill the display ads.
The big unknown in such a plan is whether the administrators could really be trusted to respect the terms of the endowment disbursement.
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Re:Doesn't really matter what *WE* think, does it? (Score:4, Insightful)
I think a good compromise plan would be to establish a projected required operating budget (maybe $10M / year, growing at 10% per year until reaching $100M / year), and put up the display ads, rake in the cash far faster than they need it [...]
Stop there. Why raise it faster than necessary? Surely Wikipedia could display ads on only a percentage of page views, tweaking the number as needed to maintain a neutral revenue.
I think a simple: "Why?" is in order... If you've got a cash generating machine and the ability to set up your own perpetual endowment, why would you throttle your income and risk financial hardship in the future?
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Sure do it, if it keeps it free (Score:5, Insightful)
I have no problem with this at all. Many people choose to not "pay" for TV but in exchange they have to watch advertisements.
I would rather put up with ads and still get to use the wikipedia free of charge than to loose it all together (or have to start paying for it.) I do the same thing here at Slashdot. ;)
Re:Sure do it, if it keeps it free (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem with an advertising model is that it could all too easily compromise Wikipedia's neutrality. It's a well-known problem, for example, that product reviews published in magazines can be unreliable due to pressure from advertisers. If Wikipedia became dependent on advertising, how could it resist such pressure?
Parent
Re:Sure do it, if it keeps it free (Score:5, Insightful)
True, however wikipedia has a lot more oversight.
The magazine article is finalized when its published. Wikipedia can be changed at any time.
Wikipedia is more like a discussion forum than a traditional encylopedia... which is what makes it more useful and typically more current and topical.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Many people choose to not "pay" for TV but in exchange they have to watch advertisements.
That's why I get pissed off by advertisements on cable TV (in BR, at least, that happens all the time): I pay for TV AND have to watch comercials. Worst of two worlds :(
Monetary Reward : Bad Idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Monetary Reward : Bad Idea (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:Monetary Reward : Bad Idea (Score:5, Insightful)
The little I know of economic theory suggests that replacing intrinsic rewards - like the warm fuzzy feeling you get from contributing - with a small cash reward means that people will value contributing to Wikipedia at the price of the small cash reward. This is invariably less than the dollar amount they'd attach to an act of charity that also spreads knowledge.
tl;dr: don't offer cash rewards for people doing things for fuzzy emotional reasons. It doesn't work.
Parent
1 cent per search (Score:3, Interesting)
I think they should ask users to pay 1 cent per search.
Not demand that they pay it, but simply ask them to.
Track the # of searches for registered users and display it in the corner somewhere.
fees (Score:3, Insightful)
good idea. 1 cent for them, 40 cents for the transaction fee. You really need to jump to $5+ to make it worthwhile. So how long do you think it will take an average user to hit 500 wikipedia searches? I don't know if I've ever visited that many pages.
98.3% of registered users inactive (Score:3, Funny)
Probably because they don't know anything.
I'm glad they're inactive. who would keep up with all of those crap changes?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I agree with the author (Score:5, Insightful)
Financial Reward (TM) (Score:5, Insightful)
"He also suggests that contributors should be financially rewarded and that the lack of financial reward is the reason why 98.3% of registered Wikipedia users are inactive."
Oh! The writer couldn't be farther from truth. 98.3% of users are inactive because rest of the 1.7% users have formed a self-serving "community", and most people who are contributing in their spare time don't have the energy and will to fight their way inside this community.
On a side note, I heard that most content is generated by anonymous users. So why so stress on registered users?
I would not be surprised if such a suggestion is accepted. Community needs care! :)
The "community" will kill Wikipedia (Score:3, Insightful)
Now, they try to be a "real" encyclopedia. The problem is, it will never be a real encyclopedia. Quoting Wikipedia will not be considered a valid source.
Quit worrying about content that isn't encyclopedia quality, and then maybe normal people will contribute again.
Re:The "community" will kill Wikipedia (Score:5, Insightful)
Quoting any encyclopedia is not "considered a valid source" in any scholarly work.
An encyclopedia is where you get the basic ideas and the pointers to the real sources.
Parent
Re: Quoting (Score:4, Insightful)
However, we don't do scholarly work here. Slashdot is a reasonably intelligent discussion forum, and a Wiki link to get the rawest of raw basics of something is more accurate than complete non-information we had to start with.
Parent
Too many assumptions.. (Score:5, Insightful)
The article makes a perilous, and all too common, assumption - that the addition of adverts will make no difference to the way users respond to the site. It's getting 10 billion hits now, but would "a simple text advert" drive any of them elsewhere? Would the text advert drive away contributors who are basically what Wikipedia is selling? Would someone else fork wikipedia and set up an ad-free rival?
It's easy to think that massive traffic now equates to massive traffic forever, and you can monetize that traffic without upsetting people, but you can't. It's that simple. Introducing big changes (and it would be a BIG change) would have far-reaching consequences that I don't believe the article writer has fully considered.
Re:Too many assumptions.. (Score:4, Interesting)
I thought there could be an opt-in for ads.
People who want to support wikipedia could choose to view it with a couple ads.
Then they could show ads to the people who opted in.
They could even stop showing ads when they have enough money to pay for bandwidth, servers and whatever.
As a result, nobody would be pissed off and since the money stops pouring in when there is too much of it, we reduce the pressure to pay contributors back as the money was only to pay for the operating costs.
Parent
The outlaw Jimmy Whales (Score:5, Interesting)
I can understand the idea that by accepting advertising dollars, you somehow compromise your journalistic integrity.
NPR (I am pretty right wing, but NPR is the only non-braindead radio in my area) does a good job of what is called a firewall [findarticles.com] whereby editorial teams are separated from funding decisions and funding teams are not included in editorial decisions.
It's pretty reasonable that Wikimedia could do the same thing. I know, not having ads separates wikipedia from the rest of the icky for-profit websites out there...but as another /. poster pointed out: begging for money all the time isn't a business model.
Let's set some ground rules (Score:5, Interesting)
1. Keep them simple: no flashy "shoot the monkey and win $10,000" kind of ads.
2. Make them context sensitive but not insensitive: No porn ads on "Erectile disfuction" articles.
3. Try to use the ads for the common good: focus on open and innovative initiatives
4. Make some sort of mechanism for users to rate the ads (other than by (not)clicking on them)
Any more ideas on the subject?
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Very similar to how Public Broadcast System in the US used to work.
ie: "Sunkist Raisins proudly supports PBS programming and the development of young minds through proper nutrition"
Neutral and relevant to the theme of PBS and still gets advert message across.
Re:Let's set some ground rules (Score:4, Insightful)
Very similar to how Public Broadcast System in the US used to work.
ie: "Sunkist Raisins proudly supports PBS programming and the development of young minds through proper nutrition"
Neutral and relevant to the theme of PBS and still gets advert message across.
I've never much cared for that stuff. "Sponsorship" where the advertiser still gets mentioned by name and function is just advertising to a different type of audience. In the early days of television and radio, the above is exactly how regular advertising was done.
Parent
Public Traded... (Score:3, Informative)
I would say no but not for that Lame reason the author mentioned. Wikipedia is a not for profit organization (NPO), the real difference between a NPO and a For Profit Organization (FPO) oddly enough isn't profit NPO reason for being a NPO because they just account it as Excess Revenue, then treat it internally like profit. But the Excess Revenue for a NPO should go to focus on its mission. So you have excess revenue well put the money in the bank and use it for a dry spell, or to help expand Wikipedia. But giving the Profit back to the "Share Holders" makes it a for profit organization. Once they do that they will loose all their NPO advantages, as well the subconscious ones. You are not going to donate $5 - $50 dollars of a for profit organization, who makes enough to pay the people and keep operating efficiency. You are not donating to Wikipedia if you expect a monetary return form you investment. Within time you will get some investors who are so heavily invested in Wikipedia that Wikipedia will need to take strong considerations of their interests.
But for things like adds effecting the content. I doubt it... Most internet adds go threw companies ie Double Click / Google.... And bitting the hand that feeds them doesn't normally get them in to much trouble especially with public generated content. If Wikipedia was a Blog or had some ways of tightly controlling its content I would say advertisements could effect the service. However the danger is not by adds but paying the investors, who can change the direction of Wikipedia Corp. To do what will maximize profit.
Integrity? (Score:5, Insightful)
Why does everyone think as soon as you start to throw up billboards and advertisements that the organization in question has become unethical? Wiki provides a service to the community. Do you think those services are free? The internet has many services that are free except for advertising, simply because publishing information is very cheap (but not free). Even this website you're reading this comment on is supported by advertising. I don't think wikipedia should be any different from a million other websites that are supported by advertisements.
There are only a few other options here;
Micro-payments. Hahahaha! lolz. Great idea, but where's the infrastructure? In other news, where are those fleets of alternative-fuel cars? Oh yeah... On the drawing board, waiting for the infrastructure to be built.
Fee-based. Sure, charge maybe $12 a year for access to wikipedia... aaaaand 95% of their userbase says "Oh screw that" and the site tanks. This is pretty much committing suicide online to attempt this; Very few websites have survived the transition.
Subsidized. You know, like the BBC. Quality content, paid for by your tax dollars. Ah, wait... This is the United States and we ere hates dem dar communist bullshiat.
Clearly, advertisements is the best way to go for wiki.
Re:Integrity? (Score:5, Insightful)
When a publisher gets paid by advertisers, those advertisers have tremendous influence over what gets published. When the evening news is "brought to you by Amalgamated Profits, Inc.!", don't expect to see any coverage of that company's shady dealings.
If the Encyclopedia Britannica had ads for Pepsi on the endpapers of each volume, would you trust its entry on Coca-Cola?
And then there's the one that they're using, and that is working: asking for donations.
Parent
An imagined problem. (Score:5, Insightful)
So some guy with a blog makes a post claiming that Wikipedia needs to change. I missed the part where there was a problem.
The facts are that the goal is within spitting distance. They're 97% of the way their. So what's the problem with this model?
As for the 98% dormant figure, it's irrelevant. Isn't what we care about if Wikipedia is expanding its coverage, increasing it's quality, and serving more people? The percentage of active people could be 1%, it could or it could be 50% and that wouldn't necessarily impact quality, scope, or number served.
(I'm also fairly sure quality, scope, and number served are increasing, but I have no evidence to support that).
Please don't pay contributors (Score:3, Interesting)
Ads are ok only if really required (Score:3, Interesting)
*I* stopped contributing to Wikipedia, (Score:5, Insightful)
If you want to insist that I cite examples, then use the example of the article on naked short selling in the stock market. If you are not familiar with that case, look it up. It is hardly an isolated case.
Wikipedia was a good idea, but it has been seriously corrupted by people like these, and the foundation has not done anything to address the problem. On the contrary, it has, in some cases, supported people who have worked hard to keep certain articles inaccurate.
They don't get any of my money until they take serious measures to address this problem. Unless they do, Wikipedia will continue to go downhill... just as it would deserve.
Re:*I* stopped contributing to Wikipedia, (Score:5, Insightful)
He was not interested in whether I was correct, but only whether his version of the Wikipedia "rules" were followed, but only of course the rules he wanted to enforce, when he wanted to enforce them.
But that is only one example, involving myself. I have seen other blatant examples, and some have been on the news.
Parent
If wikipedia goes commercial, it will finally die (Score:5, Interesting)
But it may be too late anyway.
In my experience, the Wikipedia community has been deteriorating for some time now. I suspect the percentage of people inactive was lower than 98.3% a year or two ago, but people have been driven away.
Most pages of any significance have a group of people that have appointed themselves overseers, and resist new additions on general principle. Often, they have a collective ideology slant and have chased off everyone who disagrees in any significant way. In this state, the odd person coming along and trying to modify the article against the views of the established mass is shouted down, accused of going against consensus, and chased off. If you took all editors of an article over all time, there would be a completely different consensus than the momentary ones that occur when a single dissenter arrives.
Adding monetary incentives would make this worse. It would make the local tribes more militant and more powerful, finally ending the principle of a free encyclopedia that anyone can edit.
Wikipedia was an interesting and important social experiment, but I think it is past its peak and is due to decline. I personally believe that history will be more interested in the talk pages and edit logs than the content itself.
Re:$6mil a damn fortune (Score:5, Informative)
If you want to see how they spend their money, go here: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate/Questions/en#How_is_the_revenue_spent.3F [wikimediafoundation.org]
There's even an PDF of their 07-08 financial there with projections for the 08-09 FY.
Yes, $6mill could provide alot of clean drinking water.. but did you ever think that maybe information provided to those same people might enable them to provide themselves with drinking water? Wikipedia won't make you an expert in a topic, but it can definitely get you thinking about it.. it's a decent tool for getting a feel for the problems/solutions/etc on a topic of which you are unfamiliar... now we just need to provide useful/accessibility to impoverished persons so they can enable themselves.
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