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Wikipedia On the Brink? Or Crying Wolf?

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the all-about-the-benjamins dept.

netbuzz writes "Might Wikipedia 'disappear' three or four months from now absent a major infusion of cash donations? The suggestion has been made by Florence Devouard, chairwoman of the Wikimedia Foundation. And while her spokesperson has since backpedaled off that dire prediction, there can be little doubt that the encyclopedia anyone can edit could use a few more benefactors to go along with all those editors."

12 of 380 comments (clear)

  1. I really doubt it. by suso · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Wikipedia is the "Great Library of Alexandria" of our time. And like open source, it will only die when enough people lose interest of it. And that flame is
    far from going out or being stomped out by political or social interests.

    Didn't the wikimedia foundation used to provide a way for anyone to download the entire 25GB+ database for wikipedia? So anyone could pick up with it. Even if
    that's not still the case, the torch would likely be passed onto someone else.

    After all, look how long defunct operating systems last.

    1. Re:I really doubt it. by Short+Circuit · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Most open source software doesn't really require money to develop, just people time. Wikipedia requires not just people with time, but bandwidth. Oodles and oodles of bandwidth.

      Perhaps it needs a P2P-based hosting system to serve up its content. That would be quite the task, though.

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    2. Re:I really doubt it. by MrAnnoyanceToYou · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Noone RTFA. The foundation's not in trouble, that was taken out of context. They have four months of cash reserves, which is good for a project that uses that much bandwidth. Good for them. Next time they have a funding goal I'll donate, if I'm employed at the time.

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    3. Re:I really doubt it. by limecat4eva · · Score: 5, Insightful

      How can you consider it the "Great Library of Alexandria" when its administrators ban on sight (with no warning) anyone that happens to have a username in non-Western script? It happened to me last year and left me with a great feeling of disgust, not to mention I lost my edit history and couldn't even login thereafter for 48 hours. And a little research shows that even though it's not sanctioned policy (does such a thing exist?) on English Wikipedia, there are enough rogue admins who enforce it as if it were policy—again, without warning or explanation—to turn off a lot of would-be contributors.

      If you want to force people to have usernames in English, TELL THEM instead of banning them and then forbidding logins from that IP like a common vandal. IMO, no website so hostile to the outside world can be considered a "Great Library" of any sort.

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    4. Re:I really doubt it. by limecat4eva · · Score: 3, Insightful

      So instead of asking you politely, they just forcibly ban you when they see you trying contribute? Gee, that's welcoming.

      FWIW, I was contributing in English, not moonspeak. It was my username that was in Japanese (and nothing impolite, either).

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    5. Re:I really doubt it. by thestuckmud · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I refuse to donate to any organization whose board members use my blood, sweat, and misery to jet-set around the world, hobnobbing with celebrities.
      I used to be on the board of a nonprofit, and I have a question for you: Would you volunteer to show up to tedious board meetings several times a year at your own expense (travel, lodging, lost time at work and with family), and then sit in a meeting room for a couple of days spending most of the time on tedious topics?

      I did. At least I could afford it. Some of our board members didn't have much money, but they found ways to get there and a spot on a floor or couch to sleep on. What made it worthwhile was the good work the organization did, plus the opportunity to spend time with some very cool, like-minded people.

      Now I don't know squat about how Wikimedia is run, but if it is like many small non-profits, board members are expected to contribute. Generously. Our board was accused of wasting donations on travel even though we paid our own way. Forgive me if I am sensitive to this issue, but you haven't come close to demonstrating that Wikimedia is using its funds improperly. My experience was that the people who argued as you do had no clue about the organization.

  2. Ad by in2mind · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If things were really that bad, wouild it hurt to have a tiny adsense ad?

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  3. Re:Its assets? by arose · · Score: 3, Insightful

    While the article claims Wiki's assets are valuable, I doubt that.
    And your wrong, wikipedia.org is one of the most visited domains on the internet, usualy you just can't buy that sort of exposure.
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    Analogies don't equal equalities, they are merely somewhat analogous.
  4. Wales for profit? by JeffSh · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Wales is a business man, not a do-gooder. His for-profit wikia.com venture stands ready to replace wikipedia, and with all Wikipedia content under a GFDL license, he has the legal right to do so.

    i don't want to be a conspiracy theorist, but everything seems to be falling into place for a commercial takeover of the wikimedia foundation. Wikimedia bankruptcy, recent pushes on Wikipedia to remove all not-for-free content, etc. they figure it's time to cash in.

  5. Re:It's an old saying... by DoofusOfDeath · · Score: 3, Insightful

    That which is worthwhile survives...that which is not, passes away.

    I get it. Things like clean air, habeus corpus, and logging-free federal forests aren't worthwhile. I was wondering why they were passing away...

  6. Re:Is it worth it? by pilkul · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Wait, a game engine is more valuable to you than a vast free easily-accessible encyclopedia? Your priorities are remarkably short-sighted. Do you have any idea the kind of subtle impact Wikipedia is having on society and the economy as a whole? Anyone is capable of quickly getting the basic facts, with usually reasonable reliability, on just about any topic. It's an advance in information dissemination comparable to the creation of the first paper encyclopedia in the 18th century.

    I rarely visit wikipedia - and usually when I do there are other similar google results where I can get the same information, wikipedia just has a slightly cleaner aggregation of it.

    This doesn't correspond at all to my experience. But I imagine you only search for computer-related topics.

  7. crocodile tears and fat paychecks by James+Walsh · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Anyone familiar with public broadcasting should be familiar with this sort of "your silence is killing us" appeal. So they have only four months operating revenue on hand? Many small businesses have only short-term reserves for operational purposes. Many charities support next quarter's activities with this quarter's donations. Even PBS continues to struggle with a desire to fund operations from endowment proceeds when charitable donors don't seem to find the charity worthy of endowment funding. Wikimedia Foundation can get in line with thousands of other charitable solicitors who believe their cause is worthy of big money. Until that money comes in, there's plenty Wikimedia Foundation can do to cut expenses, which have skyrocketed in recent months. First, they can cut payroll, which has grown exponentially in the past year. It could cut expenses such as the recent hiring of a head-hunter firm to select the foundation's next well-paid executive director. That's an odd approach -- wikis are good for writing dubious biographies but apparently the community that is entrusted with the responsibility of compiling "all the world's knowledge" is not qualified to select from among itself a qualified executive director. Then the Foundation could look at its travel budget. Wikimedia Foundation supposedly thrives on volunteer contributions, but some volunteers get more perks than others, including subsidized vacations at Wikipedia's many off-line community-building events. The problem in the travel budget is that Wikimedia Foundation leaders - especially Jimmy Wales - claim the Wikipedia community "knows each other" through online personas. They don't. Wikipedia writers know only the slice of other contributors' personas they choose to reveal. That's not enough to create the critical mass of a community, so contributors, with the Foundation's blessing, created several other venues where core members could conspire outside the collaborative, all-edits-are-preserved, know-them-by-their-work constraints of Wikipedia. And this sort of international community-building, outside the low-cost online venue, is costly. The Foundation has footed much of the bill for building an offline community using donors' cash. Even if the Wikimedia Foundation were to fold, which might not be a bad thing, Wikipedia content and development of MediaWiki software would survive. Wikipedia has been forked by hundreds of other sites. If wikis work, as the founders of WF claim, they can work elsewhere. Chances are, if the Foundation folds, the first company to benefit will be Wikia, Inc. -- founded by Wikimedia Foundation board members -- and which offers free hosting to almost any wiki that can demonstrate public interest. Hosting by a for-profit company would be a more honest approach. Instead of presenting the project as "undoubtably (sic) good" as Jimbo Wales presents wikipedia, it could be presented as would be any other enterprise -- an effort of its principles to advance their social standing (profit) while advancing their individual ideals (in Wales' case, libertarian objectivism of the Ann Rand variety).