Wikipedia Exceeds Fundraising Target, But Continues Asking For More Money (theregister.co.uk)

Reader Andreas Kolbe writes: The fundraising banners on Wikipedia this year are so effective that halfway through its December fundraising campaign, the Wikimedia Foundation has already exceeded its $25 million donations target for the entire month, reports The Register. A few weeks ago, Jimmy Wales promised that the Wikimedia Foundation would "stop the fundraiser if enough money were raised in shorter than the planned time". But there's no sign of the Foundation doing that. When asked about this more recently, a Wikimedia Foundation spokesperson remained non-committal on ending the campaign early. The most recent audited accounts of the Wikimedia Foundation showed net assets of $92 million and revenue of $82 million. None of this money, incidentally, pays for writing or checking Wikipedia content – that's the job of unpaid volunteers – and only $2 million are spent on internet hosting every year.

Comments

Misleading

[Thelasko]

Hosting is not Wikipedia's largest expense. Salaries are. They spent $32 million on salaries. Total expenses were $67 million.

Even considering all of the expenses, their net income was positive $16 million last year.

Re:Misleading

[ckatko]

People commenting are just guessing.

They used to have ONE or two full-time engineers running the entire site till like... 2008 or so. Then they started hiring TONS of people running the "Foundation" including marketing, events, charity shit, "diversity consultant" hires. Basically, an army of losers who don't do anything productive and spend their time justifying their existence and partying.

Basically, Wikipedia has become the US college system. A few productive teachers, surrounded by an army of "administrators" and their assistants... and their assistants... and their assistants.

Hell, check out one of their own projections. Only 35% is engineering. That's pretty much the opposite of "lean" for a company that PRODUCES NO CONTENT.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/w...

But don't take my word for it. Check the glass door:

https://www.glassdoor.com/Revi...

>This is an organization in crisis. It is highly dysfunctional, there is a strong culture of secrecy, which is surprising for an organization working in open knowledge. Teams are siloed and isolated, C-levels disagree on direction, ED has lost the support needed to do her job, BoT is in a freeze and too weak to drive change. It is a toxic and depressing place to work.

>Bureaucracy and secrecy creeps in unless regularly checked. Our Board sometimes wants us to be a venture-style tech company rather than a knowledge-empowerment nonprofit. Community consultation adds a layer of complexity to every new venture (but its worth it!).

>PHP. Low pay. Fear of changes. Top management has almost completely flipped since Lila took over in 2015. (including bosses who have come and gone since then) It's really tough to get work done when your boss keeps changing.

>Many mid-level managers are inexperienced and have trouble supporting their employees. Overall lack of strategy and lack of will to make positive change. The communication can be disrespectful. The foundation values diversity but fails to make it one of their own priorities.

>Politics! Politics! Politics! Performance review process outdated.

>Tolerance of non performers, Hostile behaviors by some staff threaten continued diversity/innovation.

Trying to build up an endowment

[LordNicholas]

Per their financial statements, they're trying to build up an endowment (like a university and many other large non-profits) so they can support themselves off investment income, and not need to rely as much on direct donations. Those incremental donations after the fundraising goal is reached are even more valuable since they can go directly towards growing the endowment.

During the year ended June 30, 2016, the Foundation entered into an agreement with the Tides Foundation to establish the Wikimedia Endowment as a Collective Action Fund to act as a permanent safekeeping fund to generate income to ensure a base level of support for the Wikimedia projects in perpetuity. The Endowment is independent from the Foundation. On June 29, 2016, the Foundation provided an irrevocable grant in the amount of $5 million to the Tides Foundation for the purpose of the Wikimedia Endowment. The amount is recorded in awards and grants expense.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/w...

Re:The reason they keep raising money

[Steve Hamlin]

$78.5 million of the $92 million of net assets are cash and short-term financial investments.

2016 Donations & Revenue (gross inflows)
$ 82 million

2016 Expenses (selected):

$ 32 million - Salaries
$ 11 million - Awards & Grants
$ 6 million - Professional Services
$ 4.8 million - Other Operating Expenses
$ 3.6 million - Donation Processing Expenses
$ 2.6 million - Travel, Conferences & Special Events
$ 2.0 million - Internet Hosting

2016 "Net Income" (increase in unrestricted net assets)
$ 15 million

See for yourself: https://upload.wikimedia.org/w...

Re: Why does anyone donate to Wikipedia?

[Andreas Kolbe]

About ten years ago, Jimmy Wales said about Wikipedia (time code 4:35):

“So, we’re doing around 1.4 billion page views monthly. So, it’s really gotten to be a huge thing. And everything is managed by the volunteers and the total monthly cost for our bandwidth is about 5,000 dollars, and that’s essentially our main cost. We could actually do without the employee ... We actually hired Brion [Vibber] because he was working part-time for two years and full-time at Wikipedia so we actually hired him so he could get a life and go to the movies sometimes.”

In 2008, when Wikipedia was already the world's number 8 website, the Wikimedia Foundation survived on $5 million (vs. $82 million last year). So, yes, you can have a top-ten website – written entirely by unpaid volunteers – for a fraction of the current cost.