5 ms·

Well, I'm not seeing any problems. The Annual Report is available here: https://wikimediafoundation.org/about/2018-annual-report/financials-leadership/ https:/

• surround 7y ago
  From the “update” sections: > [The 2016-2017 report] has numbers for "Grants and awards" and "Professional service expenses" but there is no obvious way of finding out the details of those expenditures
• anonu 7y ago
  Me neither. Sounds like a guy with a grudge. Organizations grow and morph over time. Assuming Wikipedia should be a barebones hosting platform like it was at it's start is probably dreaming.
  • Randor 7y ago
    Yep, It appears that their biggest expense is the $38,597,407 in salaries distributed to ~350 employees. This makes the average salary $110,278 at the Wikimedia Foundation. I don't really have anything negative to say about that. However I guess you could question why they need 350 employees. So I looked at the projects they are currently working on: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Complete_list_of_Wikimedia_projects https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Complete_list_of_Wikimedia_p...
    • aidenn0 7y ago
      I can see the argument for say 175 employees and a reduced scope, while building up an endowment to better weather down-years is better for WMF's long-term goals, but there's also the risk that reduced spending would cause reduced donations.
      • loeg 7y ago
        > but there's also the risk that reduced spending would cause reduced donations. Reduced spending and reduced donations would be a good outcome for Wikipedia readers (especially in the long term). Lower running costs allows putting more current revenue towards that endowment, and means the future is a bit more sustainable in less favorable economic cycles. Donations also don't exist in a vacuum; the best use of donors' limited money is probably not WMF burning a pile of it. I'd encourage, for example, https://www.givewell.org/charities/top-charities https://www.givewell.org/charities/top-charities in place of WMF giving.
        • aidenn0 7y ago
          I agree with everything you say, but presumably those in charge of the WMF believe their goals to be of sufficient importance, so arguing to them that they shouldn't spend money on those goals is silly, but one should rather couch things in terms of how best to achieve those goals.
          • loeg 7y ago
            I'm not arguing to WMF; I'm hoping to raise awareness among donors. If the WMF miss their fundraising targets due to donor displeasure, they have to come around sooner or later. Or who knows, maybe they'll run the thing into the ground. I hope not. The worst part of it for me is that they advertise it on Wikipedia as if wikipedia were going out of business. When in reality, if you give $1.00 to WMF, ~$0.03 goes to server expenses. Wikipedia is their cash cow that funds a ton of random pet projects and a dozen or so executive staff (which seems huge for a 300 person organization). If they were honest about that in their fundraising, I think they'd see flat or down revenue. I dislike the dishonesty used to solicit donations and then use them somewhere else. It feels similar to a con.
    • perl4ever 7y ago
      Is that salary, or cost of employees? I would assume that gross salaries are around half of what's spent on an employee.
• mikekchar 7y ago
  From my perspective: - What is the $7 million for "Professional service expenses"? That's 8% of the budget and I've got no clue what it might have been spent on. Salaries, travel expenses and depreciation is already accounted for. - What is the $7 million for "Other operating expenses"? Again 8% of the budget in "other" that doesn't include something that is depreciated and doesn't include travel? - What is the $2.7 million for "In kind service expenses"? To me that sounds like internal "funny money" where you are paying for one service with another service you perform. But how are they calculating the loss and what account is that money actually coming from? I worry that millions of dollars are being spent on consultants who are essentially just pocketing donations. Also, I'd really like to see the operating costs broken down because it's impossible to see what's going on here. You've got $3 million in depreciation, but what is that paying for? Desks, computers, telephones? Do they pay rent, or do they own a building? The thing that's frustrating is that there may be nothing at all wrong. For example, I can see $38 million for salaries and wages, with 300 employees. But where are the other expenses? Is that the "other expenses" section? If so, how hard would it be to break down that cost for me so that I can understand what the money is being used for? While I disagree with the approach the author of the page is taking, I completely agree that their financial statements are as clear as mud. If this was a company I was thinking of investing in, I would give it a really wide berth based on the terrible financial reporting. As a non-profit operating on public donations they should be doing a much better job.
  • qtplatypus 7y ago
    Depreciation is the cost that comes from the fact that the assets that they have purchased lose value over time.
  • therealx 7y ago
    Sounds of things like: trips to conferences, buying SaaS subscriptions/software licenses, consultants (for the first one), etc etc
  • deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  • lwf 7y ago