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I have to object to this. Wikimedia as of their audited 2019 financial statements (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/3/31/Wikimedia_Foundation_A

I have to object to this. Wikimedia as of their audited 2019 financial statements (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/3/31/Wikimedia_Foundation_Audit_Report_-_FY18-19.pdf https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/3/31/Wikim...) already has ~$53m in short term investments, leaving ~$101m in "cash and cash equivalents", which notably often includes Treasury bonds, CDs, etc, anyways. So they are likely already investing all of their cash into safe, low-yield investments already. Even if they weren't, the ~$154m they have free for investments, would only gross ~$1.2m in 10 year Treasuries, or at most $5-6m in relatively higher-yield investment grade corporate bonds. Looking at their expenses in 2019, even if you cut donation processing expenses to $0, cut awards and grants to $0, cut travel and conferences to $0, strip out depreciation and amortization, and cut their $46m payroll in half to $23m (which at a fully loaded cost of $200k/employee, is only 115 employees for one of the most widely used websites in the world), you would still be looking at annual operating expenses of ~$45m. There is absolutely no way that Wikipedia/the Wikimedia Foundation could survive without any donations - they have $154m between cash and investments, and would need to support $45m in annual operating expenses, even with these fantastically high budget cuts. That means they'd need to net, after taxes, almost 30% return on their assets every year, just to tread water, and only after cutting their budget essentially in half. Wikipedia has 51.1 million articles in 291 languages, is something like the 5th most visited website in the US, 10th in the world, and they manage to do this without running any ads. Can't we be thankful for the incredible human library of knowledge they've built, and chip in a few dollars if we are able, instead of complaining and telling them they should not accept donations?

PoachedSausage 6y ago
I'm personally very thankful for the library of knowledge that is Wikipedia. For a lot of searches on technical matters I usually bypass Google and go directly to Wikipedia. I find that you can often use the references and links to bypass the Ad infested web to some extent.
xigency 6y ago
On the flip side, the website hosting only costs $2.3 million annually [0] and the content creators work for free. Even if the Wikimedia Foundation could not survive like that, a lean Wikipedia operation clearly could. [0] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/3/31/Wikimedia_Foundation_Audit_Report_-_FY18-19.pdf https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/3/31/Wikim...
- levthedev 6y ago
  I disagree. There is no such thing as a "lean" site that is as popular as Wikipedia (top 5-10 US depending on the day). I believe they are likely the leanest website in the Alexa top 30. The only site that I see that is leaner in the top rankings is Craigslist, currently at #38 in America, and Craigslist is a famously, fantastically, uniquely lean site (in some people's opinions, even to a fault). Hosting costs for Wikipedia are "only" $2.3m, but imagine the legal expense they have, fighting likely millions of takedown requests, malicious lawsuits, complying with local laws and regulations in China, Russia, etc, paying a team of top software engineers to handle running a top-visited site (that by the way, has almost no downtime), a security threat model that includes nation-state actors, and the responsibility that if they fail (by being hacked, or sued, or DDOSd, or whatever), they will have let humanity's library be harmed. I just can't understand how any casual bystander can complain about Wikipedia or their funding/organizational model. If you don't like it, just don't donate money.
  - xyzzyz 6y ago
    > but imagine the legal expense they have, fighting likely millions of takedown requests, malicious lawsuits, complying with local laws and regulations in China, Russia Wikimedia Foundation is not fighting any takedown requests. Wikimedia Foundation had exactly ten DMCA requests last year[1]. That’s a bit short of “millions” you believe it does. It does not comply with any local regulations in China or Russia, or elsewhere, because it does not operate in China or Russia (or really anywhere outside US, except caching servers in NL and Singapore). Wikipedia is actually completely blocked in China, and the fact that you did not know that signals your utter unfamiliarity with the realities of Wikipedia and Wikimedia Foundation. > paying a team of top software engineers to handle running a top-visited site (that by the way, has almost no downtime), It was already a top visited site when its development team consisted of a single person, Brion Vibber. There have been very little significant development since then, and if there had been zero development since then, you’d probably not even notice. Now, to be sure, at this scale, it needs some full time round the clock reliability engineers, but you can easily see that their headcount keeps growing, but their site and infrastructure is mostly unchanged. [1] - https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:DMCA_2019 https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:DMCA_2019
xeeeeeeeeeeenu 6y ago
>Wikipedia has 51.1 million articles in 291 languages, is something like the 5th most visited website in the US, 10th in the world, and they manage to do this without running any ads. Can't we be thankful for the incredible human library of knowledge they've built, and chip in a few dollars if we are able, instead of complaining and telling them they should not accept donations? But the donations don't go to the people who wrote those articles!

PoachedSausage 6y ago

I'm personally very thankful for the library of knowledge that is Wikipedia. For a lot of searches on technical matters I usually bypass Google and go directly to Wikipedia. I find that you can often use the references and links to bypass the Ad infested web to some extent.

xigency 6y ago

On the flip side, the website hosting only costs $2.3 million annually [0] and the content creators work for free. Even if the Wikimedia Foundation could not survive like that, a lean Wikipedia operation clearly could. [0] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/3/31/Wikimedia_Foundation_Audit_Report_-_FY18-19.pdf https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/3/31/Wikim...

levthedev 6y ago
I disagree. There is no such thing as a "lean" site that is as popular as Wikipedia (top 5-10 US depending on the day). I believe they are likely the leanest website in the Alexa top 30. The only site that I see that is leaner in the top rankings is Craigslist, currently at #38 in America, and Craigslist is a famously, fantastically, uniquely lean site (in some people's opinions, even to a fault). Hosting costs for Wikipedia are "only" $2.3m, but imagine the legal expense they have, fighting likely millions of takedown requests, malicious lawsuits, complying with local laws and regulations in China, Russia, etc, paying a team of top software engineers to handle running a top-visited site (that by the way, has almost no downtime), a security threat model that includes nation-state actors, and the responsibility that if they fail (by being hacked, or sued, or DDOSd, or whatever), they will have let humanity's library be harmed. I just can't understand how any casual bystander can complain about Wikipedia or their funding/organizational model. If you don't like it, just don't donate money.
- xyzzyz 6y ago
  > but imagine the legal expense they have, fighting likely millions of takedown requests, malicious lawsuits, complying with local laws and regulations in China, Russia Wikimedia Foundation is not fighting any takedown requests. Wikimedia Foundation had exactly ten DMCA requests last year[1]. That’s a bit short of “millions” you believe it does. It does not comply with any local regulations in China or Russia, or elsewhere, because it does not operate in China or Russia (or really anywhere outside US, except caching servers in NL and Singapore). Wikipedia is actually completely blocked in China, and the fact that you did not know that signals your utter unfamiliarity with the realities of Wikipedia and Wikimedia Foundation. > paying a team of top software engineers to handle running a top-visited site (that by the way, has almost no downtime), It was already a top visited site when its development team consisted of a single person, Brion Vibber. There have been very little significant development since then, and if there had been zero development since then, you’d probably not even notice. Now, to be sure, at this scale, it needs some full time round the clock reliability engineers, but you can easily see that their headcount keeps growing, but their site and infrastructure is mostly unchanged. [1] - https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:DMCA_2019 https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:DMCA_2019

xeeeeeeeeeeenu 6y ago

>Wikipedia has 51.1 million articles in 291 languages, is something like the 5th most visited website in the US, 10th in the world, and they manage to do this without running any ads. Can't we be thankful for the incredible human library of knowledge they've built, and chip in a few dollars if we are able, instead of complaining and telling them they should not accept donations? But the donations don't go to the people who wrote those articles!