Comments on: Why Wikipedia asks for donation, when they can give donations?

By: mayank

mayank — Sun, 03 Apr 2011 12:30:58 +0000

@Anand – I would completely agree to your point of how people feel the frustration when they see the ad, however the ad feels bad when they are obtrusive. I never vouch for obtrusive ads.

Now, the point i’ve been making all this while is that how will that money be utilized – providing education where it is not reaching – various people in villages of “third world countries” don’t get even primary education. That money can be used to ensure that people get knowledge, it kind of matches wikipedia’s free knowledge idea.

I’m a big open-source fan myself. I use ubuntu, wordpress, firefox, chrome, apache, nginx, openoffice.org and various such projects in my day to day life and for my living and I believe that contribution of real stars make these projects!

I’m not sure that how much you are aware of Google’s contribution in making Firefox a super hit browser. Google used to give $1 for every download that used to happen from their ad banner.

ok! I guess you have no clue about the amount of money text ads make for a website. I bet that 6 million won’t take more than 1 month for wikipedia to reach that target. The amount of page views they get will be enough to make them more than 100 millions/yr.

I’m just hoping that wikipedia community thinks from these point of views as well. With one goal – providing free education across via wikipedia’s content. Providing tools that’ll help education institutes to submit content in wikipedia and what not. I’m sure I can go on and on when it comes to what can be done to utilize that money… but ultimately all depends on the community :)

By: Anand Gowda

Anand Gowda — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 07:37:45 +0000

Mayank, you underestimate how many people feel silent frustration and helplessness over ads that hinder thought and create distraction across the screen.

Asking for donations implies that the organization strives to be as lean and efficient as possible. Free flowing income from ads might open up new cost centres and expenses that did not exist or were tightly controlled before.

Ads are everywhere you go and people find Google invasive because it has to remember your details to offer relevant ads. The anonymity of wikipedia is a relief and the one standout that isn’t getting us to buy anything.

Everytime I use open source software, it gladdens me to remember that there are people out there that are human enough to put their effort, wealth and knowledge without expecting a dime in return. Wikipedia is one way non-engineers and ordinary people with specific domain knowledge can put in a few words for the overall betterment of our civilization.

Text only ads on Industry related articles for as many months as it would take to reach their target of say 6 Million, might seem like a promising half way compromise. But there are people out there very talented in priming articles with specific words for various purposes.

As long as the world isn’t short of grateful people with 30 dollars to spare, I hope things stay as it is.

By: mayank

mayank — Fri, 24 Dec 2010 05:53:06 +0000

@Matt – Thanks for dropping by. I’m glad that you took time to share your experience. Here’s a small thing that I would like to add… it’s just the way we perceive things that makes us believe or not believe in things. I believe that ads won’t really harm the quality or my faith in wikipedia as I believe in the system they’ve created. After all, the content is contributed by people like you and me. Till this date, there are people trying to abuse the system of wikipedia, however things are still neat. There are thousands of webmasters who try to add links to wikipedia, so that they can get a linkback to their site from authority site like wikipedia. I’m not sure if you are aware of that or not… i can promise that services exist that would post information about you or your business on wikipedia for some money. So will you still be able to believe wikipedia that much?

See why i’m saying this — there are people who need quality and free education in the world. Wikipedia has one motive, to provide free education, so why not do it properly?

By: Matt

Matt — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 09:50:46 +0000

Although I agree with you that they can make money from advertising (and lots of it) I believe Wikipedia strives to be as credible as possible. I wouldn’t put as much faith in an article on nuclear weapons or presidential elections if it had banners for McDonald’s across the page. It may not make a difference to the people that know the information is correct but it certainly gives an image that the information may not be reputable.

I think asking for donations has worked for them to keep this option off the table for now and it may continue to work for them. As long as they can rely on donations and continue to keep the site running and up to par, what would be the harm?

However, my personal issue with Wikipedia isn’t about the donations or advertising at all. I recently did donate to them so I may be a little biased in my opinion. I donated for a few reasons though.

First, I believe in what Wikipedia offers to the world. Its a wealth of information that is free for anyone to explore. The cited content has helped me finish many college reports by finding where they found the information to post it. It has literally helped put me through college and I felt I owed something back the help the experience stay the same for future students.

I hope I didn’t come off as argumentative I just wanted to share my experiences, thoughts, and reasons for donating. Have a great day!

By: mayank

mayank — Tue, 21 Dec 2010 12:59:18 +0000

@Richard – thats the point mate. Lets say that wikipedia can’t generate the $7 million that it needs to survive, then all those people who’ve put their efforts to bring it to this level will feel ditched that after so much time and efforts, they can’t even see the website now. Why not simply make the money and donate all that money after ensuring that wikipedia is there or may be start schools to spread the free education that they’ve been talking about all these years.

By: richard

richard — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 06:04:17 +0000

Just imagine if they put ads on wikipedia, I’m sure they will generate a lot of moeny (more than $6m). But Jimmy’s idea at the beginning of wikipedia is the reason why he is not resorting to ads. The asking of donations of wikipedia is simply a way of telling people that if they can’t sustain the expense, there is chance that it will shutdown the site and http://www.wikipedia.org is history.

By: mayank

mayank — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 13:48:04 +0000

@gautam – hmm.. That is one thing i’m not sure about if US laws will prohibit them from engaging in revenue generating activities. I tried to find information about it and couldn’t find any, will it be possible for you to guide me to the correct sources. And well my point was that they need not make money for themselves, they should use that money to grow wikipedia’s efforts at a faster pace.. like wikibooks, educational institutions that can give free education…. so in short it won’t be anybody’s money but everybody’s benefit.

By: gautam

gautam — Sun, 12 Dec 2010 16:55:54 +0000

Wikipedia cannot post ads because it is registered as a charitable foundation and U.S. law prohibits charities from engaging in any revenue generating activities other than donations.
Also, any $$ they get as donations must be spent within the foundation and cannot be given away as it is not ‘their money’, i.e. they did not earn it, it was given to them

By: Steve

Steve — Sat, 20 Nov 2010 04:09:23 +0000

I love the idea that I can look at something useful on the internet without being bombarded by ads. It’s fair to say that a non-obtrusive banner ad would not be a big deal. But once you start down that road, more obtrusive ads will inevitably follow: an introduction ad before being taken to the site, video ads that have to load before the rest of the site will load, adobe flash cars driving across the screen on top of what you are trying to read, ads that expand over the entire screen if you accidentally move your mouse over them, etc.

Using ad money to fund other NPO’s is a nice idea, but it really is not what Wikipedia is about. Wikipedia does good in the world by providing a wealth of free information. I’m all for helping charities where I can, but I prefer to donate directly and when I choose to rather than indirectly via revenue paid to Wikipedia in exchange for annoying its readers.

By: mayank

mayank — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 10:38:39 +0000

@Gonzalo – well, thats where the crowd sourcing part comes in. There are company’s that are supporting it, however the content is not managed by wikipedia. It’s managed by individuals like you and is audited by large team of moderators. So the chances are that if someone is putting facts then he’ll point the negatives as well.

That’s what made it popular.. isn’t it?