[jessriedel]

First, you didn't answer my question. You may find the abstract idea of a Wikipedia that is perpetually endowed comforting, but you didn't actually describe a scenario where it was well functioning but ran out of money. I think the far-fetched-ness of such scenarios makes that abstract idea less enticing.

Second, the hoarding worry with charities still applies to those with limited possible scope. The idea is that such charities should not acquire perpetual funds because they become unaccountable; this doesn't rely on there always being more available orphans.

Third, why did you limit things to Wikipedia and Wiktionary? There are a bunch of other similar projects, extant and hypothetical, that the WMF would arguably be the best organization to run.

[elect_engineer]

Full disclosure: I am the author of the Wikipedia essay "Wikipedia has cancer".

I believe that I did "actually describe a scenario where it was well functioning but ran out of money."

From my essay:

"Nothing can grow forever. Sooner or later, something is going to happen that causes the donations to decline instead of increase. It could be a scandal (real or perceived). It could be the WMF taking a political position that offends many donors. Or it could be a recession, leaving people with less money to give. It might even be a lawsuit that forces the WMF to pay out a judgement that is larger than the reserve. Whatever the reason is, it will happen. It would be naïve to think that the WMF, which up to this point has never seriously considered any sort of spending limits, will suddenly discover fiscal prudence when the revenues start to decline. It is far more likely that the WMF will not react to a drop in donations by decreasing spending, but instead will ramp up fund-raising efforts while burning through our reserves and our endowment."

[jessriedel]

My comment was a response to your comment, not the essay. If you want to debate that paragraph:

* The recession hypothetical is highly unrealistic, as already explored in this thread.

* A lawsuit is exactly the sort of thing that is exacerbated by giving the organization a huge endowment. You want fewer assets to be exposed. Non-profits have bankruptcy protection just like for-profits (in fact, greater), so WMF can resume operations with new donations following closing of the bankruptcy proceedings. The only thing a pile of cash helps with is staving off bankruptcy in the first place, but making WMF a juicy target is not a strategic method of doing this.

* A "scandal" that causes the WMF to lose donor support is exactly the sort of thing that should cause it to lose donor support! Why would you especially, as a critic of WMF, think that the organization should be protected in scenarios where it experiences a scandal so severe that it undermines its ability to raise the minimum funds necessary to maintain operations?

* There is no reasonable political position WMF could take that would cut off donations so severely that operations couldn't be maintained. It's donor base is huge, vastly better than other open-source non-profits, and it only needs a tiny fraction to agree with it.