[kmaher]

Andreas, you do realize interviews are edited, right? The editorial POV of that interview you link to was that WMF is a nonprofit and deserves support. They appear to have cut directly to my answer about the value of being a nonprofit. Whatever is left on the cutting room floor is a decision of the production team.

I agree that there were some problems with the fundraising messaging in India. It's an example of where the initial message testing worked, but when it went to a full campaign, the press ran with stories that were misleading and alarmist. In fact, WMF staff then worked extensively with the communities in India and did a significant amount of press, including television interviews, to clarify the purpose of the fundraiser and dispel concerns.

You continue to push for messaging that you personally believe to be more truthful to your belief about how fundraising works. Okay. That's fair, and you are entirely welcome to continue to do that. However, years of research and focus groups and testing has continuously demonstrated that the primary reason people donate to Wikipedia isn't a fear it will go away, nor is it a strategic interest in the future. The overwhelming reason is gratitude that it exists, and the opportunity to have contribute in their own way.

Would I personally respond to a message about mission and strategy? Yes, I would. But most people do not. Instead, millions of people find the donation banners acceptable and even inspirational -- far more so than messages about product and feature improvements. So despite the loyal opposition of you and others, I'm fairly certain that the WMF will continue to fundraise with messages that work on the level of what people care the most about, which is what Wikipedia means to them in their own lives.

Moving on, the WMF has been entirely clear that $4.2m of that $8.7m is going to affiliates for this year's APG funding. I would have wanted to get information about the $4.5m set aside for knowledge equity out the door faster, but I am no longer at the organization, so cannot speak to your concerns.

[marcan_42]

> the primary reason people donate to Wikipedia isn't a fear it will go away

> I'm fairly certain that the WMF will continue to fundraise with messages that work on the level of what people care the most about, which is what Wikipedia means to them in their own lives.

Those two are obviously contradictory. WMF's messaging is clearly, blatantly aimed at presenting the Foundation as having a problem staying afloat. If you didn't think the primary reason people donate to Wikipedia was a fear of it going away, you wouldn't be pushing messaging that is designed to cause people to have precisely that fear.

Quite frankly, your messaging reads like typical corporate doublespeak, and does nothing but further make me lose trust in the foundation.

[akolbe]

I've lost count of the number of donors who've said they felt stung by learning just how well off the WMF is financially, felt they'd been lied to, wished they had donated to someone else, said they'd now cancelled their monthly donation, etc.

The implication is that for them, the sense of urgency was precisely the reason they donated. They believed they were helping "a friend in need". That's what made them feel good. Being used, not so much.

[akolbe]

Minassian Media are the WMF's PR consultants. Mr Minassian's wife is a producer on The Daily Show. This being so, it seems highy unlikely to me that the interview would have been cut in any way that would have run counter to your and your PR company's wishes.

Still: Do you recall what you said in response to Trevor Noah, when he asked you, "The downside of it means you often struggle to have enough money to keep Wikipedia up and running. So ... is that true and how does it affect you?"? Would you mind sharing it here?

People who donate to Wikipedia are indeed generally motivated by gratitude. They would feel this gratitude whether the banners evoke a sense of financial emergency or not. The Germans (the only ones, I believe, who do their own banner wordings rather than translating the WMF's) have demonstrated that it is possible to achieve adequate results without evoking this sort of threat.

Now to evoke such an illusory sense of threat to Wikipedia's independence in Latin America in the middle of a pandemic, when the WMF was already nearly $50M ahead of its overall year goal with three months to spare, seems unconscionable to me, whatever the focus groups say.

Do you not think that people reading this exchange will find your attitude towards readers disrespectful and exploitative? Are you not saying, in so many words, that they're not capable of understanding what you would: that they, unlike you, need to be manipulated?

You appear to be saying that as long as readers, donors, don't know they've been tricked, but rather feel inspired, enriched by having given, everyone's needs have been served: theirs to feel good about themselves, yours (the WMF's) to have more money.

This may all be true: but it's manipulative. The idea that this sort of thinking should guide the management of such a widely used source of information as Wikipedia, which purports to be about informing people about reality, is unpalatable.

[michaelolenick]

Like the other reply, this is flat-out gaslighting.

First, it's a fallacy that executive rates for nonprofits should be set by the market based on others. Who would say their nonprofit CEO is in the bottom half? Nobody, or they wouldn't want that person to be CEO. Therefore, everybody reevaluates and pushes salaries up, up, up to the sky ... exactly like they do in for-profit businesses, an endless cycle of greed. Would you have done the job for $200K? If so, you should have. If not, you shouldn't have been at Wikimedia. It's really that simple. Interestingly, the techies do work for significantly less than market rates but the suits don't. You are (or were) very well paid.

As for the fundraising, the messages are self-evident and dishonest to the point they're arguably fraudulent. Like Jimmy Wales using the term "bankruptcy" when he said well, we'd never want that. Sure - it's like a mobster saying "it'd be shame if..." then denying the threat. Both of you know exactly what those messages were meant to and did imply. Stop gaslighting.

I'm sure the WMF will continue to fundraise because, let's face it, that's all the organization actually does. They fundraise and nothing else. Wikipedia is 100% volunteers. Have you even edited anything on Wikipedia? You were/are the PR person before your higher role.

As for the final piece, moving on... no. Absolutely not. Wikimedia exists to make money. You're/they're working on a project right now to charge Google, Amazon, Facebook and the rest (who, oh yeah, are colluding to support Wikipedia as a single-source of truth ... which is exactly a long-term goal. of the CFR - but I'm sure that's a total coincidence). This is a fundraising organization, barely tied to Wikipedia.

Wikimedia exists to pull in money. Nothing else. The messaging is questionable enough I believe it should be investigated by various consumer agencies. At most, 1/3rd of the money raised goes to support what people know of as Wikipedia - those are Lisa's numbers. I doubt the figure is even that high.

People: Wikipedia's server costs are about $2.5M per year. That's it. Figure admin fees about 3x that, $10M per year give or take. The rest ... you can sit until you're blue in the face wondering where the money goes because they're not saying.