[orthecreedence]

Ask for money. If this model works for them (it seems to), then there's no reason to change it.

Also, by having "sponsors" you open yourself up to "change this article to be like this, or we'll pull our support from Wikipedia." This may seem like a far-fetched scenario, but unless you only use the ad revenue for extra income and don't depend on it at all, you are vulnerable (no matter how many levels removed you are from the advertiser).

It's also extremely difficult to have a steady source of income and not become dependent on it (like ads). My point being that even if they did run ads, they would have to still depend only on community donations if they didn't want to be held on the puppet strings of the capitalist dollar, which is a hard thing to do.

Note that I'm not against capitalism, but once you depend on it for your income, you and your free speech are at its mercy.

I completely agree with Wikipedia for not running ads. It would open a door that once opened is very difficult to close.

[tzs]

> Also, by having "sponsors" you open yourself up to "change this article to be like this, or we'll pull our support from Wikipedia."

Why can't the people who donate money do the same thing--that is threaten to stop donating unless an article is changed to their liking?

[orthecreedence]

They can...but the difference is that most people reading Wikipedia enjoy the fact that it's unbiased. I can imagine many more scenarios where a company/corporation would NOT enjoy this.

There are also many more readers of Wikipedia than there are advertisers. This makes gathering donations a more distributed means of paying their expenses.

[aaronklein]

Agreed if they are selling the ads directly.

They could throw Google AdWords up there and have the ads algorithmically placed.

They won't make as much money but they wouldn't have to beg.

[orthecreedence]

In essence, my argument is this: because at their core, they are an unbiased source of information, the less controlling interests involved, the better.

To generate revenue from ads is to "sell" a piece of themselves. Equate it somewhat to raising money from investors. They now have much more revenue, but at the cost of some of the control of their company. Ads certainly don't take away control in the sense investors do, but depending on the revenue from ads in any way is an extremely slippery slope.

[jarin]

How about only showing the ads until each month's (or the year's) costs are met?

That way there's no temptation to try to derive a profit from it, and at worst you end up with ads on Wikipedia for a couple of months out of the year (kind of like you get now).

[wpietri]

Costs aren't a fixed thing. Organizations can always use more resources, and people can always thing up more great things to do.

I think their fixed fundraising period is a better way to do things. Although I'd really like to see them build up an endowment and live off that.

[blurbytree]

They would undoubtedly make a lot more.

FWIW I find the current begging really offputting and irritating. More so than small relevant text adverts would be.

Online news sites run ads without worrying about impartiality etc. I don't see why wikipedia worries so much about it.