Wikipedia Is Finally Asking Big Tech to Pay Up(wired.com)
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Wikipedia Is Finally Asking Big Tech to Pay Up
https://www.wired.com/story/wikipedia-finally-asking-big-tech-to-pay-up/
161 comments
Wikipedia already has enough money and gets more every year... And all the real work that people actually appreciate is done for free by volunteers. I always felt their donation drives were very deceitful since the money is not actually going to supporting the wiki (that's already funded) but is being used to increase the foundation's bureaucracy and endowment. The messaging they use doesn't make this at all clear.
> I always felt their donation drives were very deceitful since the money is not actually going to supporting the wiki (that's already funded)
The servers don't buy themselves. You could argue that WMF doesn't spend money effectively if you want, servers are a small part of the budget after all and like any org there are parts of the budget that are of questionable value, however its a bit much to claim its not going to supporting the wiki.
[Disclaimer: i used to work for WMF a while ago. I dont anymore. My opinions are my own]
The servers don't buy themselves. You could argue that WMF doesn't spend money effectively if you want, servers are a small part of the budget after all and like any org there are parts of the budget that are of questionable value, however its a bit much to claim its not going to supporting the wiki.
[Disclaimer: i used to work for WMF a while ago. I dont anymore. My opinions are my own]
The notices give a sense of urgency and uncertainty. They also use that insinuation, as well as the fact that proportionately few users donate, to guilt readers into donating. That's unkind, unpleasant behavior that makes me like Wikipedia less (along with increasing issues with the content of the website - at least the English articles).
What issues do you have with content?
Read the communism page. Does it mention the hundred million plus dead because of communism?
Only "Excess deaths"...
Only "Excess deaths"...
I'm from Ukraine. In the 20-th century communists killed several of my relatives. I will never forget about that, and there're many million people like me all over the world.
I do observe tendency in modern world to white-wash communism, and cancel facts about crimes committed by communist regimes.
I know it sounds crazy and I don't have any evidence, but one possible explanation of the trend - Russia's or China's state-sponsored propaganda.
I do observe tendency in modern world to white-wash communism, and cancel facts about crimes committed by communist regimes.
I know it sounds crazy and I don't have any evidence, but one possible explanation of the trend - Russia's or China's state-sponsored propaganda.
If it sounds crazy AND you haven't any evidence - why bring it up?
Ummm, free speech. Feel free to ignore.
Mao arguably murdered more humans than anyone else in history. Read a book or two.
Mao arguably murdered more humans than anyone else in history. Read a book or two.
> Feel free to ignore.
Isn't the point of free speech that the merits of ideas get challenged? The merits of the argument:
1. P is a crazy idea
2. There is no evidence for P
C. Therefore P
are few and far between.
> Mao arguably murdered more humans than anyone else in history. Read a book or two.
We're talking about Soviet and Chinese Communism (and their offshoots). Both of these forms of Communism have had great results as well as terrible. Looking at China now and comparing it to China before Communism I see development that is nothing short of astonishing. Or even just over the last four decades. I don't know how many have been saved by increased standards of living, access to healthcare, and general governmental competence, but I do know that the number is very high. Compare this to a country which has not been under Communism: India. How many have died due to lack of development, lack of access to healthcare, governmental incompetence, etc.?
Isn't the point of free speech that the merits of ideas get challenged? The merits of the argument:
1. P is a crazy idea
2. There is no evidence for P
C. Therefore P
are few and far between.
> Mao arguably murdered more humans than anyone else in history. Read a book or two.
We're talking about Soviet and Chinese Communism (and their offshoots). Both of these forms of Communism have had great results as well as terrible. Looking at China now and comparing it to China before Communism I see development that is nothing short of astonishing. Or even just over the last four decades. I don't know how many have been saved by increased standards of living, access to healthcare, and general governmental competence, but I do know that the number is very high. Compare this to a country which has not been under Communism: India. How many have died due to lack of development, lack of access to healthcare, governmental incompetence, etc.?
> "Russia's or China's state-sponsored propaganda"
I do not think that this is a crazy idea at all [1]
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Research_Agency
I do not think that this is a crazy idea at all [1]
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Research_Agency
Maybe you'e a communist by ideological persuasion, in which case nothing I say will sway you, but insofar as China is concerned, the country entered extraordinary levels of general development and increases in human development (well-being) explicitly after it left behind Maoist communism from the 1980's onwards. Prior to that, Mao's policies of classic communist rigidity were a demographic, social, economic and human disaster.
As for India, it has many of its own bureaucratic problems without having to be a communist state, true, but to claim that this in any way legitimizes communist social management is absurd. If my family gets sick and some of them die of neglect in my house, it doesn't make my neighbor who outright starved and murdered most of his family any less reprehensible. In any case, India too saw large increases in human development as it left behind pseudo-socialist policies and embraced a more market-friendly form of governance during the same time-frame as China..
As for India, it has many of its own bureaucratic problems without having to be a communist state, true, but to claim that this in any way legitimizes communist social management is absurd. If my family gets sick and some of them die of neglect in my house, it doesn't make my neighbor who outright starved and murdered most of his family any less reprehensible. In any case, India too saw large increases in human development as it left behind pseudo-socialist policies and embraced a more market-friendly form of governance during the same time-frame as China..
> [India] has many of its own bureaucratic problems without having to be a communist state, true
India's issues being the result of bureaucratic problems is not what I suggest.
> If my family gets sick and some of them die of neglect in my house, it doesn't make my neighbor who outright starved and murdered most of his family any less reprehensible
I agree. But that is not analogous to the situation with Chinese Communism. A more analogous situation is this one: A man has ten children, each of whom has fallen sick. The man decides to heal them. He has little knowledge, and due to his poor care the first three children he treats die. But he learns from his mistakes, and he successfully heals the rest of his children.
At first, we thought poorly of the man. "Doesn't he know that this method of healing will only hurt his children?" we asked. But as the man learned more and more about healing, we realised that his heart had always been in the right place, and that he was now great caregiver.
And, meanwhile, the neighbor's ten children had also fallen sick. This man decided it was best to let nature take its course, and he did not try to heal his children. Four passed away, three were sickly for the rest of their lives, and three fully recovered.
Looking at these two fathers, at first we looked down on the one who tried to heal his children, but only hurt them. Much better to let nature take its course, we thought. But, by the end, we realised that the first man was in fact the better carer for his children.
> In any case, India too saw large increases in human development as it left behind pseudo-socialist policies and embraced a more market-friendly form of governance during the same time-frame as China..
As a developing country, development is expected. The presence of development is almost irrelevant. So let's compare the rate of development of the two countries: even as India has developed, it has at the same time fallen further and further behind China. And let's compare the nature of the development: In China, unprecedented efforts have been made to ensure that the poorest of the nation are lifted up. In India, this is far from the case.
India's issues being the result of bureaucratic problems is not what I suggest.
> If my family gets sick and some of them die of neglect in my house, it doesn't make my neighbor who outright starved and murdered most of his family any less reprehensible
I agree. But that is not analogous to the situation with Chinese Communism. A more analogous situation is this one: A man has ten children, each of whom has fallen sick. The man decides to heal them. He has little knowledge, and due to his poor care the first three children he treats die. But he learns from his mistakes, and he successfully heals the rest of his children.
At first, we thought poorly of the man. "Doesn't he know that this method of healing will only hurt his children?" we asked. But as the man learned more and more about healing, we realised that his heart had always been in the right place, and that he was now great caregiver.
And, meanwhile, the neighbor's ten children had also fallen sick. This man decided it was best to let nature take its course, and he did not try to heal his children. Four passed away, three were sickly for the rest of their lives, and three fully recovered.
Looking at these two fathers, at first we looked down on the one who tried to heal his children, but only hurt them. Much better to let nature take its course, we thought. But, by the end, we realised that the first man was in fact the better carer for his children.
> In any case, India too saw large increases in human development as it left behind pseudo-socialist policies and embraced a more market-friendly form of governance during the same time-frame as China..
As a developing country, development is expected. The presence of development is almost irrelevant. So let's compare the rate of development of the two countries: even as India has developed, it has at the same time fallen further and further behind China. And let's compare the nature of the development: In China, unprecedented efforts have been made to ensure that the poorest of the nation are lifted up. In India, this is far from the case.
And all of the things you describe about China, in both your larger analogy and in your final paragraph happened after the country abandoned its communist dogmas in favor of a market economy (a highly fascistic one to be sure but a market economy in many ways nonetheless). The original post as I interpreted it seemed to claim that China's communist experiment is what improved the lot of its people. It did not. As for India, it is falling behind and its governments since the end of colonial rule have made many mistakes to make development tragically slow but none of these are creations of market economics. They're the dredges of heavy handed and often corrupt bureaucratic administration (even if it doesn't self-label itself as socialist).
Because I don’t know other possible explanations of the observed phenomenon.
Do you?
Do you?
Authoritarian regimes tend to commit atrocities. Unchecked power tends to lead to abuse of power.
This is true regardless of what ideology helped the regime take root. Recognizing this fact is not whitewashing anything.
To give you a less personal (to you) example, the Islamic State of Irak and Levant filmed and uploaded executions of hundreds of people, and killed many, many more people off-screen. They have "Islam" in their name.
Should the page about "Islam (religion)" put ISIL front and center, despite them existing for less than a 1‰ of time Islam existed, and having similarly little adherents in comparison to global population of muslims?
This is true regardless of what ideology helped the regime take root. Recognizing this fact is not whitewashing anything.
To give you a less personal (to you) example, the Islamic State of Irak and Levant filmed and uploaded executions of hundreds of people, and killed many, many more people off-screen. They have "Islam" in their name.
Should the page about "Islam (religion)" put ISIL front and center, despite them existing for less than a 1‰ of time Islam existed, and having similarly little adherents in comparison to global population of muslims?
I dunno man, communism is different.
About 25% of the world population are Muslims, roughly 25% of modern countries are predominantly Muslims, yet as you wrote in the comment, ISIL is a small percentage in both space and time.
For communist countries, these atrocities seem more like a rule than an exception. Soviet Union, countries of Eastern Block in 20-th century, China – they all did horrible things.
Wikipedia’s articles about fascism and nazism do mention war crimes and genocides, rightfully so. Yet Wikipedia’s article about communism does not. They do have two links in the “Related topics” section, but other links in that section aren’t particularly related, they also link to capitalism and trade union there.
About 25% of the world population are Muslims, roughly 25% of modern countries are predominantly Muslims, yet as you wrote in the comment, ISIL is a small percentage in both space and time.
For communist countries, these atrocities seem more like a rule than an exception. Soviet Union, countries of Eastern Block in 20-th century, China – they all did horrible things.
Wikipedia’s articles about fascism and nazism do mention war crimes and genocides, rightfully so. Yet Wikipedia’s article about communism does not. They do have two links in the “Related topics” section, but other links in that section aren’t particularly related, they also link to capitalism and trade union there.
There's a link to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_killings_under_communist_... in the See also section of Communism article...
EDIT: I see it's probably the same link you saw in Related topics, so it's mentioned twice on the page. Should it be mentioned in the text of the article? I don't know. There's similarly no mention of crussades on the Christianity page.
EDIT: I see it's probably the same link you saw in Related topics, so it's mentioned twice on the page. Should it be mentioned in the text of the article? I don't know. There's similarly no mention of crussades on the Christianity page.
The “nazism” article has links to night of the long knives and holocaust in the very first section.
The “communism” article links to the mass murders from the very last page, in an article about 10 pages long. Looking at the edit history of that article, I see the edits to change that are systematically reverted: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Communism&type=re...
The “communism” article links to the mass murders from the very last page, in an article about 10 pages long. Looking at the edit history of that article, I see the edits to change that are systematically reverted: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Communism&type=re...
It doesn't sound crazy to me in the first place that Communist China is whitewashing the history of Communism.
Thank you for sharing a difficult part of your family history. This should never be forgotten. I have several friends that grew up in Hungary, Czech Republic, Poland. All of them have horror stories. All left their homes to escape communism.
Read the Joseph Stalin or Chairman Mao page, see that they do mention millions of deaths because of them. And before you ask, no, the connection between Stalin and communism is highlighted in the article, it's not like anyone tries to hide it.
I'm not saying there's no bias on the Wiki, but it manifests in interpretations and wording choices, the facts are generally there. At least in the articles about history, which I read regularly.
As an example, read the page on George Washington and you'll see he recommended a total war against indigenous people of America, "the total destruction and devastation of their settlements and the capture of as many prisoners of every age and sex as possible". It's downplayed, explained away in all kinds of ways, but the fact is there.
I'm not saying there's no bias on the Wiki, but it manifests in interpretations and wording choices, the facts are generally there. At least in the articles about history, which I read regularly.
As an example, read the page on George Washington and you'll see he recommended a total war against indigenous people of America, "the total destruction and devastation of their settlements and the capture of as many prisoners of every age and sex as possible". It's downplayed, explained away in all kinds of ways, but the fact is there.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the definition of excess deaths means they're not literally counting every person who died, including from old age or car accidents, but theoretically attributable to a cause.
For example, researchers can measure excess deaths in 2020 compared to the previous year and find a gap between that and confirmed covid deaths in every country. For example, if the caretaker of a child or disabled or elderly person was suddenly hospitalized without time to find a substitute, and they didn't survive due to lack of care.
For example, researchers can measure excess deaths in 2020 compared to the previous year and find a gap between that and confirmed covid deaths in every country. For example, if the caretaker of a child or disabled or elderly person was suddenly hospitalized without time to find a substitute, and they didn't survive due to lack of care.
I'm no fan of communism but the number 100 million+ is also engineered the other way around, and includes various awful parts of history only tangentially related to communism, like the Soviet Union's high WW2 death toll. "Excess deaths" is in this case strictly factual.
Gwern says it best: https://www.gwern.net/In-Defense-Of-Inclusionism
Damn, he always does. Good read.
I feel like the same thing happened to stack overflow.
I feel like the same thing happened to stack overflow.
Commonly cited problems are the lack of neutrality, which is well reflected by how different the political tone of different language versions is. — the Russian article on Vladimir Putin is quite a bit less critical than the English article, and in reverse, the English article on Barack Obama is quite a bit more lauding than how other languages treat him.
But that is unavoidable for articles written by men, rather than some truly neutral artificial intelligence.
My gripe is that I find that Wikipedia does not acknowledge the issues enough, and seems to mostly assert that it is fairly neutral.
But that is unavoidable for articles written by men, rather than some truly neutral artificial intelligence.
My gripe is that I find that Wikipedia does not acknowledge the issues enough, and seems to mostly assert that it is fairly neutral.
I believe the bias generally comes from the sources - "reputable" (and generally liberal) English language sources tend to take a deferential tone towards Obama, even while criticizing him, because of the political significance of his presidency.
This is likely exacerbated by the fact that there are very few "reputable" right-wing English language sources that can be cited on Wikipedia. Similarly, sources from the Middle-East or Russia, which are less likely to be cited, would probably take a less charitable view as well.
This is likely exacerbated by the fact that there are very few "reputable" right-wing English language sources that can be cited on Wikipedia. Similarly, sources from the Middle-East or Russia, which are less likely to be cited, would probably take a less charitable view as well.
Well that would be the problem with the U.S.A. culture war: — there are two sides, and both consider themselves “fair and balanced” and the other unreliable, and from where I'm standing as a European, both are unreliable, because politics is not about reliability, and truth is not a weapon in politics and never has been.
English language Wikipedia of course has a disproportional number of editors from the U.S.A. and most of them have a particular side in this culture war.
But it touches upon another issue of All voices must be repræsented, proportional to their weight.. — does this mean all voices currently on the planet? all voices that have ever been on the planet? or only English voices on the English-language Wikipedia?
In particular, I find it somewhat odd that, for instance, English-language Wikipedia will speak of the “critical consensus” surrounding a Japanese work of fiction, using only English-language reviews thereof, while there are probably more Japanese-language reviews and fans of the work, and the critical perception is often very different in different cultures, but English-language Wikipedia very often speaks of “critical consensus” for what should be called “Anglo-Saxon critical consensus”, and dare I say that it is often not even that, but chiefly a U.S.A. consensus.
English language Wikipedia of course has a disproportional number of editors from the U.S.A. and most of them have a particular side in this culture war.
But it touches upon another issue of All voices must be repræsented, proportional to their weight.. — does this mean all voices currently on the planet? all voices that have ever been on the planet? or only English voices on the English-language Wikipedia?
In particular, I find it somewhat odd that, for instance, English-language Wikipedia will speak of the “critical consensus” surrounding a Japanese work of fiction, using only English-language reviews thereof, while there are probably more Japanese-language reviews and fans of the work, and the critical perception is often very different in different cultures, but English-language Wikipedia very often speaks of “critical consensus” for what should be called “Anglo-Saxon critical consensus”, and dare I say that it is often not even that, but chiefly a U.S.A. consensus.
>I believe the bias generally comes from the sources - "reputable" (and generally liberal) English language sources tend to take a deferential tone towards Obama
It's much worse than that. The vast majority of sources that would potentially provide alternative [and valid, but right leaning] perspectives on basically any subject are effectively blacklisted as unreliable by somewhat of a cabal of heavily left leaning regular editors. Go to any talk page on any politically controversial subject and you'll see how the seasoned editors are almost all extremely left leaning and easily overwhelm anyone asking for a more neutral representation of facts. And let's not pretend that this has anything to do with "quality" or "factual reporting" when you'll find sources like Vox and Salon on some of these pages.
It's self reinforcing, in that such heavy editorial bias discourages neutral and right leaning people from making edits that they then have to defend publicly against virtual extremists.
It's pure cultural warfare. And in typical subversive fashion, they all play dumb and dance around the fact that the only approved sources are extremely biased towards their side.
It's much worse than that. The vast majority of sources that would potentially provide alternative [and valid, but right leaning] perspectives on basically any subject are effectively blacklisted as unreliable by somewhat of a cabal of heavily left leaning regular editors. Go to any talk page on any politically controversial subject and you'll see how the seasoned editors are almost all extremely left leaning and easily overwhelm anyone asking for a more neutral representation of facts. And let's not pretend that this has anything to do with "quality" or "factual reporting" when you'll find sources like Vox and Salon on some of these pages.
It's self reinforcing, in that such heavy editorial bias discourages neutral and right leaning people from making edits that they then have to defend publicly against virtual extremists.
It's pure cultural warfare. And in typical subversive fashion, they all play dumb and dance around the fact that the only approved sources are extremely biased towards their side.
And therein lies the problem yet again of “neutral point of view”, — with respect to what? the U.S.A. only?
In most of the world, “liberal” does not mean “left”; it means capitalism.
It is a common sentiment of the European that both what the U.S.A. calls “left” and “right” is rather “right” in his eyes, with both he Democratic, and Republican Parties espousing more right wing fiscal policies than many of the most right wing European parties would dream to tender.
The U.S.A.-man might look at it from a perspective of what he calls “right” vs. “left” in terms of neutrality, but from where I stand it is mostly an issue of “U.S.A. culture” vs. “global perspective”, as even articles that pertain to events in specific countries on English-Language Wikipeia seem to very often be analysed from what is clearly a U.S.A. cultural perspective.
In most of the world, “liberal” does not mean “left”; it means capitalism.
It is a common sentiment of the European that both what the U.S.A. calls “left” and “right” is rather “right” in his eyes, with both he Democratic, and Republican Parties espousing more right wing fiscal policies than many of the most right wing European parties would dream to tender.
The U.S.A.-man might look at it from a perspective of what he calls “right” vs. “left” in terms of neutrality, but from where I stand it is mostly an issue of “U.S.A. culture” vs. “global perspective”, as even articles that pertain to events in specific countries on English-Language Wikipeia seem to very often be analysed from what is clearly a U.S.A. cultural perspective.
Liberal has not meant capitalism for a very long time, not in europe or anywhere else. Maybe if you say libertarian it still does.
I really don't think europeans think the left in american are really "right". Europe is not further left than the american left.
Grrr, what does european even mean. It's like 40 different governments and countries. All with different cultures.
I really don't think europeans think the left in american are really "right". Europe is not further left than the american left.
Grrr, what does european even mean. It's like 40 different governments and countries. All with different cultures.
You're right that Europe is a pretty diverse place, but having lived in a few countries there and being in contact with people from at least half of the countries I can't say I've ever heard any European describe anything in the US as leftish. Perhaps parts of the current American diversity discourse excepted.
> Liberal has not meant capitalism for a very long time, not in europe or anywhere else. Maybe if you say libertarian it still does.
How about the term 'neoliberal'?
How about the term 'neoliberal'?
>Liberal has not meant capitalism for a very long time, not in europe or anywhere else.
« Liberal » means economic liberalism in pretty much all of continental Europe.
« Liberal » means economic liberalism in pretty much all of continental Europe.
It means it in pretty much all of the world including, say, Australia.
Frankness be, it makes one wonder how one country can so often develop different political terminology from the standard in about the entire world. A similar situation is that in the U.S.A., blue has become the color of left wing politics, and red for right wing politics, a fairly recent symbolism dating back less than two decades, whereas for centuries in the entire world it has been opposite.
How could U.S.A. news stations possibly have decided upon this? it seems to me that the news editors that approved this must have been largely ignorant of this symbolism when they decided to go against the rest of the world here, and so was the population, which must mean that they weren't aware that dating to the French revolution, the left has flown red, and the right has flown blue.
The cold war is a fairly recent event; surely they noticed that the communists took red as their color of choice?
Frankness be, it makes one wonder how one country can so often develop different political terminology from the standard in about the entire world. A similar situation is that in the U.S.A., blue has become the color of left wing politics, and red for right wing politics, a fairly recent symbolism dating back less than two decades, whereas for centuries in the entire world it has been opposite.
How could U.S.A. news stations possibly have decided upon this? it seems to me that the news editors that approved this must have been largely ignorant of this symbolism when they decided to go against the rest of the world here, and so was the population, which must mean that they weren't aware that dating to the French revolution, the left has flown red, and the right has flown blue.
The cold war is a fairly recent event; surely they noticed that the communists took red as their color of choice?
>A similar situation is that in the U.S.A., blue has become the color of left wing politics, and red for right wing politics, a fairly recent symbolism dating back less than two decades, whereas for centuries in the entire world it has been opposite.
Well, « blue » as a political signifier very much started on the left, being associated to American and French Republicans (in the true sense of the word, not the GOP). The right wing being « white », ie. monarchist. Coincidentally that meaning also found posterity in the Russian Revolution as the colour of the Tsarist regime also happened to be white (possibly in imitation of the French, but religious reasons also play into it).
As far as I'm aware, the US under a « swap » of sorts as the Northern and Southern wings of the Democratic and Republican parties broke up and reorganized.
Well, « blue » as a political signifier very much started on the left, being associated to American and French Republicans (in the true sense of the word, not the GOP). The right wing being « white », ie. monarchist. Coincidentally that meaning also found posterity in the Russian Revolution as the colour of the Tsarist regime also happened to be white (possibly in imitation of the French, but religious reasons also play into it).
As far as I'm aware, the US under a « swap » of sorts as the Northern and Southern wings of the Democratic and Republican parties broke up and reorganized.
> Liberal has not meant capitalism for a very long time, not in europe or anywhere else. Maybe if you say libertarian it still does.
“liberal” very much means capitalism in most European political discourse or really most places outside of the -U.S.A.
Consider that even on Wikipedia, where non-U.S.A. politics is discussed, the term is typically so used:
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Party_for_Freedom_a...
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_Party_of_Australia
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Democratic_Party_(Germany...
> I really don't think europeans think the left in american are really "right". Europe is not further left than the american left.
It is quite a common sentiment one hears from European that from their perspective all U.S.A. politics is right wing.
Consider that there are very few European countries where even the most right wing parties would ever suggest such a system as at-will employment, which is pervasive throughout the U.S.A., and which neither party has shown any desire to end. — it is really seen as quite dystopian from a European perspective.
To say that Europe is not further left is a very strange claim. You will find no European country, or many developed countries at all, with the following, which are common to universal in the U.S.A.:
- The right of employers to terminate without first seeking approval from an employment court or similar organ
- A lack of universal healthcare
- A lack of universal access to higher education
- The legal allowance of advertising drugs
- Non-defaultable student loans
- Very low minimum wages
- Waivability of refund rights
Such things are generally considered extremely capitalist in most developed nations, but are quite normal in the U.S.A..
> Grrr, what does european even mean. It's like 40 different governments and countries. All with different cultures.
And you will find that in each and every one of them healthcare is a universal right, at will employment does not exist, and drugs cannot be advertised, and probably many more of what I listed.
It is not that Europe is so culturally homogeneous, it is that the U.S.A. is very exceptional in how capitalist it is. You will also not find most of these things in, say, Canada, or Australia, or any other developed nations. — the U.S.A. is rather unique in how much it indulges the big man at the expense of the little man, and neither party seems particularly interested in implementing changes that would bring it to a similar balance that the rest of the developed world enjoys.
“liberal” very much means capitalism in most European political discourse or really most places outside of the -U.S.A.
Consider that even on Wikipedia, where non-U.S.A. politics is discussed, the term is typically so used:
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Party_for_Freedom_a...
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_Party_of_Australia
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Democratic_Party_(Germany...
> I really don't think europeans think the left in american are really "right". Europe is not further left than the american left.
It is quite a common sentiment one hears from European that from their perspective all U.S.A. politics is right wing.
Consider that there are very few European countries where even the most right wing parties would ever suggest such a system as at-will employment, which is pervasive throughout the U.S.A., and which neither party has shown any desire to end. — it is really seen as quite dystopian from a European perspective.
To say that Europe is not further left is a very strange claim. You will find no European country, or many developed countries at all, with the following, which are common to universal in the U.S.A.:
- The right of employers to terminate without first seeking approval from an employment court or similar organ
- A lack of universal healthcare
- A lack of universal access to higher education
- The legal allowance of advertising drugs
- Non-defaultable student loans
- Very low minimum wages
- Waivability of refund rights
Such things are generally considered extremely capitalist in most developed nations, but are quite normal in the U.S.A..
> Grrr, what does european even mean. It's like 40 different governments and countries. All with different cultures.
And you will find that in each and every one of them healthcare is a universal right, at will employment does not exist, and drugs cannot be advertised, and probably many more of what I listed.
It is not that Europe is so culturally homogeneous, it is that the U.S.A. is very exceptional in how capitalist it is. You will also not find most of these things in, say, Canada, or Australia, or any other developed nations. — the U.S.A. is rather unique in how much it indulges the big man at the expense of the little man, and neither party seems particularly interested in implementing changes that would bring it to a similar balance that the rest of the developed world enjoys.
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The banner is moving (thus moving the whole text below it) and loads after ~a sec. I don't give money to people who intentionally try really hard to annoy me.
Your comment just made me realize Wikipedia is using dark patterns to try to get me to donate.
They probably have a fundraising team on staff that does all the standard fundraising "tricks" that the rest of the fundraising industry does.
The servers are relatively low when compared to the rest
There is an essay called "wikipedia has cancer" about its balooning costs that grow like a tumor
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2...
There is an essay called "wikipedia has cancer" about its balooning costs that grow like a tumor
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2...
FYI, the user who wrote that keeps an annually-updated version on his own userpage: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guy_Macon/Wikipedia_has_C...
It includes updates as of March 2020.
It includes updates as of March 2020.
This post should be pinned for this topic.
I've read it. I think its misleading. Hosting costs were less when wikimedia had no money, but speed was much lower, downtime was constant, there were no backup data centers (and the data center was literally in a high risk hurricane zone), and the sites had exponential growth since then. I'm not sure if that chart includes salary cost, but there's also the difference between paying all the sysadmins vs largely volunteer sysadmins. Maybe there's an argument that its better to stick to volunteers if at all possible, but at the end of the day there are quality improvements when you have 24/7 on call coverage vs hoping some random volunteer with a day-job is available to bring the site back up when it explodes (not to mention burn out is not sustainable in the long term).
At the end of the day, wikipedia's hosting is much higher quality now than it was in the beginning. Wikipedia used to go down so much there was literally an external website dedicated as a scratch pad for users to write articles on until the real website came back up. Back in the day, when WMF had no money, they cut every corner they could to make it work. The result was something that was always on fire but got the job done. Now we have much better quality. But quality costs money. Whether or not the trade-off is worth it is debatable, but lets not pretend that wikimedia hosting costs are buying the same thing as they were in 2005.
Last of all, i would encourage a comparison to any other site of similar size/popularity. Wikimedia hosting is orders of magnitude cheaper than industry norms.
[Disclaimer: used to work there but not on the infra team. I dont work there anymore. My opinions are my own]
At the end of the day, wikipedia's hosting is much higher quality now than it was in the beginning. Wikipedia used to go down so much there was literally an external website dedicated as a scratch pad for users to write articles on until the real website came back up. Back in the day, when WMF had no money, they cut every corner they could to make it work. The result was something that was always on fire but got the job done. Now we have much better quality. But quality costs money. Whether or not the trade-off is worth it is debatable, but lets not pretend that wikimedia hosting costs are buying the same thing as they were in 2005.
Last of all, i would encourage a comparison to any other site of similar size/popularity. Wikimedia hosting is orders of magnitude cheaper than industry norms.
[Disclaimer: used to work there but not on the infra team. I dont work there anymore. My opinions are my own]
Don’t they ? Don’t the interests on their endowment cover the cost of the technical infrastructure ?
"Hosting wikipedia accounts for roughly 2% of their total expenses"
Last time that I posted about it I ended up getting mass-downvoted though https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26056276
Their fundraising banners are obnoxious and A/B tested to death, worded such that it seems they are so cash-strapped that they will shut down tomorrow if you don't donate. In reality they raising a LOT more money than necessary to operate servers.
There would not be nothing to put on those servers is not for the volunteers.
>The servers don't buy themselves. You could argue that WMF doesn't spend money effectively if you want, servers are a small part of the budget after all and like any org there are parts of the budget that are of questionable value, however its a bit much to claim its not going to supporting the wiki.
Purchase of computer equipment: (3,709,426)
At 3% return they need 100 million in the market to cover it, their short term investments are 95 million. Wikimedia does not need to raise money ever again if the only thing they are about are servers: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/f/f7/Wikim...
Wikimedia is the perfect example of a bureaucracy expanding to meet the needs of an expanding bureaucracy.
Purchase of computer equipment: (3,709,426)
At 3% return they need 100 million in the market to cover it, their short term investments are 95 million. Wikimedia does not need to raise money ever again if the only thing they are about are servers: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/f/f7/Wikim...
Wikimedia is the perfect example of a bureaucracy expanding to meet the needs of an expanding bureaucracy.
Wikimedia/pedia also has constantly new challenges and tasks. Would you want them to not ever change the software, management, ...? WMF has a mission beyond wikipedia, all of them related, in the public interest and transparently done.
Wikimedia is welcome to raise money for wikimedia. Their fundraisers on wikipedia are however as much a dark pattern as anything google and facebook do on their privacy.
The more money it takes the more it will end up relying upon large donors and the more will kowtow to the interests of those donors.
So, yes, I'd rather they were extemely conservative about software and management. Running PHP and having a non visual editor is less of a big deal than having to tweak donor Wikipedia pages to remove awkward facts to keep the $$$ flowing and salaries paid.
So, yes, I'd rather they were extemely conservative about software and management. Running PHP and having a non visual editor is less of a big deal than having to tweak donor Wikipedia pages to remove awkward facts to keep the $$$ flowing and salaries paid.
While they may have enough money year on year - as someone who has been donating yearly for the past 10 years I prefer that it stays ad free.
It is a fantastic resource and while is a need for increased transparency, more fiscal responsibility etc. Is there an alternative resource out there that provides as much value to the world? I'd be happy to switch and start supporting something else if so.
It would be rather sad to see donations drop off and the project shut down... I know this would likely never happen with the amount of value it offers at this stage but still...
It is a fantastic resource and while is a need for increased transparency, more fiscal responsibility etc. Is there an alternative resource out there that provides as much value to the world? I'd be happy to switch and start supporting something else if so.
It would be rather sad to see donations drop off and the project shut down... I know this would likely never happen with the amount of value it offers at this stage but still...
I'd rather they just ran an ultra transparent ad network and capped maximum spend at $100 and banned groups or individuals who tried to get around it.
This would be less risky than donations as it would ensure it doesn't rely on any groups in particular for cash who might have dirty laundry to hide.
Like big tech.
This would be less risky than donations as it would ensure it doesn't rely on any groups in particular for cash who might have dirty laundry to hide.
Like big tech.
> capped maximum spend at $100
They would need 100,000 advertisers to earn $10 million, which seems impractical.
For comparison, they earned $120 million in contributions in 2020.
That said, Facebook has 8-10 million advertisers, many probably running low budget campaigns. But low budget campaigns typically only work when they're hyper-targeted / personalized (something I assume we don't want Wikipedia to do)
They would need 100,000 advertisers to earn $10 million, which seems impractical.
For comparison, they earned $120 million in contributions in 2020.
That said, Facebook has 8-10 million advertisers, many probably running low budget campaigns. But low budget campaigns typically only work when they're hyper-targeted / personalized (something I assume we don't want Wikipedia to do)
While I'd usually agree, I'd say Wikipedia has a great opportunity to target ads without predatory data harvesting - they can simply be put on relevant pages. Maybe not as effective as user-level targeting, but probably still some decent opportunities there. And easy to have advertisers bid for space on more in-demand pages.
This would be absolutely horrible for me. Ads are designed to distract us and manipulate our emotions or identities in order to get us to spend more money than we need to spend. Wikipedia as it is now is a counter to those distractive, manipulative forces.
I think you underestimate how much advertisement would influence such a website.
There are very strict content rules with most advertisement networks and threading over those will severely limit the income from ads as those that run advertisement often do not wish to be associated with various content.
Consider what happened to TVTropes, which at one point decided to remove articles that dealt with a variety of sexual subjects as it was very bad for their advertisement revenue that the articles even existed on their website.
If Wikipedia become dependent on advertisers, it would have to tailor it's content to accommodate them.
Of course, it's content also influences the number of donations they receive as it is.
There are very strict content rules with most advertisement networks and threading over those will severely limit the income from ads as those that run advertisement often do not wish to be associated with various content.
Consider what happened to TVTropes, which at one point decided to remove articles that dealt with a variety of sexual subjects as it was very bad for their advertisement revenue that the articles even existed on their website.
If Wikipedia become dependent on advertisers, it would have to tailor it's content to accommodate them.
Of course, it's content also influences the number of donations they receive as it is.
Running an ad network is fairly expensive on its own if you want any value out of it. You need targeting, campaign management, some sort of bidding auction, CTR/CVR prediction models (or some sort of intelligent targeting), fraud detection models, reviewing ads, page exclusions, etc. All of this at massive scale.
edit: And customer service, people who spend $100 tend to be angrier all too often than people who spend $1,000,000.
edit: And customer service, people who spend $100 tend to be angrier all too often than people who spend $1,000,000.
You don't need all of this.
Just define a price per day/week/month and that's it.
That's how advertisements in newspapers work since ages, without any overhead.
Just define a price per day/week/month and that's it.
That's how advertisements in newspapers work since ages, without any overhead.
Except this isn't 1950 and internet advertising exists. Why give $100 to wikimedia for advertising for ads that perform badly when you can give it to Facebook or Google or Twitter for ads that perform well.
OK, worst comment of the day for me and it's not even 9am.
Jokes aside the whole point of Wikipedia is to be ad free. That's literally the whole thing about it. The rest is made by contributors.
Jokes aside the whole point of Wikipedia is to be ad free. That's literally the whole thing about it. The rest is made by contributors.
>... thousands of Wikipedia “volunteers” essentially work on the site full-time, driving its success — but that while they get nothing tangible for their efforts, WMF bankrolls its employees’ cooking classes, massages and gym memberships.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2015/12...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2015/12...
Yes, I stopped giving them money after I learned this.
How much does wikipedia need to operate and how much are the donations?
I kept donating every year for the past several years, but I wonder if I should continue to do so.
As other commenters mentioned, the dark patterns make me reluctant to donate in the future, and this move potentially too.
I kept donating every year for the past several years, but I wonder if I should continue to do so.
As other commenters mentioned, the dark patterns make me reluctant to donate in the future, and this move potentially too.
Audited financials:
FY 16&17: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/d/da/Wikim...
FY 18&19: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/3/31/Wikim...
FY 16&17: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/d/da/Wikim...
FY 18&19: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/3/31/Wikim...
> And all the real work that people actually appreciate is done for free by volunteers.
I have been contributing to Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons for well over 2 years now: Volunteers do contribute a lot but they also tend to create ruckus in equal proportion. One such example: The tools the engineers build for a focus group of Editors who have one or two jobs to do across all Wikipedia properties are absolutely important and don't come for free.
I have been contributing to Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons for well over 2 years now: Volunteers do contribute a lot but they also tend to create ruckus in equal proportion. One such example: The tools the engineers build for a focus group of Editors who have one or two jobs to do across all Wikipedia properties are absolutely important and don't come for free.
Increasing the endowment is fine. That’s a recurring source of income that gives them complete independence for the future.
> is being used to increase the foundation's bureaucracy and endowment.
What is that supposed to mean? Increasing "bureaucracy and endowment" is not a goal in itself. Are you implying systemic misappropriation and bad faith acting inside wikipedia org? If so I encourage heavy citation.
What is that supposed to mean? Increasing "bureaucracy and endowment" is not a goal in itself. Are you implying systemic misappropriation and bad faith acting inside wikipedia org? If so I encourage heavy citation.
I think there's some merit to that argument, but the other side is what happens if funding dries up or significantly decreases (e.g. after another economic crisis) - do they have enough runway? Through that lens, IIRC they're not that wealthy.
(And in terms of work that people actually appreciate: I also very much appreciate that it's practically never down and responds quickly. Just not as actively, I suppose, since you only notice when it's not there.)
(And in terms of work that people actually appreciate: I also very much appreciate that it's practically never down and responds quickly. Just not as actively, I suppose, since you only notice when it's not there.)
They have $180 million in the bank after you take away liabilities. Their expenses are $90 million however a decade ago they were $20 million and I believe page views haven't increased that dramatically. They spend $20 million a year on grants and awards.
If they focused on just running the website they'd probably have a decade of runway. If they had saved money instead of growing expenses until now then they'd probably have had 20+ years of runway by now.
If they focused on just running the website they'd probably have a decade of runway. If they had saved money instead of growing expenses until now then they'd probably have had 20+ years of runway by now.
I like how often the top comment is negative when talking about a free and open repository of knowledge.
Their 990's are online
Wikipedia quality has actually gone down since the donation campaigns started.
A website like pypi gets much more server load and they have never asked for a penny.
A website like pypi gets much more server load and they have never asked for a penny.
there is no way on earth pypi traffic is higher than wikipedias.
https://dtdg.co/pypi
pypi servers receive 1 million requests per minute. That's likely more than wikipedia.
pypi servers receive 1 million requests per minute. That's likely more than wikipedia.
Both wikipedia and pypi requests are >99% readonly and cacheable, and neither have strict global consistency guarantees. That makes them very cheap and technically easy to run through a free global CDN like cloudflare.
You make it sound like Cloudflare would be OK serving all Wikipedia or pypi traffic for free. Reality would be a little different.
Fastly currently serves all of PyPI's CDN traffic for free. Cloudflare probably would as well.
Back-of-the-envelope math says Wikipedia serves at least twice as much traffic.
According to Wikipedia's public statistics[0], they receive ~3 Billion media requests per day, which is about 2 million requests per minute.
https://stats.wikimedia.org/#/all-projects/content/total-med...
According to Wikipedia's public statistics[0], they receive ~3 Billion media requests per day, which is about 2 million requests per minute.
https://stats.wikimedia.org/#/all-projects/content/total-med...
https://pageviews.toolforge.org/siteviews/?platform=all-acce...
en.wikipedia.org has around 260 million page views per day. Each page view consists of multiple HTTP requests (picking a few random pages shows twenty or more per page) - so I'm pretty sure that wikipedia has higher traffic figures.
en.wikipedia.org has around 260 million page views per day. Each page view consists of multiple HTTP requests (picking a few random pages shows twenty or more per page) - so I'm pretty sure that wikipedia has higher traffic figures.
It seems wikipedia english gets 255m per day. This doesn't include all of their image hosting and other side services though. I think those are in the many hundreda of millions if not billions. Id say they are at least comparable.
It's kinda moot though. I wouldn't begrudge pypi asking for money either.
It's kinda moot though. I wouldn't begrudge pypi asking for money either.
Wikipedia? They have plenty funds to sustain their infra and core team to maintain it.
What about all the (big) freeloaders who use OpenStreetMap Foundation's map tile server infrastructure [1] instead of self-hosting as it was intended [2](or using a SaaS)?
All the corporate sponsors who fund OSMF [3] roll their own map stack, but outside of them still there occasionally appears a rogue app/website with high traffic. IIRC, most of the tile server traffic comes from outside of osm.org.
[1] https://operations.osmfoundation.org/policies/tiles/
[2] https://switch2osm.org/
[3] Who still are controversial for their constant "bargaining" on how to put the copyright notice in the least visible way, even though it's required by ODbL license.
What about all the (big) freeloaders who use OpenStreetMap Foundation's map tile server infrastructure [1] instead of self-hosting as it was intended [2](or using a SaaS)?
All the corporate sponsors who fund OSMF [3] roll their own map stack, but outside of them still there occasionally appears a rogue app/website with high traffic. IIRC, most of the tile server traffic comes from outside of osm.org.
[1] https://operations.osmfoundation.org/policies/tiles/
[2] https://switch2osm.org/
[3] Who still are controversial for their constant "bargaining" on how to put the copyright notice in the least visible way, even though it's required by ODbL license.
Everyone running their own tile servers is in theory a good idea, but in practice (at least last time I looked) it’s a nightmare to set up. If they want to push people in that direction, they could learn something from “certbot” from LetsEncrypt for example: if you give people a good enough wrapper that makes it relatively easy to self host and contribute to the network, they will. If they don’t understand how, they’ll just use a tile server from somewhere else.
There's a Docker image.
https://switch2osm.org/serving-tiles/using-a-docker-containe...
https://switch2osm.org/serving-tiles/using-a-docker-containe...
Have you ever set it up? If so, how complicated was it to get it to work?
If you're looking to set up osm2pgsql you might find my code useful. It's a wip hobby project by a student, so absolutely no promises about quality/correctness, but it shows basic usage.
https://www.github.com/danielzfranklin/backpackingmap/tree/m...
https://www.github.com/danielzfranklin/backpackingmap/tree/m...
I haven't, I'm afraid (I'm not greatly into Docker and vector tiles are more interesting these days anyway).
This money would be going to foundation, their ever increasing staff, and the different random projects that they support.
Well yes, but sometimes I ponder whether the funds are well spent. I checked out their research projects (supported by data from analytics stack they maintain), yet many were non-conclusive or half-finished.
Hope they don't go the route of Mozilla.
Hope they don't go the route of Mozilla.
What's the problem? Other for-profit entities are getting material value from importing Wikipedia content at no cost. I'm not opposed to a for-profit vs nonprofit/personal distinction where for-profit clients that redistribute Wikipedia content have to pay a small license fee. If that results in Wikipedia paying their contributors something for accepted article contributions I'd be even more for it.
Wikipedia? They have plenty funds to sustain their infra and core team to maintain it.
And? Let them extract more value from big tech companies. The Wikimedia foundation provides services that I value. If big tech pays for those services and not me, all the better.
And? Let them extract more value from big tech companies. The Wikimedia foundation provides services that I value. If big tech pays for those services and not me, all the better.
OSM should just run their tile server behind cloudflare. Then cloudflare will pay for all the traffic for common map tiles, and load on the tile infrastructure will be low enough that the running cost isn't substantial. Asking thousands of individual users to set up and host their own tile servers is just a waste of everyone's time.
OSM already runs its tileserver behind fastly.
OSM Foundation treasurer here. Hi!
We've recently started hosting our tiles on Fastly, thanks to their generous support. Our policies remain the same, and if you're going to use a big amount of tiles, you should go with one of the commercial tile services, or host your own.
We've recently started hosting our tiles on Fastly, thanks to their generous support. Our policies remain the same, and if you're going to use a big amount of tiles, you should go with one of the commercial tile services, or host your own.
Thanks for your and your orgs fantastic job!
As a Wikipedia contributor and admin (in one country) since early days, I urge everyone to read the original description[0] of this product:
> The goal of the project is to build services for large-scale for-profit reusers of Wikimedia content. [...] The focus is on organizations that want to repurpose Wikimedia content in other contexts, providing data services at a large scale, so that they are faster and more comprehensive, reliable, and secure. Wikimedia Enterprise aims to improve the user experience of Wikimedia's readers beyond our own websites; increase the reach and discoverability of the content; and improve awareness and ease of attribution and verifiability by the organizations that reuse Wikimedia content the most—through self-funding services.
This has _nothing_ to do with diverging into a free and a commercial version of Wikipedia. Wikipedia stays the same; Enterprise is just a product built on top of it that anyone can opt to pay for.
This is actually to make it easier for _everyone_ to make use of the Wikipedia data in a better way;
> As this idea developed, it became clear there is a responsibility to democratize our data for organizations that do not possess the resources of these largest users, to ensure we are leveling the playing field and helping to foster a healthy internet without reinforcing monopolies. The benefits of such a service shouldn't just be for startups or alternatives to the internet giants, but also for universities and university researchers; archives and archivists; along with the wider Wikimedia movement.
[0] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Enterprise
> The goal of the project is to build services for large-scale for-profit reusers of Wikimedia content. [...] The focus is on organizations that want to repurpose Wikimedia content in other contexts, providing data services at a large scale, so that they are faster and more comprehensive, reliable, and secure. Wikimedia Enterprise aims to improve the user experience of Wikimedia's readers beyond our own websites; increase the reach and discoverability of the content; and improve awareness and ease of attribution and verifiability by the organizations that reuse Wikimedia content the most—through self-funding services.
This has _nothing_ to do with diverging into a free and a commercial version of Wikipedia. Wikipedia stays the same; Enterprise is just a product built on top of it that anyone can opt to pay for.
This is actually to make it easier for _everyone_ to make use of the Wikipedia data in a better way;
> As this idea developed, it became clear there is a responsibility to democratize our data for organizations that do not possess the resources of these largest users, to ensure we are leveling the playing field and helping to foster a healthy internet without reinforcing monopolies. The benefits of such a service shouldn't just be for startups or alternatives to the internet giants, but also for universities and university researchers; archives and archivists; along with the wider Wikimedia movement.
[0] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Enterprise
Most of the comments is just generic slippery slope arguments about how this will ruin Wikipedia in the long run. HN has a way of surfacing such doom and gloom comments while the "seems to be positive, let's wait and watch" wallows at the bottom.
If anyone disagrees and is firmly convinced that Wikipedia is going to die because they're offering a way for enterprises to avoid hammering the main site with requests, I'm willing to take a $100 long bet that says otherwise.
If anyone disagrees and is firmly convinced that Wikipedia is going to die because they're offering a way for enterprises to avoid hammering the main site with requests, I'm willing to take a $100 long bet that says otherwise.
Maybe having all the "avoid these outcomes" posts at the top is a useful way to checklist the actions?
A lot of readers with decent attention spans, or a vested interest will make it to the bottom of the page, probably.
A lot of readers with decent attention spans, or a vested interest will make it to the bottom of the page, probably.
Maybe you're right, but I still think it's a large jump going from completely non-commercial to partially funded through commercial means. It's a jump that I find concerning
And this is how Wikimedia continues metastasizing. Wikipedia is now creating an enterprise version that will "compete" with free Wikipedia (articles words) to cater to enterprise clients.
My donations and writings were intended to sustain a free, robust encyclopedia, not to create an internal division that explicitly caters to big tech. This title is misleading. The entire project is misleading.
If Wikipedia Enterprise aims to succeed it will need to bow to its customer. Big tech is going to pay up, and it's going to expect exactly what it's paying for.
My donations and writings were intended to sustain a free, robust encyclopedia, not to create an internal division that explicitly caters to big tech. This title is misleading. The entire project is misleading.
If Wikipedia Enterprise aims to succeed it will need to bow to its customer. Big tech is going to pay up, and it's going to expect exactly what it's paying for.
> Wikipedia is now creating an enterprise version that will "compete" with free Wikipedia (articles words) to cater to enterprise clients.
How do you come to that conclusion? All data from Wikipedia is free for everyone as done before.
How do you come to that conclusion? All data from Wikipedia is free for everyone as done before.
This is about features, not data. Though the line can be slim and moving fast.
Today they add better query-abilities. Tommorow they offer generation of additional data which not of public interesst. Next year they might add a enterprise-only content-part which contains data not available to the public for legal reasons, or considered irrelevant for the public pedia.
And of course this is technically ok to do that. But at some point it undermines the original mission of the project if you mix up opposite goals, because there naturally will be a clash between people who work on different goals.
Today they add better query-abilities. Tommorow they offer generation of additional data which not of public interesst. Next year they might add a enterprise-only content-part which contains data not available to the public for legal reasons, or considered irrelevant for the public pedia.
And of course this is technically ok to do that. But at some point it undermines the original mission of the project if you mix up opposite goals, because there naturally will be a clash between people who work on different goals.
I thought I understood the Enterprise product to just be a faster API to the same content. Are you saying the content itself will diverge?
I'm saying the tech will diverge and will cater to corporate interests.
If anything, this project needs to exist as as a separate private entity, not something within Wikimedia, unless they plan to give it to everyone for free and consider public feedback as the guiding design principal.
If anything, this project needs to exist as as a separate private entity, not something within Wikimedia, unless they plan to give it to everyone for free and consider public feedback as the guiding design principal.
Your concern seems to be about purely speculative changes you think might happen in the future, not about what is actually changing now.
I find this extremely concerning - this could be the beginning of a slide into financial dependence on Big Tech companies, not to mention the many conflict of interest issues.
Mozilla #2
In your opinion, how can the Wikipedia goal of separating commercial and other users be managed?
Relying on its existing cash pile, focus on its core mission instead of growth, and hence not seeking/needing compensatory revenue streams from commercial users.
I donated and contribute to wikipedia so it's material would be free to use for /anyone/ even corporates.
If it improves other services I use or even others that I need to pay for, I'm glad. That's the point of a free, public resource.
I donated and contribute to wikipedia so it's material would be free to use for /anyone/ even corporates.
If it improves other services I use or even others that I need to pay for, I'm glad. That's the point of a free, public resource.
Bear in mind the actual content will still be free, the thing these enterprises will be paying for is a customised feed and support infrastructure servicing their particular requirements. Would you be ok with your donations being used to pay for a feed service and support dedicated to, say, the particular needs of Google search results, or Apple's Siri?
It also depends if you consider it's core mission is just English Wikipedia. Expanding into additional languages and keeping the content consistent between languages is a huge undertaking that won't work on a purely volunteer basis. If this dependable revenue stream can help with some of these other very capital intensive but worthy initiatives I'm for it.
It also depends if you consider it's core mission is just English Wikipedia. Expanding into additional languages and keeping the content consistent between languages is a huge undertaking that won't work on a purely volunteer basis. If this dependable revenue stream can help with some of these other very capital intensive but worthy initiatives I'm for it.
Wikipedia is already in 300+ different languages...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:SiteMatrix
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:SiteMatrix
I'm not concerned but there's at least a handful of those that aren't written by speakers. The Scots one was the notable example as it was almost entirely written by an American teenager who doesn't know the language
If there are no Scots speakers who care enough to write it, should it exist?
Of course.
The person who suffers in this scenario is not the Scots speaking subject matter expert who chooses not to contribute their time for free, but the Scots speaking child who doesn’t have the resources to learn.
The person who suffers in this scenario is not the Scots speaking subject matter expert who chooses not to contribute their time for free, but the Scots speaking child who doesn’t have the resources to learn.
The quality of most of those is absolutely appalling though, very sparse, inaccurate, out of date, and in some cases not even in the actual language.
> Would you be ok with your donations being used to pay for a feed service and support dedicated to, say, the particular needs of Google search results, or Apple's Siri?
Absolutely not, and this isn't whats happening today. Third parties do not use the existing Wikipedia APIs to begin with, cache page results, and create their own machine readable versions. These "enterprise customers" entirely bear the costs and risk of maintaining a machine readable API. There are also businesses that compete and innovate in this space already.
I'm also not okay with my donations financing an upstart like this targeting enterprise.
This needs to exist outside of Wikimedia. It's completely out of scope. Profit incentives warp missions. Why can't Apple/Google et al start their own consortium that does this themselves. Why does Wikimedia need to do this?
Think of the scale of operations required to support an entity like Google or Apple. This is going to require a /ton/ of investment and talent and it may even fail. Why is Wikimedia incurring start up risks like this to appease the needs of big tech?
Absolutely not, and this isn't whats happening today. Third parties do not use the existing Wikipedia APIs to begin with, cache page results, and create their own machine readable versions. These "enterprise customers" entirely bear the costs and risk of maintaining a machine readable API. There are also businesses that compete and innovate in this space already.
I'm also not okay with my donations financing an upstart like this targeting enterprise.
This needs to exist outside of Wikimedia. It's completely out of scope. Profit incentives warp missions. Why can't Apple/Google et al start their own consortium that does this themselves. Why does Wikimedia need to do this?
Think of the scale of operations required to support an entity like Google or Apple. This is going to require a /ton/ of investment and talent and it may even fail. Why is Wikimedia incurring start up risks like this to appease the needs of big tech?
I hadn't thought of it that way, but you are right.
We are already dependent on "Big Tech", we just haven't realised it yet.
"But whereas one mushroomed into a trillion-dollar company, the other has remained a midsize nonprofit"
A midsize nonprofit that works. As it provides the technical foundation of Wikipedias Community - who are the ones to provide the actual value. So everything is pretty much working as is should be. Why on earth would anyone want Wikipedia to be a trillion dollar company?
Companies are after profit. Going after profit - and providing information free (and adfree!) to the world are contrary things.
So finding ways to generate extra money, while not changing the core - why not. But this sounds a bit too vague - and with potentially lots of money involved - dangerous, when they get dependent on it. Money buys influence. Not something I want in the worlds encyclopedy.
A midsize nonprofit that works. As it provides the technical foundation of Wikipedias Community - who are the ones to provide the actual value. So everything is pretty much working as is should be. Why on earth would anyone want Wikipedia to be a trillion dollar company?
Companies are after profit. Going after profit - and providing information free (and adfree!) to the world are contrary things.
So finding ways to generate extra money, while not changing the core - why not. But this sounds a bit too vague - and with potentially lots of money involved - dangerous, when they get dependent on it. Money buys influence. Not something I want in the worlds encyclopedy.
Very sloppy article.
Wikipedia never mentioned going explicitly after Google.
Also I guess this is not the story the author wanted to tell, so it isn't mentioned, but Google is regularly donating millions to Wikipedia.
This looks like a great way to formalize their symbiotic relationship, which the article got right, but - I didn't think I would ever say this - the article isn't exactly being fair on Google by singling them out and omitting any mention of their contributions.
Wikipedia never mentioned going explicitly after Google.
Also I guess this is not the story the author wanted to tell, so it isn't mentioned, but Google is regularly donating millions to Wikipedia.
This looks like a great way to formalize their symbiotic relationship, which the article got right, but - I didn't think I would ever say this - the article isn't exactly being fair on Google by singling them out and omitting any mention of their contributions.
Wikimedia linked this article in their official announcement, so I guess that's their way of saying they agree with this narrative.
Is it just me or is Wikipedia lately sounding more and more desperate? What are the reasons?
- Are the server costs ballooning?
- Are the middle managers / bureaucracy increasing in numbers?
- If not these, what else?
They are also employing annoyance tactics and dark patterns to coerce you into donating.
I suppose it's extremely easy for one to believe various yes-men that your organization needs more people -- from one point of growth and on.
But the pertinent question remains: why does a non-profit need to grow?
- Are the server costs ballooning?
- Are the middle managers / bureaucracy increasing in numbers?
- If not these, what else?
They are also employing annoyance tactics and dark patterns to coerce you into donating.
I suppose it's extremely easy for one to believe various yes-men that your organization needs more people -- from one point of growth and on.
But the pertinent question remains: why does a non-profit need to grow?
Are there any indications how much this new feed will cost?
If the existing feed remains available, as a big enterprise I wouldn't pay much for use of the new feed. Just to have a few more data formatting options and possibly filtering of events barely seems worth it - I can get one of my own in house developers to implement the same in a few weeks, so if the cost is >$20k per year, I don't think I would be subscribing.
I suspect the unsaid undertones are "this new feed has an SLA, and the old one doesn't, so we'll be deliberately breaking the old feed on a more regular basis till you are forced to pay for the new one".
If the existing feed remains available, as a big enterprise I wouldn't pay much for use of the new feed. Just to have a few more data formatting options and possibly filtering of events barely seems worth it - I can get one of my own in house developers to implement the same in a few weeks, so if the cost is >$20k per year, I don't think I would be subscribing.
I suspect the unsaid undertones are "this new feed has an SLA, and the old one doesn't, so we'll be deliberately breaking the old feed on a more regular basis till you are forced to pay for the new one".
More relevant discussion is here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26484080
That title seems more relevant as well.
So I suppose big tech can pay this instead of donating funds? And individual donors should stop since there’s this new revenue stream?
Related discussion "Introducing the Wikimedia Enterprise API": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26484080
And I'm asking Big Tech to pay me for my personal data oh wait a minute I get free access to their internet services but is that really enough?
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Considering the costs of Wikipedia, I wonder if switching to something like IPFS or Sia would make sense in future?
Reminder that Wikimedia receives north of 100 million of USD per year, with the servers themselves costing 2 millions.
The immense majority of the money is (in my opinion) wasted on bureaucracy.
The immense majority of the money is (in my opinion) wasted on bureaucracy.
I do wonder if this is related to dwindling editor engagement. With fewer people investing a lot of their free time into the project, a move away from a more open-source approach and more into a content marketing one inspires less opposition.
We might be seeing a final cashout attempt by Wikipedia top brass here.
We might be seeing a final cashout attempt by Wikipedia top brass here.
> I do wonder if this is related to dwindling editor engagement.
It increasingly becomes an uphill battle to be a Wikipedia editor - the neutral editors have to fight through the ideological gatekeeping and activism on the site. Even the co-founder of Wikipedia declared its neutrality to be dead. https://larrysanger.org/2020/05/wikipedia-is-badly-biased/
It increasingly becomes an uphill battle to be a Wikipedia editor - the neutral editors have to fight through the ideological gatekeeping and activism on the site. Even the co-founder of Wikipedia declared its neutrality to be dead. https://larrysanger.org/2020/05/wikipedia-is-badly-biased/
Larry Sanger has been a severe critic of Wikipedia for nearly its entire life.
Even putting aside his personal bias, the article you cite is not particularly convincing.
As key examples, he compares the Wikipedia pages for Barack Obama (generally positive) and Donald Trump (generally negative) as evidence of failed neutrality.
Any definition of neutrality that requires all political figures to be equally criticised and praised would result in a resource that simply has no value. Should the article about Hitler really balance for and against arguments concerning the Holocaust?
Even putting aside his personal bias, the article you cite is not particularly convincing.
As key examples, he compares the Wikipedia pages for Barack Obama (generally positive) and Donald Trump (generally negative) as evidence of failed neutrality.
Any definition of neutrality that requires all political figures to be equally criticised and praised would result in a resource that simply has no value. Should the article about Hitler really balance for and against arguments concerning the Holocaust?
No one is demanding equal amounts of criticism and praise. The argument in the article is that several valid and noteworthy criticisms of Obama are simply missing. It's hard to see it other than as a whitewash.
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Editor engagement concerns are mostly around english wikipedia. English is just a small part of the wikimedia world.
Besides people have been complaining about editor engagement on en for more than a decade now, its not like much has been changing on that front.
[Disclaimer: used to work for WMF. Dont anymore]
Besides people have been complaining about editor engagement on en for more than a decade now, its not like much has been changing on that front.
[Disclaimer: used to work for WMF. Dont anymore]
Active editor count on enwiki peaked at around 100k in 2007 and had fallen to around 50k by 2014. It has been stagnant since, but it is not like complaints about engagement are unwarranted.
https://stats.wikimedia.org/#/en.wikipedia.org/contributing/...
https://stats.wikimedia.org/#/en.wikipedia.org/contributing/...
Any project to put wikipedia in some sort of blockchain hosting solution, or maybe like ipfs/zeronet/i2p?
I've also already brought up that wikipedia articles are not categorized or labelled by field/domain, and it makes it very hard to build list of articles if you want to browse them offline.
Kiwix is great, and "good article" are nice, but if articles are not properly labelled, then it becomes much harder to browse wikipedia, in my view. For example I would like to browse articles about natural history or physics. I cannot really do that.
I guess a decent natural language algorithm would also easily be able to label articles pretty accurately, but I believe any serious author/editor of a wikipedia article should be asked to give at least 3 labels on a article. Dewey is already a simple enough type of classification.
For example I'm pretty sure that Wikipedia is FILLED with articles on movies and tv shows and romance books, which are things I don't have any interest in.
I've also already brought up that wikipedia articles are not categorized or labelled by field/domain, and it makes it very hard to build list of articles if you want to browse them offline.
Kiwix is great, and "good article" are nice, but if articles are not properly labelled, then it becomes much harder to browse wikipedia, in my view. For example I would like to browse articles about natural history or physics. I cannot really do that.
I guess a decent natural language algorithm would also easily be able to label articles pretty accurately, but I believe any serious author/editor of a wikipedia article should be asked to give at least 3 labels on a article. Dewey is already a simple enough type of classification.
For example I'm pretty sure that Wikipedia is FILLED with articles on movies and tv shows and romance books, which are things I don't have any interest in.