On 12/30/06, David Strauss <david(a)fourkitchens.com> wrote:
Michael Noda wrote:
On 12/30/06, The Cunctator
<cunctator(a)gmail.com> wrote:
On 12/28/06, daniwo59(a)aol.com
<daniwo59(a)aol.com> wrote:
7. We are already paying a steep cost. While it
doesn't appear in the audit,
the fact that we do not have advertising is costing us. This is unrealized
income at a minimum of $60k a day and probably much more. In other words it is
many millions a year. Yet, the Board and the community have chosen to avoid
ads so that we can maintain our independence.
You have a strange definition of
cost. Wikipedia is missing out on
tons of money by not being in the porno business. You don't get to
write that up as a cost.
The technical term Danny was alluding to but didn't use was
[[opportunity cost]].
And opportunity cost is the measurement we should be using. There's no
sense in treating expenditures any differently from unrealized income.
If we were a for-profit entity, I would agree. The purpose of
Wikipedia is not to maximize income or profit. All things being equal,
more income -> more realization of Wikimedia's goals, but the
introduction of ads would not be keeping things equal.
Adding advertisements would fundamentally change the nature of
Wikipedia. Additional income to the tune of $60K a day would too; but
I believe it would be a hard argument to make that the difference from
the increased money would necessarily be fundamentally improving. I
rather suspect that one of Wikipedia's core reasons for success has
been its minimal reliance on monetary transactions (related to its
minimal reliance on experts, minimal reliance on long-term planning,
etc.).
That said, there are other reasons to not have porn
ads.
There are other reasons not to have any ads. (See above, or think of your own.)