On Tue, Feb 23, 2016 at 8:20 PM, pajz pajzmail@gmail.com wrote:
Well, we all know about the problems of giving monetary compensation to editors. Just thinking aloud here, but I guess if you want to reward editors in some way, but don't want to pay them directly, there's some middle ground: Don't pay them, but let them donate their share of the cake.
At the beginning of the year, the WMF would set a budget, add some buffer, and all that is received on top of that goes to a charity pool which "belongs" to the editors. However, they can't claim any of the money for themselves, but instead can choose how much they'd like to give to charity A, charity B, etc. So, for instance, I'm a fan of the work of UNICEF and a lesser-known charity called Evidence Action. So "my" compensation for my Wikipedia work would be an amount X that I prorate between these two organizations. Other editors would also take part in this scheme.
And here I thought you were going to suggest giving each editor a pool of $$ to assign to their favorite skunkworks projects.
If we divide the current WMF budget ($58M) by the current number of monthly active editors (71K), then take 60% off the top for keeping the lights on, infrastructure, etc. -- this is a fairly typical overhead percentage for grants at universities -- we're still left with $325/editor.
Personally, I'd vote my funds for edit-a-thons in a box :)
Phoebe, causing trouble
p.s. this is a thought experiment. I think the logistics would be unwieldy. But not so unwieldy that the the highly-praised community tech punchlist couldn't be implemented in many other areas too.