Hoi, I want to point out to all, that it says to provide the information for free in perpetuity. It does not say anything at all about advertisements, sponsorships or whatever. The implication is that first and foremost the data is to be provided for FREE, the rest is thereby fluff, nice fluff but fluff. It is not what we explicitly do.

Hoi, I want to point out to all, that it says to provide the information for free in perpetuity. It does not say anything at all about advertisements, sponsorships or whatever.

Anthony, what, according to you, is the place to speak up? I have considered this mailinglist as the place to speak up, anywhere else? teun On 1/5/07, Anthony <wikilegal(a)inbox.org> wrote: for _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l(a)wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

Hoi, I do not know if you observe when people watch watch television, but people go to the toilet when there is an advertisement break. People tape a program and fastforward the ads. The notion that ads provide information is vastly overrated. Advertisements are typically ignored.

Hoi, It is nice to be insulted with a word that I do not know .. Thank you.

ignored. You would also read in the part that you did not bother to copy that often a better deal can be had by not being lazy and by thinking about what there is to buy.

has no effect it has little effect. Another point that I l make is that the Wikimedia Foundation can be much more effective when it had a bigger budget. Given the growth rate of all our projects, our need for money will increase even when we only want to continue to provide the level of service that we do.

have not really made an impact in Africa, Asia and South America I do argue that we have not scratched the service of what we aim to do. The fact that only the English Wikipedia has more than a million articles proves to me that Wikipedia is still very much a rich man's game.

not have the organisational infrastructure to do well in many languages.

foundation is to bring information to everyone. We do not do as good a job as we could. This is the argument that is not addressed when people are rabidly against advertisements. Even when like in the Virgin Unite case that organisation does not sell a thing. The problem I have with this blanket anti add attitude is that it has little to do with our aims

Hoi, I do not know if you observe when people watch watch television, but people go to the toilet when there is an advertisement break. People tape a program and fastforward the ads. The notion that ads provide information is vastly overrated. Advertisements are typically ignored.

There is a website of a friend.. it has Google ads. When I feel good I hit an add knowing that it will benefit my friend. The notion that ads create a conflict of interest is an article of faith, it is not based in how people perceive things in real life. When you are patch is bald, and you want a solution AND you are lazy .. that is when an add helps you to get Miracle-Gro. When you are smart you buy it cheaply in bulk at a local shop and not over the Internet.

I think "patch" mentioned to a garden patch. "Miracle-Gro on head" reminds me of a website I used to go on...

Anthony, what, according to you, is the place to speak up?

I have considered this mailinglist as the place to speak up, anywhere else?

Thx, Indeed, I'd like to make clear that our vision should encompass both kinds of "free". Advertisements are likely to tarnish the strictly neutral image of our projects. take the example of the Microsoft articles on wikipedia. Microsoft the company, and articles on their products. Using the google context ad-aware system, the most logical ads would be for exactly ... uh, these microsoft products. You cant fool me - even if the people could easily distinguish articles and ads, unconsciously they would be influenced. Waerth en GerardM argued that people ignore ads. If they were right, companies would no longer spend a dime on ads. But they are spending billions on them. teun On 1/6/07, Anthony <wikilegal(a)inbox.org> wrote: > On 1/5/07, Teun Spaans <teun.spaans(a)gmail.com> wrote: > >> Anthony, >> >> what, according to you, is the place to speak up? >> >> > This thread is certainly a good place. If you think "without > advertisements" should be added to the mission statement, suggest it. > It would be interesting to see who, if anyone, objects. > > >> I have considered this mailinglist as the place to speak up, anywhere else? >> >> > There's a talk page for that mission statement draft. Not sure where > else it's being discussed. > > Anthony

I regret your style of discussing: both on Anthony (with whom i disagree) and on me your result in personal attacks. Could you please refrain from them? Or is this attitude customary on wikimedia mailing lists? thx teun On 1/8/07, Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen(a)gmail.com> wrote: > Hoi, > You make the issue too simple. When I am to be asked if I want > advertisements, than the answer is no. When /you /are to be asked do you > want response times that are on average 50 seconds, than the answer is > likely to be no as well. > > When you say that billions are spend on adverts, then you hit the > jackpot. This is indeed one place where we can find the money to > continue the upward trend that we have both in content, in bandwidth, in > people using our content/people contributing to our content, in > languages and in projects. My problem with your stance is that you > provide no credible alternative in the face of a demonstrated need for > money. The current budget ignores all the things we could do if we had > indeed more money than needed for our immediate requirements. > > To demonstrate that you can think differently; in a contract for adds, > you could specify that organisations can not advertise on their own page > and on the page of their competitor. This would wipe away your Micro$oft > inspired comment. > > PS When will you start taking the real issue seriously? The issue is we > need MORE money and we will need EVEN MORE money given our growth rate. > > Thanks, > GerardM > > > teun spaans schreef: > >> Thx, >> >> Indeed, I'd like to make clear that our vision should encompass both >> kinds of "free". >> >> Advertisements are likely to tarnish the strictly neutral image of our >> projects. take the example of the Microsoft articles on wikipedia. >> Microsoft the company, and articles on their products. >> Using the google context ad-aware system, the most logical ads would >> be for exactly ... uh, these microsoft products. You cant fool me - >> even if the people could easily distinguish articles and ads, >> unconsciously they would be influenced. >> >> Waerth en GerardM argued that people ignore ads. If they were right, >> companies would no longer spend a dime on ads. But they are spending >> billions on them. >> >> teun >> >> On 1/6/07, Anthony <wikilegal(a)inbox.org> wrote: >> >> >>> On 1/5/07, Teun Spaans <teun.spaans(a)gmail.com> wrote: >>> >>> >>>> Anthony, >>>> >>>> what, according to you, is the place to speak up? >>>> >>>> >>>> >>> This thread is certainly a good place. If you think "without >>> advertisements" should be added to the mission statement, suggest it. >>> It would be interesting to see who, if anyone, objects. >>> >>> >>> >>>> I have considered this mailinglist as the place to speak up, anywhere else?

In particular, I wonder why the "on the Internet free of charge" bit was added to the mission statement.

One problem I found on working with translators is that some of them tend to prefer to translate "free knowledge" into "knowledge free of charge"

If Wikimedia itself pursue both form of free knowledge - knowledge as free as both beer and speech, I think it makes a sense its mission statement mentions *both* notions. Then no one shall misunderstand what the word "free" means here.

On 1/6/07, Gregory Maxwell <gmaxwell(a)gmail.com> wrote: To emphasize the free licensing / free availability distinction, and to make it explicit that we are committed to both (which we very much are).

Hair splitting, but we can change it to "free content license".

Same argument applies. I don't see how the internet is important to our mission. It's the best tool for the job today, sure, but it's not our mission. Sure we can revise it.. but why bother mentioning it. Our mission is providing effective support for the creation and propagation of this free content. That we use the Internet is true today, but it's not at all fundimental ... it simply adds length without adding clarity.

The words "Free Content" are effectively a domain specific jargon, and I think our mission statement should be free of such jargon. I think the best way to avoid the jargon is to just say what we mean.

We can offset the additional length by removing the free-beer aspects of the current draft. I believe the free-beerness of Wikimedia itself is a natural side effect of our mission of wide propagation but not in and of itself a fundamental goal.

On 1/5/07, Erik Moeller <erik(a)wikimedia.org> wrote: Same argument applies. I don't see how the internet is important to our mission. It's the best tool for the job today, sure, but it's not our mission. Sure we can revise it.. but why bother mentioning it. Our mission is providing effective support for the creation and propagation of this free content. That we use the Internet is true today, but it's not at all fundimental ... it simply adds length without adding clarity.

of the current draft. I believe the free-beerness of Wikimedia itself is a natural side effect of our mission of wide propagation but not in and of itself a fundamental goal.

On 1/6/07, Gregory Maxwell <gmaxwell(a)gmail.com> wrote: I would respectfully disagree -- some degree of specificity in mission is a Good Thing. The *vision* statement is deservedly as broad as possible. I think focusing on the Internet in the mission is good.

We can offset the additional length by removing the free-beer aspects Considering how many people in the world are poor, and that our intended audience is the whole world, maybe it should be a fundamental goal.