Hey All--

I appreciate all the feedback and comments that I've received both on this list and from other sources regarding the fundraiser. As you will see below, we're listening - and we're working to implement some changes right away. I appreciate the time and energy the community has given towards making it better.

The fundraiser has been a substantial learning process and I try to merge my years of fundraising experience into this very different, very remarkable, global community. There definitely has been a steep learning curve...but it's been a wonderful experience.

We are currently working on the following immediate items for this week:

1) Updating the site notices with project specific site notices. ("Wikibooks is a non-profit project: please donate today.") 2) Implementing the plain text "collapsed" banner for logged-in users. 3) Translation of non-Core pages into more languages. Our volunteers are already hard at work translating the Questions?, Stories, and "Ways to give" pages.

To review, our current donations can be found here: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Special:ContributionStatistics

Shortly, we will be moving towards Phase II of the Annual Fundraiser. It will have another round of updates and look to highlight again the donation link and our needs as a non-profit. We've gotten positive feedback and comments on and offline from new donors, and as Brion pointed out earlier - donations are up from previous years - so I think the direct request for funds and support has been working. We're going to continue that and attempt to shake things up to get some donors to think again about donating.

Quick comparison 2007 vs 2008: a) First week of data only: 10/22/07-10/28/07 vs 11/03/08-11/09/08 b) Only including donations UNDER $10,000

2007 Donors: 7547 2008 Donors: 14825

2007 Dollars: $203,605.40 (ave. gift $26.98) 2008 Dollars: $406,126.06 (ave. gift $27.39)

Phase II items, by the end of November, if not sooner:

1) Improved contribution statistics & shared contribution data with the community. 2) A new set of site notices. We'll be updating these in a few weeks...and I'll post them on Meta wiki for comment. 3) Minimum donations set to $1 or reasonable equivalent. 4) Additional currency: the shekel (ILS). We are also looking to add the rupee. 5) Additional features to the Live Comments page. 6) Other changes to the look and feel that highlight our value to the community and or fundraising needs. 7) Enhanced Chapter visibility and promotion.

As always, I welcome your questions or comments. I read this list regularly - it's a fantastic way to see rapid feedback and commentary.

-Rand