Christopher Mahan wrote:
I agree with Fred. I think it's important for people to realize right away that they can help the project financially. It also answers the question I get when I show the W to aquaintances: "Where's the catch, they can't be doing this for free."
That is why there is a donations link in the sidebar. It is prominent yet it isn't obtrusive (the 'support' message is under the article title and is thus part of the article - that's obtrusive). We can afford to be obtrusive only when we are having an official fundraising drive. Otherwise we, at worst, annoy people and, at best they start to ignore the message (try saying the same word over and over and over again - after a while you can't remember what the word means).
Fundraising drives are supposed to be a bit annoying and attention getting, but that's fine because they are only held a handful of times a year. Last time I checked we were not in such dire straights to require a constant fundraising drive. Do you want us to give the impression that we are desperate for cash?
Another way people can get to the donation page is through a link to the foundation's homepage under the logo of every project. It would say "A [Wikimedia] project". [Wikimedia] would be a link to http://wikimediafoundation.org (which in turn has prominent statement asking people to consider donating and a "Donate Now" link in the sidebar). Then there would be an indirect link to the donation page at the top of every sidebar and a direct one at the bottom of every sidebar.
-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
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