[Foundation-l] Answers.com and Wikimedia Foundation to Form NewPartnership

[Robert Scott Horning]

Delirium wrote:

> Anthony DiPierro wrote:
>
>> I can't for the life of me understand why people "a bunch of editors and
>> readers" would leave over something like this. I also don't think 
>> it'd be a
>> bad thing to get rid of the people who think this way.
>>
> Well, if the Foundation really wanted to find out, they could issue an 
> ultimatum---we're starting GoogleAds tomorrow, and anyone opposed to 
> advertising on Wikipedia can get out (and good riddance!).
>
> Of course, they are unlikely to do so. =]
>
> -Mark

Attitudes like this are going to destroy the project entirely.  I guess 
you don't care about the fact that your actions are encouraging large 
scale emmigration from Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects, and 
forking of contents.  It doesn't matter if this action with Answer.com 
was good or bad, an attitude like this where you can good riddance to 
people who don't agree with you is contrary to what this community has 
been about.

This whole episode and debate is unfortunately going to leave a lot of 
embittered people on all sides of the issue, primarily due to the way it 
was presented in the first place.  At this point, that doesn't matter, 
and all we got now is controversy that perhaps will never go away. 
 Rubbing salt in the wounds and telling people to go away is not going 
to help.

While the initial presentation may have been flawed, and the "community" 
feeling like it was ignored (with the huge numbers of e-mails on this 
list, plus a slashdot story and the rest of the public airing of this 
issue) this can either be a divisive issue or we can try to come 
together with compromise solutions to get this to work.  

The underlying issue for this whole exchange is that the Foundation 
needs money in order to operate.  In addtion, being one of the top 50 
websites on the internet makes advertising revenue something very 
attractive, particularly given the current commercial climate with most 
internet websites.  What needs to happen is some creative thoughts about 
how some sort of revenue can help pay for the basic needs of this 
project, particularly for bandwidth and server costs.

Could other organizational aspects be done?  What about P2P distributed 
models for dealing with content?  Other software models for organizing 
the content?  More effecient software algorithms for MediaWiki?

As for financial resources available to the Wikimedia Foundaion, what 
else could be done.  More direct fundraising?  A "telethon" or similar 
media campaign?  Foundation grants or other philenthropic charities that 
could donate for specific projects (like Wikijunior and the Beck 
Foundation)?  A "bookstore" that would sell CD-ROMs and printed books 
based on contents of Wikimedia projects?  All of these and more can be done.

In this case there are many individuals who feel that they have labored 
hard to create an interesting public resource, only to see a few 
individuals seemingly make some money off of their volunteer labors, 
particularly with the cooperation of the "leaders" of this community. 
 That is what is sticking in the craw of those who don't like what is 
going on here.  And a darker side is that if somebody else is making 
money, why can't I?  If Answers.com is going to get that benefit from 
Wikipedia readers and make a little bit of money, what is going to stop 
each and every other editor/contributor to Wikipedia to do the same 
thing with a link on the tools page that would copy what Answers.com is 
doing?  Would that need Foundation approval (getting into cronyism) or 
can any editor simply put a link in the same place at any time?  Do you 
need to be an admin to make changes there? (more resentment of the 
"heirarchy" of community leaders by ordinary users.)  What about other 
products/services?  What is the "end result" of all this commercial 
activity with Wikipedia?

I don't have any answers this these questions for the most part, but I 
have seen them all raised on this mailing list in many different forums. 
 Rather than telling people to "get lost and never come back, we don't 
need you", it is far better the make the people having complaints to 
become part of the solution.  The decision to have ads on Wikipedia  or 
not is just a small part of much larger issues here, and it never does 
any good to drive people away... especially people who are genuinely 
trying to make this a bettter place in the first place.  We are not 
talking about driving away vandals and trolls here, but rather people 
who have made some significant contributions to this community.

-- 
Robert Scott Horning