[Foundation-l] Jimmy Wales in the news

[David Gerard]

On 08/03/2008, Dan Rosenthal <swatjester at gmail.com> wrote:

> Now look
>  at this from an outside investor's opinion? They not only have to
>  balance the costs of their spending, but the opportunity cost of not
>  spending on others groups, with the "warm fuzzy feeling" being to them
>  much less important, as well as wanting to see something returning
>  back to them from it, be it money, or other benefit. Then they compare
>  whether to invest in the foundation vs. another group, and if they are
>  acting rationally they will go for the one with the best benefit to
>  cost ratio.  That's the way that I see things.


The intangibles can be hard to measure. e.g.

- Cancer is a good cause, but $50,000 to the American Cancer Society
has less impact as a single donation than $50,000 to the WMF.
- But if you had a close relative die of cancer, you might work your
arse off for the ACS as your favourite cause anyway.
- But if Wikipedia and the WMF's mission resonates with you, you might
feel dropping $50k on the Foundation is an obviously good idea if you
can spare that much this year - so that cost ratio is not an issue at
all, just how much you can spare this year.
- And some wealthy donors like a thank-you of whatever prominence, but
others are really quite averse to publicity.

What donors get out of donating is *incredibly* squishy and intangible.


- d.