[Foundation-l] Advertisements?

[Todd Allen]

> I don't know what the community as a whole really thinks, but I think
>  your view that clearly labeled and distinguished advertisements are
>  fundemental breach of NPOV is absurd.  I trust in the basic intelligence of
>  our readers to be able to distinguish between a clearly labeled ad and our
>  actual content.  Do you consider the NYTimes (and essentially every other
>  newspaper and magazine) to be fundementally biased simply because they carry
>  ads?

Actually, yes. I am rather suspicious of such publications when they
run stories about their major advertisers. One also wonders what they
choose -not- to run about them. If there were a newspaper which did
not use ads, I would read it any day over the ones that do, for the
exact reason of lack of potential bias (and actual bias, in giving
part of their space to someone to promote themself). If we sold ads,
we would be doing the same thing; namely, allowing self-promotion on
part of our site in exchange for money. We have, historically, totally
disallowed self-promotion in article space (or other areas such as
Special:Search commonly viewed by readers), and should continue to
strictly forbid it.

As to labelling and distinguishing, I wouldn't find part of an article
acceptable if it were blatant self-promotion, even if it were labelled
"Blatant self-promotion". When a reader views or searches for an
article, there should be -no self promotion- anywhere on the reader's
screen. Period, end of the story. Anything else violates NPOV.
Labelled POV is still POV.

>
>  IF ads are ever added to Wikipedia, then I for one would stick with the site
>  that would be expected to have tens of millions of dollars for further
>  development rather than clinging to an idealistic, but ultimately
>  self-destructive, fork.

Wikipedia/Wikimedia itself was initially an idealistic but ultimately
unrealistic and self-destructive project. It has survived and
prospered on the sweat of dedicated contributors who agree with its
ideals (and many of whom disagree with the sale of those ideals to the
highest bidder), legions of readers who find it a valuable resource
due to exactly the same, and donations. It has never had large amounts
of cash. It has been successful in spite of, or perhaps even because
of, that lack.

>
>  -Robert Rohde
>
>  PS. I'm not saying ads are the only solution, but I consider them an
>  entirely reasonable option.

For some websites, sure they are. For this one, it's one of the most
divisive and destructive things we could do to the project. I would
urge you to learn from the experience of the Spanish Wikipedia. It
took them years to recover from that. You know as well as I do that
ads on the English Wikipedia (which I'm most familiar with, so I use
it as an example) would cause drama beyond belief and contributors to
leave in hordes. This is not for no good reason, -Wikipedia should not
have ads-. Ever. The only thing I would come back to do is vote every
board member who even makes a peep about instituting or keeping the
ads out on their ass, and vote for everyone who advocates getting rid
of them. And I am by no means alone in this view.

The reason this project is worth anything at all, monetarily or
otherwise, is because of the volunteers who worked to build it. Even
setting aside the ethical question of alienating and ignoring the
wishes of a large percentage of those, there is the practical
question--we can always hold a fund drive, or at the worst slash
costs, and things would keep kicking along, but could Wikimedia
survive a mass exodus and major forking across the board? Maybe, but
I'd like to not find out.

I am not heartened by the silence of most of the Foundation board
members. I would very much like to hear a resounding "ABSOLUTELY NOT",
or at the very least "We considered the option but have already
rejected it." I find the quiet on this issue to be worrisome. Our
current Board is composed of some pretty smart people, but it would
still be good to hear definitively that they do not intend to do this.
And of course, if such an option is under ANY amount of consideration,
the Board certainly must be aware that it would be most unwise to even
begin deliberation on such a question without first seeking community
input.

P.S. Spare us the "children in Africa" bit. (That applies to everyone
who is directly or indirectly using it.) It is Wikimedia's job to make
knowledge available to the world, but better to fulfill that mission
slowly and surely than never at all, by killing the project or
tainting it with (real or perceived) bias. It's a despicable rhetoric
tactic to make one's opponent appear as though (s)he is "against
helping the poor (insert sympathetic cause here)", when in reality
that's tangential to the discussion at best.

-- 
Freedom is the right to say that 2+2=4. From this all else follows.