[Foundation-l] fundraising proposal #1

[Daniel Mayer]

--- daniwo59 at aol.com wrote:
> Given the increasing costs of hardware in Mav's report, it seems as if we 
> have to begin taking drastic measures to keep up to speed withour growth. 

Yep - we seem to have started to enter the vertical part of J curve growth.
Notice the jump from 4900K hits/day in May to 12100K hits/day in June. Did we
have any extraordinary media attention in June to explain that? 

> One possibility is that we begin compiling a snail mail list of potential
> donors, to whom we begin sending out solicitations. Donation requests would
> be small ($5-$50), but this might provide some income over the coming
> months. Of course, printing and postage would be costly, but this would be
> an initial investment with hoped-for returns. Costs would include printing
> of a letter, postage, and a postage-paid return envelope and form. 

Ick! I throw out at least a few of those every week. Opt-in email lists would
be a better place to start, IMO. We could spend out a quarterly newsletter to
past donors who agree to receive such a document and also make a donation pitch
in the same email. An opt-in checkbox to receive such a newsletter for each new
user account on any Wikimedia wiki might also be a good idea. 

IIRC, Jimbo mentioned having advertisements in that type of thing not-unlike
National Geographic. Heck, we could also include quarterly WikiReader
selections in such a newsletter and make it *become* a lot like National
Geographic. 

In addition, we need to set-up a membership fee structure so that recurring
donations can be collected. 

Once all that is in place and is successful we can think about also printing
hardcopies and sending them to recurring donors who give at least a certain set
amount of money. Everybody else would receive a pdf. 

-- mav


	
		
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - 100MB free storage!
http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail