[Foundation-l] some worries about fundraiser and editor appeals boycotting it

[Robert Rohde]

On Mon, Dec 6, 2010 at 10:39 PM, Ernesto García
<wbibliotecario at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Seeing http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Special:FundraiserStatistics  I'm quite worried about the onlook.. choosing "year to date" tab shows a definite  deacceleration (and we still need about 4x the current cumulative amount).

<snip>

The target for fiscal 2010-11 is $20.4 M in total revenue, but only
$13.5 M in individual donations under $10k.  Most such donations
(80-90%) come in via the annual fundraiser.  By extension, the target
for the fundraiser itself should be about $12 M.

We've raised $6.7 M so far, which would be 55% of $12 M.  At this
point, we are about 40% of the way through the fundraiser.

The slowing donation rate over the last several days is a natural
result of donor fatigue and a sign of a campaign starting to grow
stale.  Simple projections accounting for the declining donation rate
would put us around $10.5M at the end, and hence somewhat shy of $12M.
 However, experience suggests that variations in the appeal can often
boost the donation rate even late in a campaign.  So, while we will
have to push a bit to meet the targets, I would say it is still
entirely plausible to do so and there is no need to panic.

-Robert Rohde