[Foundation-l] Personal Image Filter results announced

[MZMcBride]

Fae wrote:
>> Fae wrote:
>>> Is there a link somewhere to the total budget and actual staff costs
>>> of the referendum?
>> 
>> This was asked very early on:
>> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Image_filter_referendum/Archive1#Cost
> 
> Sorry, not the same question as expected costs of implementation. I am
> asking for the actual staff costs for running and analysing the
> referendum itself (so far) plus any further planned costs. This should
> be entirely known and openly reported.

Oops. My bad.

I don't know of any such link and I doubt you'll ever seen one (unless you
write the page yourself!). The Wikimedia cost side would largely be focused
in Philippe (for organizing the referendum) and maybe in a contractor or two
for some work on SecurePoll. Off-hand, I can't think of anyone else who was
really involved from Wikimedia's side. I don't know if there's a cost
associated with the vote hosting (by SPI, I believe), though I'd assume
there is. (Unless the hosting is donated.)

Philippe organized a committee of users, so their time and resources would
be calculated separately. All of their work was unpaid, as far as I know.
Just another thankless task. "On Wikipedia, the reward for a job well done
is another three jobs," as Mr. Gerard says. :-)

Other than costs noted above, I can't really think of too much else that
went into this. Some Board people and staffers have commented on this list
and on the talk page, but most of that is negligible cost and/or volunteer
cost. There are grey areas to consider as well. For example, would you
consider the time and resources that went into the mock-ups as part of the
referendum costs?

I agree that a proper report would be nice, but I don't see it realistically
happening, for a variety of reasons.

MZMcBride