[Wikimedia-l] Outage: what I'm telling the press

[Thomas Dalton]

On 6 August 2012 21:06, Andreas Kolbe <jayen466 at gmail.com> wrote:
> $35 million is not "a few million dollars".

But not all of that is spent on site operations.

> All fine and dandy, but then let's please do our best to ensure that the
> BBC don't print "gaffer tape and string" sob stories about us. The tenner
> that someone in India sends us might indeed be better spent on a local
> charity there that actually feeds someone, or keeps someone healthy.

Don't you think that should be up to the donor? I certainly agree that
we need to be honest in our messaging and I've been very vocal in
opposition to messaging that suggests there is any urgency for people
to donate of that Wikipedia won't survive it they don't (at least,
once we're far enough into the fundraiser that basic costs are all
covered). That doesn't mean we shouldn't be proud of the fact that we
are extremely efficient with our operations spending.