Ori Livneh wrote:
On Fri, Nov 28, 2014 at 5:55 PM, MZMcBride
<z(a)mzmcbride.com> wrote:
The banners may be effective, but they're not
aligned with Wikimedia's
values.
I wouldn't come out quite as strongly against these banners, but I share
the underlying sentiment.
What happened to "we make the Internet not suck"? What happened to the
near-universal agreement that pop-ups are bad?
(a) solicit input from a neutral reputation management
consultancy, and
Consultants are the reason the fundraising campaigns and associated
banners are so awful. To the idea that we continue paying people
needlessly for bad advice, I'm going to say no thank you. I'd rather not.
(b) create a forum for staffers to talk openly about
this matter, without
fear of reprisal
What's wrong with wikimedia-l? I can assure you that this mailing list has
grade-A reprisal, far better than what you'll receive from work. :-)
David Gerard wrote:
"Wikipedia begging for donations per usual.
"Advertising isn't evil"
they say as they throw a second nag at me as I scroll down."
https://twitter.com/enemyplayer/status/539180814739988481
Indeed. It might help if we started referring to the fundraising banners
as full-page advertising. Calling a spade a spade, and all that.
It also occurred to me that it wouldn't be unreasonable for Adblock (Plus)
to reconsider its classification of the fundraising notices (even
"banners" is generous). Historically banners on Wikimedia wikis have not
been considered ads by Adblock and friends, but this assumed decency and
common sense on Wikimedia's part. These full-page gremlins lack both.
Obnoxious banners *really do damage the brand*.
What are the fundraiser metrics? If they don't include effect on the
brand, they'll be motivating damaging behaviour.
We used to have live-updating statistics about the annual fundraiser at
<https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Special:FundraiserStatistics>. That
error message is probably highly misleading and we really ought to have
better reporting about donations. As far as I know, we've taken several
steps backward in recent years in terms of donation transparency and this
should be addressed in 2015. (I'm somewhat hoping someone will quickly
prove me wrong with a link to up-to-date donor stats... go on!)
MZMcBride