On Tue, Feb 23, 2016 at 8:20 PM, pajz <pajzmail(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Well, we all know about the problems of giving
monetary compensation to
editors. Just thinking aloud here, but I guess if you want to reward
editors in some way, but don't want to pay them directly, there's some
middle ground: Don't pay them, but let them donate their share of the cake.
At the beginning of the year, the WMF would set a budget, add some buffer,
and all that is received on top of that goes to a charity pool which
"belongs" to the editors. However, they can't claim any of the money for
themselves, but instead can choose how much they'd like to give to charity
A, charity B, etc. So, for instance, I'm a fan of the work of UNICEF and a
lesser-known charity called Evidence Action. So "my" compensation for my
Wikipedia work would be an amount X that I prorate between these two
organizations. Other editors would also take part in this scheme.
And here I thought you were going to suggest giving each editor a pool
of $$ to assign to their favorite skunkworks projects.
If we divide the current WMF budget ($58M) by the current number of
monthly active editors (71K), then take 60% off the top for keeping
the lights on, infrastructure, etc. -- this is a fairly typical
overhead percentage for grants at universities -- we're still left
with $325/editor.
Personally, I'd vote my funds for edit-a-thons in a box :)
Phoebe, causing trouble
p.s. this is a thought experiment. I think the logistics would be
unwieldy. But not so unwieldy that the the highly-praised community
tech punchlist couldn't be implemented in many other areas too.