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Wikipedia "free" but demanding donations

Suzanne

Suzanne

Well-Known Member
V.I.P Member
I do not use that site a lot, but when I did go in, they are using guilt trip tactics to induce donations and albeit, it is only 2 euros ( here in France), still, very hesitate to even pay that little amount.

Been reading that they are a huge business and very rich.

Is it a scam or authentic? What are your thoughts on it?
 
I usually access wikipedia by google of the subject not through the site directly,occassionaly I get a money request but not often
 
I rarely ger these notifications, but if I do, I block it with uBlock Origin (Firefox adblocker app) and that usually solves the problem, for a while at least.

One thing that's guaranteed to make me not want to give a donation is when they try to bug you into giving with in-your-face notifications, begging, etc.
 
Yeah, Wikipedia has been bugging me with donation requests when I go there too. They are demanding something like US$2.70 IIRC. There are people who use them who can't pay even that. As @Progster noted, the constant popups with donation demands simply turns off a lot of people.
 
No scam that I see. Just a pitch for contributions. No different than all those televised pitches from other non-profit organizations such as the SPCA or PBS. And yes, they can be very aggressive and make no apologies for it.

Usually organizations which are nominally subsidized by corporations, yet always have some kind of annual financial shortfall they must anticipate and deal with accordingly.

Google contributes a great deal of corporate endowments to Wikipedia, but they have their own self-interest to consider. Though it doesn't pay all of Wikipedia's bills.
 
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I have seen those donation requests too and I ignore them. Perhaps Wiki is 100% impartial and 100% objective in regard to all of the information entered there. I've read that some do not believe that they are 100% impartial and objective. If that's true that that would indicate a bias. I don't like to contribute to biased things so I've not considered donating to Wiki since I don't know conclusively if it's biased or not.
 
If they're a huge business and very rich, then they're asking for spare change then?

That makes me wonder how PBS managed to stay on the air for all of these years with all those pledge drives.
 
WildCat said:
That makes me wonder how PBS managed to stay on the air for all of these years with all those pledge drives.
Click to expand...

Just take a look at the corporate backers they occasionally mention by name with individual programs broadcasted. The pledge drives may or may not fill in the gaps. The lion's share of what it takes to keep it afloat comes from tax-deductible corporate funding. Makes for some great corporate public relations at times depending on who funds what.
 
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Judge said:
Just take a look at the corporate backers they occasionally mention by name with individual programs broadcasted. The pledge drives may or may not fill in the gaps. The lion's share of what it takes to keep it afloat comes from tax-deductible corporate funding.
Click to expand...

Yeah, that makes sense of it then. There was a lot of that as far as I remembered growing up watching it, even in between programs, but as a kid I wasn't concerned with that.
 
Suzanne said:
I do not use that site a lot, but when I did go in, they are using guilt trip tactics to induce donations and albeit, it is only 2 euros ( here in France), still, very hesitate to even pay that little amount.

Been reading that they are a huge business and very rich.

Is it a scam or authentic? What are your thoughts on it?
Click to expand...
There is a bias about Israel !as you can't add any new info about terrorists in the Palestinian section, so they don't get my donations .
 
I use wikipedia quite a bit. I've donated to them before. I know wiki has its critics but I find it a good source.
 
I donate regularly. I love browsing Wikipedia and I used to be quite active in revising and expanding the articles. Since it’s one of my favorite sites I don’t mind giving them a small financial contribution every now and then.

It’s not a scam though. Most sites create revenue by hosting ads on their page. Wikipedia wants to remain neutral and therefore does not use ads on their site. This means their revenue has to come from somewhere else. If people want to donate to keep operations running smoothly, there’s no problem in my book.
 
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I throw a couple of bucks their way every now and then. I use it almost daily. Operating a huge public service web site like that is expensive and they don't have advertisers. There is nothing free in this world. Even if you don't pay yourself, someone has to for the site to stay online.
 
Streetwise said:
There is a bias about Israel !as you can't add any new info about terrorists in the Palestinian section, so they don't get my donations .
Click to expand...
Wait, there are terrorists in Palestine? Maybe they are not allow it because you aren't adding correct info / providing sources, or all info is already covered.
 
I don't see a problem with them asking for donations. It's tough running a site with millions of articles if you don't have ads, especially one as useful as a wiki. Wikipedia is even 90% reliable (some articles are stubs). They have moderators that watch closely and immediately edit out any potential misinformation (either that, or mark that a piece of information might be incorrect). They also have several links to various other sources from books, news articles, etc. They even have photo galleries.

It's worth giving them 2-5 USD every once in a while.
 
Their a non-profit organization so their not legally allowed to make profits. I don't see why they would be asking for donations if they didn't need them.
 
If it's something I peruse now and then, and the content is useful, interesting, or original, I'm happy to give a few dollars now and then, be it Wikipedia, The Guardian, the BBC, or anyone else. Especially with things being a bit tough for some this year and knowing that some who might have otherwise donated might not be able to.
 
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