Wikimedia blog

News from the Wikimedia Foundation and about the Wikimedia movement

2010-2011 fundraiser draws to a close

I’m delighted to report that the Wikimedia Foundation can ring in the New Year with the close of our seventh annual fundraiser, having exceeded our goal of $16 million. More than half a million people pitched in an average of around $22 each to support Wikipedia and its sister projects, in our shortest (and most successful) fundraiser to date.

Our community of volunteers is deeply honored that, in only 50 days, 500,000 people from 140 countries came together to support the only non-profit, user supported top-10 website in the world.  In addition to this humbling support for the Wikimedia Foundation, our chapters around the world have raised millions of dollars from hundreds of thousands of donors of their own.

We want to thank every one of our donors for making this year a success, and on behalf of the fundraising team, I personally wish to thank the one-thousand community members who helped us create and test messages, who wrote appeals, and translated banners and letters into over 80 languages.

In 15 days, Wikipedia will turn 10 years old. Since the beginning, Wikipedia’s community of readers and editors have remained dedicated to keeping the site ad-free, and free for use for its 400 million monthly visitors.  This year’s success demonstrates a continued commitment to those principles.

With the close of our annual fundraiser, we are transitioning into the contribution phase of the campaign. We will be running banners for the next few days to thank everyone who came together in the spirit of creating and “effectively disseminating the sum of human knowledge available for all.”  We will also begin to celebrate Wikipedia’s tenth birthday, with banner ads encouraging readers to join us in a local celebration.

We want to invite every one of the readers of Wikipedia and its sister sites to make their  first edit, or upload their first photograph, and join our community of volunteer contributors to continue the growth of Wikipedia for the next 10 years.

Thank you again, and happy New Year! Here’s to 2011, and to the next 10 years!

Regards,

Philippe Beaudette
Head of Reader Relations

28 Responses to “2010-2011 fundraiser draws to a close”

    1 2
  1. Johan Sosa says:

    Jonathan Carroll, when you say you volunteered for wikipedia, do you mean you edited articles or that you actually helped out at their offices? I believe you can mention your wikipedia edits and work on your resume or CV, just like you can put coursework on there. Obviously everyone (ok, maybe almost everyone) appreciates any good work you’ve done .. but I would think that if you need a reference, people would have to “know” you .. personally or professionally. Anyway if you really want a reference why don’t you tell people (on IRC, internet forums, craiglist, on here, or better yet in the offline world) what sort of articles you can create or update .. and then see if someone wants such an article done .. and then maybe if you do a good article that person might agree to provide a reference concerning that. Of course, it will be reference from that individual .. not at all associated with Wikipedia. By the way, this comment concerns me greatly “Working on wikipedia is basically the only contact I have with the outside world, and having been here 5+ years I’ve met no-one, never been asked if “I’m ok” etc” Jonathan, I highly recommend that you have other forms of activities and interaction with the world other than Wikipedia editing. Don’t isolate yourself, there are plenty of other things you can do. Also, don’t give up job hunting .. it’s free to call up places and ask if they’re hiring or in the worst case want volunteer apprentices (be very careful and don’t get ripped off by that though).

  2. David Gerard says:

    Anyone who advocates advertising on Wikipedia is a drooling moron. What Google did to TVTropes is the universal counterexample to allowing ads on Wikipedia.

    I wonder what the gay and lesbian employees of Google have to say about the fact that Google forced any page on TVTropes with even a slightly gay theme behind a filter. So far, they have nothing to say. But! That’s okay! They have mortgages!

    I used to be a fan of advertising on Wikipedia. I was so, so wrong.

  3. Chris Bartlett says:

    I’m pleased to see there has been so much support. I’d have been happy to add my own donation, except that the donation page insists that I must provide my home telephone number before it will process my credit card payment: I see no reason for you (or more likely PayPal) to need this and I don’t have confidence that if I provide it, I won’t get a load more marketing calls. Ergo no donation . . . I wonder if I was the only donor put off by this unnecessary bit of data collection?

  4. Pichpich says:

    The foundation is saying that it raised 16M$. That’s great. But the statistics available at [http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Special:FundraiserStatistics] give a total of about 14M$. As for the contribution statistics page ([http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Special:ContributionStatistics]), it gives a total of 15M$ for the current budget year. What’s the explanation behind the discrepancy? These tools are there for transparency but what good are they if they don’t reflect the actual numbers? I asked this question last year and never got a response.

    • Philippe Beaudette says:

      Great question. The difference is this: the Special:FundraiserStatistics page does not reflect checks that are collected but not yet input, stocks donated but not yet sold or input, gifts above a certain dollar amount (which qualify as “major gifts” and not toward the annual giving campaign), nor does it reflect contributions that will be made by the chapters under the joint fundraising agreement. Special:ContributionStatistics reflects all contributions that have been input (thus not checks, stocks, etc) but does NOT include the dollar threshold.

  5. Giancarlo says:

    I joined as member from the Italian Wikimedia web site (www.wikimedia.it).
    I was redirected for the payment to shop.wikimedia.it.
    SInce the very instant when I completed my payiment through paypal, I could not connect to shop.wikimedia.it. I could not have any information about my subscription, nor I received any information from people at wikimedia.it.

    Now I want to know where my money has gone.

    Best regards
    Giancarlo

  6. Jonathan Carroll says:

    I thought you should read this comment I left on another
    website about my experience: What about the people who actually
    contribute to wikipedia – for nothing. I’ve ‘worked’ there for the
    last 5 years, adding articles, improving articles. doing general
    maintenance etc I get absolutely no pay, no social support, and no
    help from the admins (sorry but this is true). I do it because I
    haven’t been able to get a job and I have nothing else to do – I do
    it to stop myself going totally insane. Working for wikipedia is
    shit. (It’s ‘free beer’ not ‘free speech’ to coin a phrase) Does
    the average user know how good articles in wikipedia get made? I’d
    much rather work in the Ipad factory if I had a choice. Obviously
    it’s up to me if I volunteer, and I don’t want to characterise the
    whole experience as negative. But what if I get sick, lonely, or
    want a reference. Working on wikipedia is basically the only
    contact I have with the outside world, and having been here 5+
    years I’ve met no-one, never been asked if “I’m ok” etc – this
    wouldn’t be considered normal in the voluntary sector, or in the
    paid sector of work. I’d like to know if the wiki-foundation cares,
    or not, or if they have any real policy on this. Thanks.

  7. could some place me in direct contact with some one in aust. or Jim Wales
    thank you

  8. herauthon says:

    Wikihopping is like traveling, or eating dinner, a search through fragments that link eachother, slowly building a new view about things, about our selfs.

  9. Free for all, masters of our destiny. Great wikipedia !!!!!

  10. massimo says:

    Wiki is great!!!

  11. Bruce Napier says:

    Well done, everyone!

    But it looks like bits.wikimedia.org is offline to us in the UK atm, so can’t access Wikipedia :( .

  12. Servaas van der Heijden says:

    How can I become a supporter? So I can automatically donate each year.

    You’re doing a great job!

    Thanks, Servaas

  13. Simone says:

    I am happy to see that there are more people in the world that believe in an effort like this one in spite of all disbelieve that “common and greater good” is possible for human kind.
    Happy 2011 and much success!!!

  14. Johan S says:

    Next year, I hope you publish what percentage of this years goals were actually accomplished. I remember when Wikimedia got by on $100K .. and I optimistically donated in the triple digits for that. Unfortunately, this time my donation was loaded more with skepticism. I’m sorry to be frank, but I don’t feel Wikimedia is accomplishing 160 times more things. There is still no easy way to download and use an offline copy of Wikipedia. Also, the amount of Wikibooks is pathetic, when are we going to see a real effort to get some of the important books completed? Wikibooks is disorganized. I thought with $16 million we could either hire or provide incentives (prizes?) to university professionals or authors to write entire textbooks or contribute to Wikipedia articles.

    Publish your goals, and come up with authoring incentives or campaigns to get some of the wikibooks or more foreign language translations completed. When someone is editing a calculus article for example, maybe display a banner about how Wikibooks needs their help. And if someone is reading an English article from a foreign IP address, remind them that they can easily create a much needed translation or improvement in the foreign version.

    Anyway, congratulations on this fundraiser .. hope you heed my comments. Wikipedia is my favorite website and I will always donate to it.

  15. LeeJai Cook says:

    A world without Wikimedia would be sooooo sad!
    I am sending you $50.00 [I'm a little late.]
    I hope that I can do better by you in the years ahead.
    Many thanks, Lee Cook

  16. Giridharan Kesavan says:

    Happy to see that we reached our goal of $16M. I pitched in with a measly $25 on the last day, but it looks like several others did, as well!

    Will continue to support Wikipedia in the years to come.
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