Topic: Wikipedia Donation Campaign and still no Bitcoin (Read 2910 times)

So you want to donate bitcoins to Wikipedia?

Have you sent them an email about that?

Maybe this has something to do with taxation issues,i guess.

Asking for a few dollars in donation was OK, if they were unbiased. But now most of the admins and moderators in Wikipedia are profiting from article creation. Corporations and individuals pay these people hard cash to modify the articles, to put them in good light.

You are free to use a fake name and address if you so choose to do so. They use that information to email you a receipt that you can use to file your tax deductions.

They run the 7th most popular website in the world,
totally free of charge- no ads or commercials,
for one of the biggest sources of knowledge in the free world.
I hardly think that asking for a few dollars in donations from each user is 'greedy'.

Yes.... From 2011 or 2012, they started all these fundraisers. And the worst thing is that they never audit their expenses for various campaigns. No one knows where the money is going. I will never donate any of my coins to Wikipedia.

I was also actually thinking about this as wikipedia if introduced the donation can be done in btc as well, they will actually start receiving few more then what they are getting as many people many give some donation if not a big one and with the rise of price they would actually end up with having a good amount of money.

For me the main reason is that it is quite hard to convert it to fiat. Talking about that, I find them too greedy. They're doing more and more fund raising campaigns, and I don't like that pretty much.

My guess would be that it is for the same reason other big sites have also not started to accept Bitcoin :

~ Bitcoin is not defined as a currency.
~ Bitcoin is not regulated in all countries.
~ Bitcoin has a bad reputation. < Silkroad / MtGox >
~ Bitcoin to fiat conversion is too much extra effort.
~ Bribes can be traced. ^heh^
~ They get too much donations via other payment methods and do not see the need to add more.

These are some of the vibes I have picked up on with my dealings with other companies, when I send them emails about Bitcoin.

Given that the above poster doesn't have a fuckin' clue, I'm curious as to who helped him set up his signature campaign.

in my country there are some donation site that accept bitcoin before, but now they already close bitcoin payment because they said only a little people that support via bitcoin, maybe that is why some site include Wikipedia Donation not accept bitcoin yet

You know what? I actually saw there anouncement asking for money. If they accepted bitcoin I wouldn't mind dropping $100 BTC or so. They provide quality work and I enjoy the site. Maybe one day....

I think there are two possible answers of your question. the first one is wikipedia dev do not know the advantages of accepting bitcoin as donation, and the second one is they already thought many times about it and they did not find the advantages of accepting bitcoin is better than the disadvantages. imo. cmiiw

You people really need to stop necroing old threads. Nothing in this thread is relevant anymore. Wikipedia does accept Bitcoin now.

https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Ways_to_Give

If they don't want to implement it, it isn't our issue beyond sending them an email. If they really need those donations and they're really hard pressed to get them, then they can start opening up other methods to donate. If they don't want to, I'll assume they have no need for those donations.

I only use wikipedia as an aggregated source provider anyways.

I think this is the reason that prevents them to accept from bitcoin meaning Anonymous donor is not allowed or shall we say from private individual? If they will include bitcoin, I think it will boost their fund from donations.

Using the links to donate requests personal information including name, email and postal address.  It should be stressed that donations in this way aren't pseudonymous unless you supply false details and use a discardable email address.  I suppose they must have some sort of legal or tax requirement that prevents them from simply listing their donation address directly.

Nowadays it isn't hard to implement the bitcoin payment processor to accept bitcoins, I have seen many tools like shopify or others have the option to select the bitpay or coinbase to accept bitcoin.

Nobody updated to say they do now accept Bitcoin donations, heres your notice.    

https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Ways_to_Give#bitcoin

Probably has a good secondary effect to represent bitcoin in a positive light if the wider internet can contribute to wikipedia.   If you prefer to find the donation page yourself, its top left on the front page.  Click that then way below there is tiny text saying "Other ways to pay"
Bitcoin is then an option along many other options

I have no problems with any of these. But all I am saying is that we should keep a careful watch on the Wikipedia Bitcoin page. I was an active Wikipedian until 2011 and I know how propagandists are making use of Wikipedia. I don't want paid cronies of Goldman and JP Morgan bashing BTC in Wikipedia.

Well, this is my point of view:

Everyone is free to do what they want, however wikipedia itself being quite the radical thing when it first got launch with the aim of providing information to everyone, not only those with access to expensive books and universities. It is also a system where you can contribute very easily without going through an elaborate approval process, hence why Nupedia wasn't that popular. And yet, today, there are academics who state you cannot trust Wikipedia well, because of a lack or proper quality checking.

So, it's easy to get the impression that Wikipedia is also something relatively new, and that they're for sharing, openness and colaboration. Just like wikipedia brings information to the masses who don't have access to expensive books, bitcoin brings a possibility to everyone, also the underbanked to participate in the global financial market.

Thus, wikipedia rejecting to accept bitcoin as a way of funding them is a way of doing the opposite of what their original intentions were. They claim today they will only accept money issued by a state. How come they then publish a encyclopedia made in a desentralized fashion (in the sense that there are numerous contributors), where there's noone in particular responsible for the content, and no quality checking like there is with a publisher?

I'm confident however that most articles have so many eyes on them that errors are quickly fixed. There are someone running the show, and these someones at Wikipedia do not like bitcoin or doesn't care - simple as that.

Because this is Wikipedia's current stance, there's no reason to bug them anymore. Just use their content for free, and do not contribute. If you want to rustle their jimmies, contribute to someone else, and send them an e-mail saying:

"I contributed 0.25 bitcoins, currently worth N USD to the internet archive. Here's a link to the transaction: [link]. If you'd accepted bitcoin, I'd be happy to contribute to your cause as well.

As things stand right now, I will not contribute to you, because as a free individual, I have a fiduciary duty (with my wife) to be responsible and prudent with our money. This has been interpreted to mean that we do not use the banking system and traditional payment systems on the brink of extinction including but not limited to VISA, Mastercard, Paypal. We do, however, strive to provide as many visits to your site pr. year as possible and continue to monitor your horseshit Bitcoin policy with interest and may revisit this position should the circumstances change.

Note: Feel free to change the message to be as much or as little political correct and polite as you feel is necessary and responsible.