this post was submitted on 16 Nov 2024
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[–] Varyk@sh.itjust.works 74 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (18 children)

I don't anymore.

they do not need your money, and it's disingenuous of them to imply they do.

The manipulative aspect of their annual fundraisers is very unsettling.

here are some numbers from 2022:

https://unherd.com/newsroom/the-next-time-wikipedia-asks-for-a-donation-ignore-it/

they have at least 400 million in reserves now and the estimate is $10 million a year to maintain the site and pay all their employees.

their higher executives are each paid hundreds of thousands of dollars annually.

they're not struggling to keep the lights on for the next half century.

[–] ricecake@sh.itjust.works 78 points 1 day ago (14 children)

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/f/f6/Wikimedia_Foundation_2024_Audited_Financial_Statements.pdf

https://wikimediafoundation.org/annualreports/2022-2023-annual-report/

They have approximately $80 million in cash, and it costs them about $100 million to pay their staff. They have $274 million in total assets, counting endowment investments.

It's extremely unclear where that site came up with $400 million.

I'm not sure why you'd link to a two year old opinion piece on it, when all of their financials are publicly available and provided without commentary.

They received cash in excess of expenses of about $6 million, and including non-cash assets their total assets increased by about $16 million in 2024.

Their CEO makes about $500 thousand a year, and the rest of their executive team ranges in salary from $300 to $100 thousand.
It's not a small salary, but it's not preposterous for one of the most visited sites in the Internet that also operates as a charity to have decently compensated executives.

They are not in financial trouble, but it's not accurate to say they can keep the lights on for the next 50 years.

[–] Rookwood@lemmy.world 29 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Those salaries are not competitive. Not that they should be because executive pay is out of control, but they are also in no way extravagant and possibly too low or at least the bare minimum to retain any kind of decent talent to run the operation.

[–] ricecake@sh.itjust.works 14 points 1 day ago

Looking at the profiles for the executives, you definitely get the feeling that they're either the sort that prioritizes "my work put good into the world and you don't need to squint to see it" over cash, so "yeah, that lets me live" is sufficient, or their seemingly going for a high score for number of "oh, nice!" organizations they can put on their CV, and the total compensation from them all is probably more than competitive.

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