User:Guy Macon/Wikipedia has Cancer

Alternative title: Just because you have some money, that doesn't mean that you have to spend it.

In biology, the hallmarks of an aggressive cancer include limitless multiplication of ordinarily beneficial cells, even when the body signals that further multiplication is no longer needed. The Wikipedia page on the wheat and chessboard problem explains that nothing can keep growing forever. In biology, the unwanted growth usually terminates with the death of the host. Ever-increasing spending can often lead to the same undesirable result in organizations.

Consider the following example of runaway spending growth:

Year Support and revenue Expenses Net assets at year end
2003–2004[1] $80,129 $23,463 $56,666
2004–2005[1] $379,088 $177,670 $268,084
2005–2006[1] $1,508,039 $791,907 $1,004,216
2006–2007[2] $2,734,909 $2,077,843 $1,658,282
2007–2008[3] $5,032,981 $3,540,724 $5,178,168
2008–2009[4] $8,658,006 $5,617,236 $8,231,767
2009–2010[5] $17,979,312 $10,266,793 $14,542,731
2010–2011[6] $24,785,092 $17,889,794 $24,192,144
2011–2012[7] $38,479,665 $29,260,652 $34,929,058
2012–2013[8] $48,635,408 $35,704,796 $45,189,124
2013–2014[9] $52,465,287 $45,900,745 $53,475,021
2014–2015[10] $75,797,223 $52,596,782 $77,820,298
2015–2016[11] $81,862,724 $65,947,465 $91,782,795
2016–2017[12] $91,242,418 $69,136,758 $113,330,197
2017–2018[13] $104,505,783 $81,442,265 $134,949,570
2018–2019[14] $120,067,266 $91,414,010 $165,641,425
2019–2020[15] $129,234,327 $112,489,397 $180,315,725
2020–2021[16] $162,886,686 $111,839,819 $231,177,536
2021–2022[17] $154,686,521 $145,970,915 $239,351,532
2022–2023[18] $180,174,103 $169,095,381 $254,971,336


In 2005, Wikipedia co-founder and Wikimedia Foundation founder Jimmy Wales told a TED audience:

"So, we're doing around 1.4 billion page views monthly. So, it's really gotten to be a huge thing. And everything is managed by the volunteers and the total monthly cost for our bandwidth is about US$5,000, and that's essentially our main cost. We could actually do without the employee […] We actually hired Brion because he was working part-time for two years and full-time at Wikipedia so we actually hired him so he could get a life and go to the movies sometimes."

According to the WMF, Wikipedia (in all language editions) now receives 16 billion page views per month.[19] The WMF spends roughly $2 million USD per year on Internet hosting[11] and employs some 300 staff.[20]

The modern Wikipedia has 11-12 times as many page views than it had in 2005,[21] but the WMF is spending 33 times as much to serve up these pages to the readers.[22] This seems reasonable given that they have improved reliability, redundancy and backups. More concerning is the fact that since 2005 the WMF has hired hundreds of extra employees and is now spending 1,250 times as much overall,[23] which seems rather excessive considering that the actual amount of work they have to do is pretty much the same. WMF's spending has gone up by 85% over the past three years.[24]

Sounds a lot like cancer, doesn't it? For those readers who were around three years ago, did you notice at the time any unmet needs that would have caused you to conclude that the WMF needed to increase spending by $30 million dollars? I certainly didn't.

From 2005 to 2015, annual inflation in the US was between 1% and 3% per year, and cumulative inflation for the entire decade was 21.4%—far less than the increase in WMF spending. We are even metastasizing the cancer by bankrolling local chapters, rewarding them for finding new ways to spend money.[25][26]

Nothing can grow forever. Sooner or later, something is going to happen that causes the donations to decline instead of increase. It could be a scandal (real or perceived). It could be the WMF taking a political position that offends many donors. Or it could be a recession, leaving people with less money to give. It might even be a lawsuit that forces the WMF to pay out a judgement that is larger than the reserve. Whatever the reason is, it will happen. It would be naïve to think that the WMF, which up to this point has never seriously considered any sort of spending limits, will suddenly discover fiscal prudence when the revenues start to decline. It is far more likely that the WMF will not react to a drop in donations by decreasing spending, but instead will ramp up fund-raising efforts while burning through our reserves and our endowment.

Although this essay focuses on spending, not fundraising, it could be argued that the ever-increasing spending is a direct cause of the kind of fund-raising that has generated a storm of criticism.[27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35] These complaints have been around for years,[36] leading one member of a major Wikimedia mailing list to automate his yearly complaint about the dishonesty he sees every year in our fundraising banners.[37]

No organization can sustain this sort of spending on a long-term basis. We should have leveled off our spending years ago. Like cancer, WMF spending is growing at an ever-increasing rate. Like cancer, this will kill the patient unless the growth is stopped. Some charities can safely grow without limits. If you are feeding 1,000 starving orphans per week, a ten times increase in revenue means that you will be able to feed 10,000 orphans per week. Wikipedia isn't like that. It costs a certain amount to have reliable servers, run a good legal team, maintain the core software, etc. But none of the things that the WMF needs to do require ever-expanding spending.

The reason I have so little faith in the WMF's ability to adapt to declining revenues (note that I specified the WMF; I think Wikipedia has shown an excellent ability to adapt to multiple problems) is the horrific track record they have regarding adapting to other kinds of problems.

In particular, their poor handling of software development has been well known for many years. The answer to the WMF's problems with software development is extensively documented in books such as The Mythical Man-Month and Peopleware: Productive Projects and Teams, yet I have never seen any evidence that the WMF has been following standard software engineering principles that were well-known when Mythical Man-Month was first published in 1975. If they had, we would be seeing things like requirements documents and schedules with measurable milestones. This failure is almost certainly a systemic problem directly caused by top management, not by the developers doing the actual work.

This is not to imply that decades-old software development methods are somehow superior to modern ones, but rather that the WMF is violating basic principles that are common to both. Nothing about Agile or SCRUM means that the developers do not have to talk to end users, create requirements, or meet milestones. In fact, modern software development methods require more communication and interaction with the final end users. Take as an example the way Visual Editor was developed. There are many pages of documentation on the WMF servers and mailing lists, but no evidence that any developer had any serious discussions with the actual editors of Wikipedia who would be using the software. Instead, the role of "customer" was played by paid WMF staffers who thought that they knew what Wikipedia editors need better than the editors themselves do. Then they threw the result over the wall, and the community of Wikipedia editors largely rejected it. Or Knowledge Engine, which was developed in secret before being cancelled when word got out about what the WMF was planning. Another example: The MediaWiki edit toolbar ended up being used by a whopping 0.03% of active editors.[38]

After we burn through our reserves, it seems likely that the next step for the WMF will be going into debt to support continued runaway spending, followed by bankruptcy. At that point there are several large corporations (Google and Facebook come to mind) that will be more than happy to pay off the debts, take over the encyclopedia, fire the WMF staff, and start running Wikipedia as a profit-making platform. There are a lot of ways to monetize Wikipedia, all undesirable. The new owners could sell banner advertising, allow uneditable "sponsored articles" for those willing to pay for the privilege, or even sell information about editors and users.

If we want to avoid disaster, we need to start shrinking the cancer now, before it is too late. We should make spending transparent, publish a detailed account of what the money is being spent on and answer any reasonable questions asking for more details. We should limit spending increases to no more than inflation plus some percentage (adjusted for any increases in page views), build up our endowment, and structure the endowment so that the WMF cannot legally dip into the principal when times get bad.

If we do these things now, in a few short years we could be in a position to do everything we are doing now, while living off of the endowment interest, and would have no need for further fundraising. Or we could keep fundraising, using the donations to do many new and useful things, knowing that whatever we do there is a guaranteed income stream from the endowment that will keep the servers running indefinitely.

  1. ^ a b c Financial Statements, June 30, 2006, 2005, and 2004 Wikimedia Foundation
  2. ^ Financial Statements, June 30, 2007 And 2006 Wikimedia Foundation
  3. ^ Financial Statements, June 30, 2008 Wikimedia Foundation
  4. ^ Financial Statements, June 30, 2009 and 2008 Wikimedia Foundation
  5. ^ Financial Statements, June 30, 2010 and 2009 Wikimedia Foundation
  6. ^ Financial Statements, June 30, 2011 and 2010 Wikimedia Foundation
  7. ^ Financial Statements, June 30, 2012 and 2011 Wikimedia Foundation
  8. ^ Financial Statements, June 30, 2013 and 2012 Wikimedia Foundation
  9. ^ Financial Statements, June 30, 2014 and 2013 Wikimedia Foundation
  10. ^ Financial Statements, June 30, 2015 and 2014 Wikimedia Foundation
  11. ^ a b Financial Statements, June 30, 2016 and 2015 Wikimedia Foundation
  12. ^ Financial Statements, June 30, 2017 and 2016 Wikimedia Foundation
  13. ^ Financial Statements, June 30, 2018 and 2017 Wikimedia Foundation
  14. ^ Financial Statements, June 30, 2019 and 2018 Wikimedia Foundation
  15. ^ Financial Statements, June 30, 2020 and 2019 Wikimedia Foundation
  16. ^ Financial Statements, June 30, 2021 and 2020 Wikimedia Foundation
  17. ^ Financial Statements, June 30, 2022 and 2021 Wikimedia Foundation
  18. ^ Financial Statements, June 30, 2023 and 2022 Wikimedia Foundation
  19. ^ Page views for Wikipedia
  20. ^ Wikimedia Foundation Wikipedia page
  21. ^ 1,400,000 x 11 ˜ = 15,400,000, 1,400,000 x 12 ˜ = 16,800,000
  22. ^ ($5000 x 12) x 33.3... = $2,000,000
  23. ^ ($5,000 x 12) x 1250 = $75,000,000
  24. ^ $35,704,796 x 1.85 ~= $65,947,465
  25. ^ Where does your Wikipedia donation go? Outgoing chief warns of potential corruption The Daily Dot
  26. ^ Wikipedia Foundation exec: Yes, we've been wasting your money The Register
  27. ^ Wikipedia has a ton of money. So why is it begging you to donate yours? The Washington Post
  28. ^ 2015–2016 Q1 fundraising update sparks mailing list debate Wikipedia Signpost
  29. ^ Wikipedia fundraising drive: Should you donate money to the Wikimedia Foundation? International Business Times
  30. ^ The Wikipedia Fundraising Banner: Sad but Untrue Wikipediocracy
  31. ^ Wikipedia Has Millions In The Bank – Why Beg For More? MakeUseOf
  32. ^ Wikipedia – keeping it free. Just pay us our salaries. Wikipediocracy
  33. ^ Should you donate to the Wikimedia Foundation? Effective Altruism
  34. ^ Why does Wikipedia ask for donations even though it has a huge reserve? Quora
  35. ^ A Modest Proposal for Wikimedia’s Future The Wikipedian
  36. ^ Wikipedia doesn't need your money - so why does it keep pestering you? The Register
  37. ^ Fundraising banners (again) Wikimedia-l
  38. ^ [1] Wikimedia Foundation