Alex / catilepticMay 27

"TLDR: In ten days last month, the Wikimedia Foundation fired the longtime lead developer of MediaWiki and disbanded the team whose entire job was to listen to volunteers. Most of the people they fired were union organizers. Wikipedia’s editors are now threatening to strike in solidarity. The Foundation is sitting on $296 million in reserves and a freshly profitable AI revenue stream. This is a confrontation with global implications"

https://medium.com/@jakeorlowitz/wikipedia-is-doing-the-capitalist-thing-56a393232943

Big Tech’s Anti-Labor Playbook Has Come for Wikipedia

TLDR: In ten days last month, the Wikimedia Foundation fired the longtime lead developer of MediaWiki and disbanded the team whose entire…

Medium
Show threadSimon Brooke

@catileptic What's crazy about this is that it is entirely possible and legal to fork the Wiki. Both code and data are open source. And if you were going to fork the wiki, the people you would want to have on your team would be, IDK, maybe Brooke Vibber and the folks who are trusted by the volunteer editors?

So #Wikipedia are basically saying to the custodians of their crown jewels, we don't need you any more, get out of here.

This may turn out to be one of those historic strategic errors.

May 27 at 4:48pmWeb
Show threadJuho MäntysaloMay 27

@simon_brooke @catileptic

To quote the article:

>[Wikimedia Foundation] holds $296.6 million in reserves[.] [In addition] The Wikimedia Endowment sits on $169.4 million in, up $25 million in a single year. Wikimedia Enterprise [- -], just turned profitable on $8.3 million in revenue, a 148% jump from the prior year.

If you fork Wikipedia, you have to both replace that circa half billion dollars they've saved for server upkeep and employee salaries, AND get new revenue to replace it.

Show threadBitter DonaldMay 29
@iju @simon_brooke @catileptic
No, if you fork Wikipedia, you have to have a financial backend to support it. Doesn't need to be nearly that large.
Show threadSimon BrookeMay 29

@bitterdonald @iju @catileptic It could start quite small; and very probably, a lot of existing Wikipedia donors could be persuaded to switch. Yes, you probably wouldn't get the big corporates at first, but if volunteer editors switch to the new wiki, so it continues to improve, you would eventually.

#Wikipedia
#Solidarity

@wwu

Show threadJuho MäntysaloMay 29

@bitterdonald @simon_brooke @catileptic

You don't need all the half a billion immediately, and indeed even for the current Foundation that's nigh three years of operating expences

But if you are imaging a fork that takes over Wikipedia in scale as well, you need that monies and you need it pretty fast.

And half a billion is a lot of money just to leave on the table because you can't get some people at the top fired.

Show threadFairness4AllMay 29
@iju @bitterdonald @simon_brooke @catileptic Depends on who forks it I guess. See grokipedia ugh