Grants talk:APG/Proposals/2016-2017 round 1/Wikimedia Deutschland e.V./Proposal form

Hello, WMDE team! Thank you for submitting your complete application on time. We look forward to reviewing it in the coming weeks, and will contact you if we have questions or need more information. If any questions or concerns arise on your end, please do let us know so we can help. Best, Winifred Olliff (WMF Program Officer) talk 22:48, 3 October 2016 (UTC)

Correction

I corrected all the links to WikiCon (were missing the namespace Wikipedia) for better legibility. Delphine (WMF) (talk) 09:54, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

Questions from FDC staff

Hello, quick question concerning the line "Volunteer Support" under "Other programs" in your detailled budget. It is not clear what kind of "other support" this might entail that can't be listed under the main "Volunteer support" line. Can you give us your rationale for having that line there? Thank you! Delphine (WMF) (talk) 09:07, 7 November 2016 (UTC)

Hi Delphine, thanks for your question. In general, we have listed expenses which cannot be specifically allocated to one of our five programs there as other program expenses for our departments Volunteer Support and Education, Science and Culture. For both departments, this includes personnel costs for management (department head) and non-personnel costs for administration-related expenses such as travel costs and external contractors. For Volunteer Support, the non-personnel costs also include expenses for one staff member from the federal volunteer service (Bundesfreiwilligendienst). We hope this further explains these budget lines. Cheers, Christof Pins (WMDE) (talk) 14:44, 7 November 2016 (UTC)

Danke. :) Delphine (WMF) (talk) 21:05, 7 November 2016 (UTC)

Questions from non-FDC members

Hello WMDE! Many thanks for this very extensive proposal. I have a few questions or comments.

1. New volunteer programme. This looks like a very exciting project, and potentially something really valuable across the movement - I look forward to hearing about its success next year! However, I am curious about the metrics for it. I totally agree that measuring retention of new editors at 10 edits is a sensible thing to do. However, the number of new editors you intend to recruit through this seems low at 750. You aim to recruit 1,300 new editors through the Volunteer Support programme which does not focus on new users. Can you explain the difference between these two figures for new editors? Also, I see that "attract new editors" was an area of significant investment in the current financial year - what success has that seen?
2. Volunteer support programme. You appear to have a good level of participation and feedback built into this programme. However, the metrics seem more focused on process than on outcome. Do you have targets or baseline figures for number of articles created / media uploaded from each aspect of this programme? Also, I am trying to understand the relationship between the APG request and the current year budget. Items 2.1, 3.1 and 3.2 of the current FY budget seem to relate most closely to this programme and total EUR580k while you are requesting 855k. Is that a fair year-on-year comparison? If so, what is the reason for the proposed increase?
3. Advocacy programme. What is the balance of resource in this programme between a) WMBXL and other European-level influencing, b) influencing German national laws, and c) everything else in the programme? Parts of this programme are more to do with community and non-political institutions than legislators. Would it make more sense for these to be in programmes 2 and 5?
4. Institutions programme. Can you explain the balance between 5.1 and 5.2? In my experience it is better to spend time and money developing partnerships than developing resources, so spending EUR100k on partnerships and EUR250k on resources seems to me to be the wrong balance. Is there a risk that you will end up with a lot of unused resources?
5. Reserves and "risk liquidity". Is it normal for an organisation in Germany with a turnover of EUR6M to have no operating reserves? Are you confident that you would be able to continue to operate if there was a significant shortfall in the EUR4.7M of donation and membership income you expect? For instance, what was your lowest figure for cash on hand in the last 12 months and what do you expect it to be in the next financial year?

Many thanks in advance for your answers! Regards, Chris Keating (The Land) (talk) 14:46, 19 October 2016 (UTC)

Dear Chris, thanks for these great questions. Here are some thoughts:

1. The number 750 is a cautious estimation, and also mathematically the number it would take to halt the annual decline of editors. While it is difficult to track new accounts and new editors with 10+ edits in terms of how and why they first joined the community, we will monitor changes in numbers following the online banner runs. Ultimately, there are no baselines for this kind of approach and we look forward to learning and sharing what we find out with the movement. The number of 1300 new editors in Program 2 is based on our experience that through the two large photo competitions WLM and WLE alone approximately 1000 people create new accounts. These 1,300 editors are not necessarily new Wikipedia editors with 10+ contributions to DEWP, but contest participants and others who create new user accounts (therefore meeting the definition under the Grant Metrics), whereas in Program 1 we aim for 750 new accounts who then also pass the 10 edit threshold and become DEWP Wikipedians. That is why this number is lower. Current financial year: In 2016 we focused on gathering data and information on our communities’ welcome culture and other conditions of attracting and retaining new editors. We analysed the data and the feedback from the community. We prepared concepts, discussed them and changed them. Our work planned for 2017 is a result of this process.

2. For the outcome metrics of this (and all programs) please refer to the Grant Metrics at the top of the proposal. These are estimations based on actual outcomes from 2016. This program’s main component are the direct financial and technical support services extended to volunteers which support up to 500 volunteer activities each year. There is a large diversity in these activities, which at times makes it difficult to gather data on output from the volunteers. In regards to the second half of your question: The total FDC request of WMDE for 2017 is €279,198. The numbers you have assembled are not an accurate year-on-year comparison of volunteer support costs - the best comparison derives from just comparing the annual budget of the volunteer support department which for 2016 is €901K and for 2017 €943K. For an easy overview of WMDE’s annual budget see the english version of our annual plan here.

3. Please hang in there as we prepare a response to this.

Hi Chris, here is the answer to your third question: Regarding the balance of resources, no clear line can be drawn between the EU and national level, because they are interlinked, but to give you estimate relations that apply to both non-personnel costs and FTE: EU-level 25%, national level 60%, other 15%.

The institutional level of rule making is particularly influential in countries with strong federalist political setup, like in Germany, where most decisions regarding cultural heritage, education and research are made on the state level. Both the state legislators as well as other peer institutions tend to pay most attention when leading – public or even private – heritage institutions bring forward new guidelines or internal rules. Thus, influence on these rules goes well beyond freeing content of the particular museum but plays a major role for influencing the overall legal framework. That’s why it is part of programme 4.--Christof Pins (WMDE) (talk) 12:49, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

4. Thanks for this great question. There is not a sharp separation between activities under each of these goals under the Institutions Program. Both goals are around creating the conditions for institutions to provide access to content, through formal partnerships, which can take multiple forms (Goal 1), and through equipping institutions and their staff with the knowledge, tools, skills and consultation so they are actually able to liberate content, and liberate it in ways that allow communities to re-use it for Wikimedia projects (Goal 2). We have provided ad hoc consultation and created materials as needed for several years, particularly to the GLAM field. Now we will be more strategic in this area, tailor the resources to the different types of organizations and fields, and create reusable modules. The development of these resources requires upfront time and funds, but will save them in later years. With the set of modules we hope to quickly and effectively get new institutional partners to the next level in terms of collaborating with our communities to liberate their content. Also, providing good trainings and effective consultations, and developing them in close collaboration with the target institutions (Goal 2), will in turn lead to new partnerships (Goal 1). For your information, Goal 2 also includes the cost of the Fellow Program Open Science, which really straddles both goals as well.

5. We are still working on this response.

And here it is: What we termed ‘Risk liquidity’ in our expenses table is not an operating reserve per the WMF definition. This line item allows us to manage cash flow and unforeseen variations in revenue or expenses.

We generally agree with you that operating reserves are a desirable risk management tool for an organization the size of WMDE. However: Unlike in the US, German charitable law has very specific provisions limiting how nonprofits may generate reserves. If any revenue from grants and donations is not disbursed within a short timeframe, German nonprofits risk losing their charitable status. There are a few exceptions: Bequests/planned gifts, and major gifts donated specifically for asset building. In 2017, WMDE Board and leadership will work on a systematic approach specifically analyzing our revenue and asset situation and, within charitable law provisions, identifying ways to minimize our financial risk. --Nicola Zeuner (WMDE) (talk) 22:47, 3 November 2016 (UTC)

Thanks Chris!--Nicola Zeuner (WMDE) (talk) 08:59, 22 October 2016 (UTC)

Hi Nikki, thanks for these replies! A few more thoughts...

New volunteers programme. Thank you for the explanation. I am pretty convinced by this programme now. The level of resource is significant and the outcomes are uncertain, but I certainly support you doing this. 750 or more lasting editors from this activity would be very valuable, particularly if it opens the door to similar work on different Wikipedias.

Volunteer support programme. Thanks for clarifying the correct year-on-year comparison. I appreciate there are many complexities in measuring this kind of work, but I would appreciate more insight into what work is supported by these funds and what outcomes you are able to measure internally. You have mentioned for instance 500 grant recipients, and c.1000 new participants uploading files to Commons from the wikicompetitions. That gets us to 1,500 - what makes you think that 3,500 more than that is a realistic target? Do you have any more details on the types of grants, e.g. equipment grants, travel grants, project grants? I am digging into this area a bit because you have presented a very high-level summary in the bid, but the request for this area is larger than the operating budgets of virtually all chapters, so I am keen to know more details.

Hi Chris, I guess you are referring to the 5,000 participants we entered as target for grant metric #1 (participants) with regard to our volunteer program, right? For several years now we have been collecting information about the number of participants at volunteer activities funded by our volunteer support program. E.g. in our latest APG Impact Report you can find the participation figures for 2015 (> 4,500 participants). To give some more context: in close coordination with WMAT and WMCH we run a volunteer support program which offers a broad variety of support options for volunteers. It ranges from individual literature and software stipends, event insurances, tech equipment or travel grants over grants for larger volunteer-led projects like e.g. workshops, trainings, photo events, edit-a-thons, writing competitions, admin meetups (with a couple of participants each) to more comprehensive organizational or logistical support e.g. for our annual volunteer conference WikiCon (with 333 participants in 2016). Wherever it applies, we collect information about project outputs like participants, media uploads, articles improved etc. This data is rarely complete, but it gives us baselines for estimating e.g. our grant metric targets and the basis for further improving our reporting systems. Apart from this, we try to capture broader outcomes like e.g. increasing motivation or emerging new partnerships through various measures like e.g. surveys or qualitative storytelling in our reports. Additionally, per decision of our members assembly, we are obligated to publish all grants > 500 € (in German only). Highlights of the supported projects are also published via monthly blogposts and a list of selected projects with detailed information can be found in the support portal.--Christof Pins (WMDE) (talk) 11:59, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

Thanks Christof. That is all very helpful. I have had a dig through that information. Generally those look like reasonable mission-aligned projects. Measuring the impact of individual grants is a tough challenge across the movement, so I can't fault the evolving state of the metrics in this area too much. However, I still feel that this is a particularly high level of direct community support compared to what any non-German speakers might stand to receive. Some people might see this as a "gold standard" that any community ought to get, others might see it as excess spending. What would be the impact of WMDE having say EUR100,000 less to spend on community grants? Chris Keating (The Land) (talk) 20:52, 25 October 2016 (UTC)

Hi Chris, we aim to align our resources as best as possible to support the Wikimedia communities according to their needs - logistic, literature, technics, project management, accreditations, budget planning, partnerships, etc. As Christof already mentioned, German communities are very active and realizing many activities to create or improve content, to outreach to institutions and to the public, as well as winning new community members. Although we are aiming at the best, there are many community driven projects we can not support to the extent as needed by the community. Avoiding 100.000 Euros in the area of Volunteer Support is against the interest of our community. Our job is to support them and not to work against their magnificent work. Here are a few examples:

• Open Editing Berlin, 22 events are planned only by this local community-group for 2017.
• Lokal K, 158 events in the local space in Cologne supported by WMDE.
• Three women groups have been developed: 1. Women Editing, 2. Women at Institutions and 3. Women in Film and on TV.
• Festival Summer, >23.500 images in 2016, >2.000 uses, >6 mio page views in 09/2016 of articles improved, due to this project the illustration of articles in the theme of music increased extensively and the photographers developed their skills, now we support the Festival Summer-Community with full frame DSLRs to gain high-quality pictures for Wikimedia Commons and Wikipedia.
• Squirrels; all species of squirrels are now complete in the German Wikipedia, we supported the user - besides many other users - with literature .
• Wiki Loves Monuments, 39.000 images, almost 900 photographers.
• WikiCon with more than 300 participants: just coming from a meeting where a colleague presented the result of an evaluation which demonstrated the importance of this event for the community (the motivation to contribute to Wikipedia and/or other Wikimedia-Projects has been increased by 93% of the participants).
• And WMDE supported many more great community-activities - around 500 a year.

We love to share our experience and exchange ideas with community members and chapters from all over the world - at Wikimania, Wikimedia Conference, bilateral and with learning patterns (e.g. Appreciation of Volunteer Work , Data transfers to Wikimedia Commons, Business Cards and Audio Samples for Wiktionary).

We also translate material, if we assume great interest of the movement - a current project is for example the “internationalisation” and translation of our new brochure on Wikimedia Commons.

Next year, we will systematically evaluate our community support programmes, aiming to share exciting insights and experiences with other chapters.

The other pillar of our work focuses on new editors. In this area we have only started yet and follow a step by step strategy of testing, learning, changing and improving. We expect to show first promising results next year, knowing that we can only be successful, if we tackle this - so far unsolved problem - for the coming years.

Hope that I could help you to gain a better understanding of the value of our work. --Julian Fischer (WMDE) (talk) 18:44, 28 October 2016 (UTC)

Institutions and their content. I think I understand this programme better now - looks like there is a lot of good work happening in this area.

Also, out of interest: is WMFG income still split on a 50/50 basis between Wikimedia Deutschland and the Wikimedia Foundation?

Hello Chris, please note that there is no such fixed split rate between Wikimedia Deutschland and the Wikimedia Foundation for fundraising incomes anymore. The transfer of revenues from fundraising is clearly defined in a formalized fundraising agreement between WMDE and WMF and is processed based on donation tracking information. All donations which are collected via Wikimedia sites (de.wikipedia.org) are transferred to the WMF. Only donations which can’t be tracked to come from wikipedia.org and donations coming from our own sites (wikimedia.de) are not transferred. Based on this, the distribution each fiscal year is roughly about 80 % for WMF and 20 % for WMDE. Thanks, --Christof Pins (WMDE) (talk) 12:07, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying. Chris Keating (The Land) (talk) 20:52, 25 October 2016 (UTC)

I look forward to hearing more aboutthe advocacy and reserves questions when your colleagues have got back to you about this. Many thanks for your time spent on this conversation, Chris Keating (The Land) (talk) 10:47, 23 October 2016 (UTC)

• Ich finde es merkwürdig, dass fast halb so viel für Fundraising ausgegeben werden soll, wie gespendet wird. Gibt es eine Schätzung, wie viel weniger gespendet würde, wenn das Fundraising sich auf kostengünstige Maßnahmen beschränken würde? Könnte es sein, dass dann mehr übrig bliebe? --Rainald62 (talk) 19:50, 20 October 2016 (UTC)

Viellenleicht übersehe ich da etwas, aber kannst Du kurz erklären, wie Du zu diesen Zahlen kommst, Rainald62?--Schreibvieh (talk) 20:38, 20 October 2016 (UTC)

Weil Fundraising in den Ausgaben für "Operations" angeführt ist, was angesichts der Organisationsstruktur von WMDE nicht wirklich transparent ist... Braveheart (talk) 17:56, 22 October 2016 (UTC)

Hallo zusammen, danke für die Nachfrage. Der Großteil der realen Fundraising-Kosten ist im WMFG Budget im Wirtschaftsplan von WMDE und WMFG aufgeführt. Hier sieht man, dass Fundraising-Einnahmen von 20,709,200 € Kosten für den operativen Betrieb von 841,236 € gegenüberstehen. Hiervon entfällt allein knapp die Hälfte auf den Versand der Zuwendungsbescheinigungen sowie Transaktionskosten. Die Fundraising-Kosten, die umseitig unter “Operations” bei WMDE subsummiert sind, umfassen nur rund 30,417 € als Verrechnungsposten zwischen WMFG und WMDE für Büro, Personalüberlassung und Sachkosten.--Christof Pins (WMDE) (talk) 10:41, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

Thnx! Braveheart (talk) 11:52, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

Questions from RightCowLeftCoast

Why this amount? What is the minimum amount that the grant submitter believes is needed to accomplish these goals? Can the grant submitter accomplish the goals stated in your proposal, without funding? If the grant submitter can't, why not? If the grant submitters grant request is not approved, what alternative sources of funding are you seeking? If only one grant is approved during this round of grant approvals, why should this grant be approved rather than all the other grant proposals--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 17:08, 29 October 2016 (UTC)

The amount requested is based on an assessment of the resources needed to implement the programs in the WMDE proposal, minus the projected revenue from other sources. For detail see the budget and programs/goals/objectives. A reduction in the amount will result in a reduction in programs. Such is the logic of grant funding. Regarding your last question - the APG funding supports a cohort of applicants each round, and we work together as part of the same movement, not as competitors for funds.--Nicola Zeuner (WMDE) (talk) 13:44, 1 November 2016 (UTC)

Questions from FDC members

• Hi WMDE, thank you for your proposal. It always great to read the great and the professional work done our biggest chapter!.
  

Could you please share with us more a detailed budget document? The budget linked from the proposal mixing staff with program costs, and the program costs on the proposal itself lack of details. For example - program 2, budgeted as 552,349€ without any more information and items costs that allow us truly understand what the costs of this program includes. Same for the rest of the budget, where most of program lines are budgeted like or even more that most of the FDC grants requests. Thank you! --Itzike (talk) 12:51, 20 October 2016 (UTC)

Hello Nicola, Christof or Julia (pinging everyone just to be safe). I have been told that historically we've asked you (and other applicants) to detail any budget line which total is above 100 k€. A budget line of 500k€ is unfortunately not very helpful in giving us all a sense of where the money goes. Thank you for your help in making this a little bit clearer! Danke! Delphine (WMF) (talk) 19:07, 20 October 2016 (UTC)

Hi Itzik, after talking to Delphine today, I just want to let you know quickly that we will work on a response to your request with our finance department and our CEO (once the latter is back from vacation the first week of November).
For now, please refer to the WMDE 2017 Annual Plan which contains breakdowns of each of the program budgets by department. What you see there is exactly the level of detail shared with our community, board and membership assembly. As far as the Program 2 budget is concerned, €492K of the non-personnel cost is the grant fund for volunteer projects, in other words the funds that get directly disbursed to our community for work on Wikimedia projects.

I also would like to add that while the Annual Plan budget does not distinguish between 'program and staff costs', the table in the proposal does. Unfortunately, the FDC's 'program and staff cost' terminology is not useful as it confuses and intermingles two concepts commonly used in grant accounting and reporting: non-personnel vs. personnel cost on the one hand, and direct vs. indirect cost on the other hand. As a result, for several years now, and in this proposal as well, we have reported on both of those dimensions, as you can see in table 7: It contains the non-personnel and personnel columns, across the lines of program cost (=direct), as well as program support and administrative cost (=indirect). Thank you and we will be in touch with more information.

--Nicola Zeuner (WMDE) (talk) 09:07, 22 October 2016 (UTC)

Hi Itzik et al, Please refer to the budget table in the WMDE 2017 Annual Plan that breaks down the Program cost by department. Following is a breakdown of the larger cost items in that table:

Program 1, New Volunteers: The WMDE Communications Department is taking the lead on this program. 124,883€ break down into personnel cost of 69,883 € and non-personnel cost of 55,000 €

Program 2, Supporting Volunteers: the €782,773 in the Volunteer Support Department break down into personnel cost of €236,773 and non-personnel cost of €546,000. The non-personnel cost comprise of the aforementioned volunteer support grant fund (€245K), as well as volunteer funds for larger projects , incl. WLM and WLE (€20K each) Wikimania (€30K), AdminCon (€20K), GLAM on Tour (€10K), WikiCon (€70K), local spaces (€92K), access to knowledge resources (€22K) community dialogue and development (€30K), and volunteer recognition ( €2.000)

Program 3, Wikidata/MediaWiki: the €1.690.495 in Software Development breaks down across the three goals as following: Goal 1 (Wikidata Software and Community) personnel: €457.943, non-personnel €111.000; Goal 2 (extending reach into WM Projects) personnel €476.383, non-personnel €90.000; Goal 3 (MediaWiki) personnel €481.762, non-personnel €43.500.

Program 4, Policy/Advocacy: the €216,640 budgeted for the Legal/Policy Team break down into personnel cost of €116.300 and non-personnel cost of €100.340.

Program 5, Institutions/Content: the €294,025 for the Department of Education, Science and Culture break down into personnel cost of €194.025 and non-personnel cost of €100.000. The latter include the cost for the Fellow Program and for Coding da Vinci.

I hope this helps. Please let us know if you have any other questions regarding expenses.--Nicola Zeuner (WMDE) (talk) 22:35, 3 November 2016 (UTC)

• Dear WMDE (pinging Nicola to be sure), in our preliminary review discussions among the FDC, we noticed that we had difficulty as a group in identifying the specific budgetary need for this APG application. We would therefore like to ask - and others from the FDC may wish to clarify this comment of mine or add their own aspect - if you could specify why this grant is requesting 279,198€ ($311,306) - or 4% of your your total expected revenues of 6,799,643€ ($7,581,602)? Because this is such a small proportion of your total expected income, yet still a very large amount relative to all the other APG applications the FDC receives, it makes us wonder what the role/impact/use this amount will be to your organisation. In short, how was the sum of 279,198€ calculated? [I'm very sorry if this is specified in the text and I just missed it!].

We also wanted to note that the amount WM-De requested through APG funding last year (specifically allocated toward Wikidata) has now been replaced with a direct WMF-Wikidata contract to precisely the same monetary value (1.2M€) [after much negotiation, congratulations to both parties on agreeing to this]. Therefore, while the 300K€ being requested this time is a reduction in the amount appearing in the APG-column of your budget, it is still a 300K€ increase in the amount being requested from the WMF as it will be used to [partly-]fund other aspects of the organisation.

I should also clarify that last year the FDC found it difficult to review WM-De's request because it was a 'restricted grant' application (to fund Wikidata development) being submitted through an 'unrestricted grant' process (APG) - and this year's application resolves that difficulty as it's a normal unrestricted grant, thank you. So, we're not saying that we're looking for a specific budget item that this 300K€ would be allocated towards; we're asking why WM-De is applying for 4% of its budget - not more not less - through this process. This is especially in the context of the aforementioned contract for Wikidata and that the total WM-De budget it increasing by 7.6% (according to WMF's analysis). -- Wittylama (talk) 16:11, 31 October 2016 (UTC)

Thanks Liam and FDC for this question. I am happy to provide more context of how this request amount was arrived at: Wikimedia Deutschland is the largest and oldest chapter in the movement. We are financially well positioned, in that we have a fundraising agreement and over 30,000 due paying members. In 2015/16 we raised over $7.9 M in donations in Germany for the movement. As you know, it is not always useful to compare WMDE to other chapters with much smaller budgets, no fundraising and serving smaller communities.

We have received much criticism in the past for APG requests that were considered too high. We are now able to provide an APG proposal with a low request, reflecting our financial strength as an organization along with our continued commitment to transparency and accountability.

The amount requested is a result of a careful, detailed and structured budgeting process that occurs as part of annual planning. Expenses are based on the resources necessary to achieve the 2017 Annual Plan goals and objectives described in the proposal, and to create measurable impact for the community and the movement. Revenues are based on reasonable expectations and baselines from previous years. The FDC request is a result of this process, and reflects the actual amount needed from the FDC to implement the proposal. We do not ask for more or less than we need from the movement. At the same time, this amount also reflects the minimum revenue that still allows us to justify to our donors and members to continuously engage in the resource-intensive APG process.

I also would like to correct two statements you make: First, WMDE’s request is only the fifth-highest, and lies $35K below the average of requests by comparable established European chapters. Second, WMDE did NOT request €1.2M for Wikidata in 2016, but €1.5M. The FDC then chose to reduce our award to €1.2.M. The 2017 request, combined with the Wikidata contract amount, therefore has stayed flat compared to 2016, and continues to reflect the organization’s actual budgetary needs.

The recently signed WMF-WMDE Wikidata agreement for the same €1.2M covers only the annual minimum cost of maintaining the project, keeping the lights on for Wikidata - not funding any big new developments or features. These we fund from our general operating and external grant funds. We consider it a success that a project incubated by WMDE has now been secured with sustainable, predictable base funding, similar to any other strategic technical and software development work for the movement. We are happy to have been able to relieve the APG mechanism from funding this work and to return to requesting general support for our Annual Plan from the FDC.

I hope this helps to shed light on the context of our budget and the development of the specific APG request for 2017. Please let us know if you have any other questions about this. --Nicola Zeuner (WMDE) (talk) 22:37, 3 November 2016 (UTC)

Recommendation for change

Hello,

being an ex-member of the German Wikipedia, my experience has been that volunteers are often not treated in a civilized manner, and to the contrary they may be removed from the community for no reason whatsoever. Therefore, it would not be very advisable to fund the Wikimedia Deutschland e.V. with regard to member acquisition, since it is not operating effectively and in some cases counterproductively.

Furthermore, Wikimedia Deutschland e.V. may well think that it is a good idea to "invite" new so-called "paid editors", who oftentimes disrupt the content of Wikipedia instead of improving it. Wikimedia Deutschland e.V. may even think that it is a good idea to spend resources (and in particular money) on that, causing an active harm to Wikipedia. Hence, cutting the funding of that organisation in that regard may be a very good idea. --Mathmensch (talk) 12:46, 21 October 2016 (UTC)

In general, I support this well written proposal. With the issues of civility, we all have to be mindful. Geraldshields11 (talk) 19:21, 22 October 2016 (UTC)

I agree with Mathmensch - Wikipedia.de needs a strong cleanup among Adminstrators and NOT MONEY.

I asked to be banned on own request from wikipedia.de (thankfully this was respected) as I had enough of them. Won't contribute there anymore - doesn't matter how much money you'll "sink" in them: it's wasted money. Regards Tonton Bernardo (talk) 02:08, 27 October 2016 (UTC)

It is such a bad luck that WMDE does not have anything to do with everyday administrative work in de.wikipedia.org and that Mathmensch's block was not even implemented by a German. → «« Man77 »» ^[de] 20:17, 29 October 2016 (UTC)