Re: [Wikitech-l] fundraising earmarks for code review, image bundle dumps, search failover auction, Wikinews independence, bugzilla queue maintenance etc.
My contributions for audio recording uploads are not ready because they depend on the upload redesign and client-side Flash. I am still waiting to hear from anyone why the current state of Flash is any less closed than that of Java. I am willing to give the benefit of the doubt that people have simply not researched the situation with Adobe's current public documentation and license along with the state of Haxe and Gnash, but in the mean time I can wait for the upload redesign before I take up that issue in earnest. I'm also trying to raise money for Gnash developers to make that particular hurdle a complete non-issue. I would love to see Flash/Gnash support on Commons, but as far as I know, it isn't currently in the development pipeline (and as you said, their is still lingering cultural resistance to anything Flash-related, despite the emergence of projects like GPLFlash and Gnash). If you want to use Flash for uploads in the meantime, you can set-up an uploading front-end on the toolserver. I have a Flash-based uploading front-end for Commons on there myself that I use for doing multi-file uploads. Ryan Kaldari On 9/6/10 1:43 PM, James Salsman wrote: Tim Starling wrote: I meant the code: CentralNotice, DonationInterface, GeoLite, ContactPageFundraiser, the Drupal extension, etc. What remains to be done on those projects? The only unassigned bug of any immediately apparent consequence on any of those keywords I was able to find is bug 24682 which looks like it might have a patch already described in it. I didn't think you were a committer. My contributions for audio recording uploads are not ready because they depend on the upload redesign and client-side Flash. I am still waiting to hear from anyone why the current state of Flash is any less closed than that of Java. I am willing to give the benefit of the doubt that people have simply not researched the situation with Adobe's current public documentation and license along with the state of Haxe and Gnash, but in the mean time I can wait for the upload redesign before I take up that issue in earnest. I'm also trying to raise money for Gnash developers to make that particular hurdle a complete non-issue. Perhaps there are Mediawiki users other than the Foundation who would not be opposed to the use of Flash for microphone audio upload? Best regards, James Salsman ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Re: [Wikitech-l] fundraising earmarks for code review, image bundle dumps, search failover auction, Wikinews independence, bugzilla queue maintenance etc.
On Fri, Sep 3, 2010 at 5:05 PM, James Salsman jsals...@gmail.com wrote: Are there any reasons not to allow donors to earmark categories? I feel an instinctive and passionate loathing for this proposal. However, instinct and loathing are not very positive grounds on which to argue a position, as I once tried to explain to a large bloke in a pub as he repeatedly punched me in the face. So I shall try to rein in my passions and argue with the logic of an automaton. Firstly, such earmarking would turn a donation into a kind of popularity vote. The populace decides what the priorities are. Voting can be very good, we are all democratic now, but voters must be informed citizens. I believe the current percentage of Wikipedia visitors that edits rather than stopping at just consuming the material is something like 0.01%. I would assume that the great majority of donors are readers of articles and have never been anywhere near a mailing list like this one, or looked at Meta-Wiki, or even visited our proposals pages, or the strategy wiki, or really given much thought about the fact that a Foundation runs Wikipedia. They may not even know it's a charity. You are proposing that this unthinking and uninterested mass present us with a few shakes of the Magic 8 Ball that the WMF will then feel bound by? Secondly, you state that perhaps 30 options for earmarking could be presented to a potential donor, when I believe it's been shown that users interact with things at a proportion inverse to the number of options; the donation interface should be as clean and unintimidating as possible or we are in danger of alienating people right on the cusp of acting as we would hope and wish. Finally, we've just had an extensive Strategy process and the community was involved. Regardless of what you think of the outcomes (for me, I was disappointed that what came out was painted in broader strokes than I had imagined and would have liked), if we were to now say actually, forget all that. Forget Strategy happened. Let's direct our energies according to the flighty whims of someone who'd never asked themselves a pertinent question until seeing a humungous list of radio buttons pop up on their screen and clicked one of the first four cos it sounded like a good thing and four is the limit of their Twitterised attention span. The Strategy Process was the community's way of influencing priorities. Those priorities will need to be funded by the donations. This ship has sailed. ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Re: [Wikitech-l] fundraising earmarks for code review, image bundle dumps, search failover auction, Wikinews independence, bugzilla queue maintenance etc.
Tim Starling wrote: I meant the code: CentralNotice, DonationInterface, GeoLite, ContactPageFundraiser, the Drupal extension, etc. What remains to be done on those projects? The only unassigned bug of any immediately apparent consequence on any of those keywords I was able to find is bug 24682 which looks like it might have a patch already described in it. I didn't think you were a committer. My contributions for audio recording uploads are not ready because they depend on the upload redesign and client-side Flash. I am still waiting to hear from anyone why the current state of Flash is any less closed than that of Java. I am willing to give the benefit of the doubt that people have simply not researched the situation with Adobe's current public documentation and license along with the state of Haxe and Gnash, but in the mean time I can wait for the upload redesign before I take up that issue in earnest. I'm also trying to raise money for Gnash developers to make that particular hurdle a complete non-issue. Perhaps there are Mediawiki users other than the Foundation who would not be opposed to the use of Flash for microphone audio upload? Best regards, James Salsman ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Re: [Wikitech-l] fundraising earmarks for code review, image bundle dumps, search failover auction, Wikinews independence, bugzilla queue maintenance etc.
On 04/09/10 02:05, James Salsman wrote: Tim Starling wrote: As for fundraising, the work is uninspiring, and I don't think we've ever managed to get volunteers interested in it regardless of how open we've been. I must take exception to that because I did a lot of work last year on several aspects of fundraising, including button design, some of which (e.g. the proposed button with Jimbo's face on it) wasn't even A/B tested even after the A/B test harness had been developed. I meant the code: CentralNotice, DonationInterface, GeoLite, ContactPageFundraiser, the Drupal extension, etc. I didn't think you were a committer. I was never told why there was no A/B test of that button. It seems like I had to ask over and over before anyone even did any A/B tests in the first place. Frankly, my efforts to help with fundraising are more inspiring than a lot of the other things I try to do to help, but inspiration is generally orthogonal to frustration. However, I know one of my responsibilities as a volunteer to keep asking until things get done. Furthermore, how do you expect effective help with fundraising when the fundraising mailing list and archives are closed? I'm not on any fundraising mailing list. -- Tim Starling ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
[Wikitech-l] fundraising earmarks for code review, image bundle dumps, search failover auction, Wikinews independence, bugzilla queue maintenance etc.
Tim Starling wrote: As for fundraising, the work is uninspiring, and I don't think we've ever managed to get volunteers interested in it regardless of how open we've been. I must take exception to that because I did a lot of work last year on several aspects of fundraising, including button design, some of which (e.g. the proposed button with Jimbo's face on it) wasn't even A/B tested even after the A/B test harness had been developed. I was never told why there was no A/B test of that button. It seems like I had to ask over and over before anyone even did any A/B tests in the first place. Frankly, my efforts to help with fundraising are more inspiring than a lot of the other things I try to do to help, but inspiration is generally orthogonal to frustration. However, I know one of my responsibilities as a volunteer to keep asking until things get done. Furthermore, how do you expect effective help with fundraising when the fundraising mailing list and archives are closed? Danese Cooper wrote: 1. Eliminate single points of failure / bottlenecks I am glad that is the top priority, because there are clearly failures and bottlenecks in external code review, production of image bundle dumps, auctioning search failover links to wealthy search engine donors, steps to make Wikinews an independent, funded, and respected bona fide news organization, general bugzilla queue software maintenance, etc. About eight months ago I was told that fundraising this year will allow donors to pick an optional earmark for their funds. Is that still the plan? Donors should be allowed to optionally mark their donations for projects including (1) the review of externally submitted code, (2) the production of image bundles along with the dumps, (3) auctioning the order of appearance of several search failover gadget links to external search engines (such as users were able to use before they were rendered unusable by the usability project) to wealthy search engine donors, (4) a way to pay people who work on the bugzilla queue (e.g. through http://odesk.com or the like) without having to set up lengthy contracts, and (5) a way to pay for Wikinews journalism awards, travel expenses, reporters, fact checkers, photographers, camera and recording equipment, and proofreaders, etc. Are there any reasons not to allow donors to earmark categories? I am not saying that those are the only earmarks which should be offered, but I am certain that at least those five should be included. What are other problems which might be solved by donor earmarks? There are ten rejected GSoC projects which I feel strongly about because they were scored positively by the mentors but rejected because of the number of slots requested. Could those be funded by donor earmarks? Regards, James Salsman ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Re: [Wikitech-l] fundraising earmarks for code review, image bundle dumps, search failover auction, Wikinews independence, bugzilla queue maintenance etc.
On 03.09.2010, 20:05 James wrote: Donors should be allowed to optionally mark their donations for projects including (1) the review of externally submitted code, (2) the production of image bundles along with the dumps, (3) auctioning the order of appearance of several search failover gadget links to external search engines (such as users were able to use before they were rendered unusable by the usability project) to wealthy search engine donors, (4) a way to pay people who work on the bugzilla queue (e.g. through http://odesk.com or the like) without having to set up lengthy contracts, and (5) a way to pay for Wikinews journalism awards, travel expenses, reporters, fact checkers, photographers, camera and recording equipment, and proofreaders, etc. 99.99(and dunno how many more nines)% of donors will donate just for Wikipedia. People don't care how things work, they simply want them to work. It's Wikimedia Foundation's responsibility to use these donations to make things just work for as many people as possible. -- Best regards, Max Semenik ([[User:MaxSem]]) ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Re: [Wikitech-l] fundraising earmarks for code review, image bundle dumps, search failover auction, Wikinews independence, bugzilla queue maintenance etc.
James Salsman wrote: Are there any reasons not to allow donors to earmark categories? I am not saying that those are the only earmarks which should be offered, but I am certain that at least those five should be included. What are other problems which might be solved by donor earmarks? There are ten rejected GSoC projects which I feel strongly about because they were scored positively by the mentors but rejected because of the number of slots requested. Could those be funded by donor earmarks? Regards, James Salsman GSoC projects and specific bugs would be really easy, since nothing stops you from offering a bounty right now for fixing bug X. Other issues are different, since you would need an employee (or otherwise someone with shell access) to fullfill it. And if you want WMF to have its employee do X, the pay would be 'I give Y money to WMF if they fix this first'? That seems a bit awkward. The idea of earmarking for minor donations is good, but it should not be readily available (we don't want to not being able to pay anything), while not completely hidden, either. ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Re: [Wikitech-l] fundraising earmarks for code review, image bundle dumps, search failover auction, Wikinews independence, bugzilla queue maintenance etc.
Hi, On 3 September 2010 22:47, Platonides platoni...@gmail.com wrote: Other issues are different, since you would need an employee (or otherwise someone with shell access) to fullfill it. And if you want WMF to have its employee do X, the pay would be 'I give Y money to WMF if they fix this first'? That seems a bit awkward. The idea of earmarking for minor donations is good, but it should not be readily available (we don't want to not being able to pay anything), while not completely hidden, either. Well, if you want to keep some control over destinations of the donations you could allow to earmark up to 50% of the donation. Or some other portion. And you could use the results of the earmarked donations at the end of the fundraising period to divide all of the donations in a likewise matter (or a major portion of the general donations). That could give at least a better view on where the people that supply the funds would like to see the efforts spend. -- Regards, Jean-Marc -- . ___ . @@ // \\ De Chelonian Mobile . (_,\/ \_/ \ TortoiseSVN . \ \_/_\_/ The coolest Interface to (Sub)Version Control . /_/ \_\ http://tortoisesvn.net ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Re: [Wikitech-l] fundraising earmarks for code review, image bundle dumps, search failover auction, Wikinews independence, bugzilla queue maintenance etc.
Platonides wrote: ... And if you want WMF to have its employee do X, the pay would be 'I give Y money to WMF if they fix this first'? That seems a bit awkward. It would be best to follow the pattern that the Red Cross uses, by offering either where needed most as the default, or a handfull of alternative options: http://american.redcross.org/site/PageServer?pagename=ntld_main Jean-Marc van Leerdam wrote: Well, if you want to keep some control over destinations of the donations you could allow to earmark up to 50% of the donation Yes, you could do that (with a footnote or similar disclaimer), and/or associate a certain amount with some of the earmark options after which those would be no longer available for selection (i.e., after they were fully funded.) Earmarking options could be offered in the order they score as maximizing total giving, until the closed-ended items with a maximum budget are fully funded. (Each could have its own goal thermometer shown. After all the closed-ended earmarks are satisfied, only the open-ended projects would remain in the order that donors find them most inspiring.) Platonides wrote: The idea of earmarking for minor donations is good, but it should not be readily available ... while not completely hidden, either. Absolutely; a multivariate linear regression test to determine the extent to which each of the earmark options tends to maximize total contributions should be run in advance, with a sample size (assuming 30 earmark possibilities offered four at a time in a variety of different languages and locales) of between 5000 and 30,000 donations. The dependent variable would be total amount given, while the independent variables should be the binary flag of whether the option appeared in each test (donation.) Here are some links to statistics to help with multivariate linear regression: http://www.statmethods.net/stats/regression.html As for the earmarks, in addition to the five I suggested earlier, and the ten approved but un-slotted Google Summer of Code projects, and Sue has a list of 15 open-ended goals which could be used. There is ample opportunity to run more than just 30 earmarking options. I'm sure people could suggest others, either that they think of or find on their favorite mailing lists or village pumps. Best regards, James Salsman ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Re: [Wikitech-l] fundraising earmarks for code review, image bundle dumps, search failover auction, Wikinews independence, bugzilla queue maintenance etc.
On Fri, Sep 3, 2010 at 6:11 PM, James Salsman jsals...@gmail.com wrote: Absolutely; a multivariate linear regression test to determine the extent to which each of the earmark options tends to maximize total contributions should be run in advance, with a sample size (assuming 30 earmark possibilities offered four at a time in a variety of different languages and locales) of between 5000 and 30,000 donations. Is that a practical number? How many donations do we get total per day? ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Re: [Wikitech-l] fundraising earmarks for code review, image bundle dumps, search failover auction, Wikinews independence, bugzilla queue maintenance etc.
Usually about 20 or so. Ryan Kaldari On 9/3/10 3:25 PM, Aryeh Gregor wrote: On Fri, Sep 3, 2010 at 6:11 PM, James Salsmanjsals...@gmail.com wrote: Absolutely; a multivariate linear regression test to determine the extent to which each of the earmark options tends to maximize total contributions should be run in advance, with a sample size (assuming 30 earmark possibilities offered four at a time in a variety of different languages and locales) of between 5000 and 30,000 donations. Is that a practical number? How many donations do we get total per day? ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Re: [Wikitech-l] fundraising earmarks for code review, image bundle dumps, search failover auction, Wikinews independence, bugzilla queue maintenance etc.
I actually discussed the idea of donor earmarks with the other fundraising folks at WMF a while back. There are a few potential problems with such a system: * More overhead for managing donations * The Foundation is trying to move away from any type of strings attached to donations (including grants) so that resources can be managed optimally and flexibly * What happens to money earmarked for scuttled projects? Would it have to be refunded? (e.g. The Philip Greenspun illustration project) I do think, however, that such an earmarking system would make donating more attractive to some people, so it's worth discussing at least. Ryan Kaldari On 9/3/10 3:11 PM, James Salsman wrote: Platonides wrote: ... And if you want WMF to have its employee do X, the pay would be 'I give Y money to WMF if they fix this first'? That seems a bit awkward. It would be best to follow the pattern that the Red Cross uses, by offering either where needed most as the default, or a handfull of alternative options: http://american.redcross.org/site/PageServer?pagename=ntld_main Jean-Marc van Leerdam wrote: Well, if you want to keep some control over destinations of the donations you could allow to earmark up to 50% of the donation Yes, you could do that (with a footnote or similar disclaimer), and/or associate a certain amount with some of the earmark options after which those would be no longer available for selection (i.e., after they were fully funded.) Earmarking options could be offered in the order they score as maximizing total giving, until the closed-ended items with a maximum budget are fully funded. (Each could have its own goal thermometer shown. After all the closed-ended earmarks are satisfied, only the open-ended projects would remain in the order that donors find them most inspiring.) Platonides wrote: The idea of earmarking for minor donations is good, but it should not be readily available ... while not completely hidden, either. Absolutely; a multivariate linear regression test to determine the extent to which each of the earmark options tends to maximize total contributions should be run in advance, with a sample size (assuming 30 earmark possibilities offered four at a time in a variety of different languages and locales) of between 5000 and 30,000 donations. The dependent variable would be total amount given, while the independent variables should be the binary flag of whether the option appeared in each test (donation.) Here are some links to statistics to help with multivariate linear regression: http://www.statmethods.net/stats/regression.html As for the earmarks, in addition to the five I suggested earlier, and the ten approved but un-slotted Google Summer of Code projects, and Sue has a list of 15 open-ended goals which could be used. There is ample opportunity to run more than just 30 earmarking options. I'm sure people could suggest others, either that they think of or find on their favorite mailing lists or village pumps. Best regards, James Salsman ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Re: [Wikitech-l] fundraising earmarks for code review, image bundle dumps, search failover auction, Wikinews independence, bugzilla queue maintenance etc.
On 3 September 2010 23:56, Ryan Kaldari rkald...@wikimedia.org wrote: *. The Foundation is trying to move away from any type of strings attached to donations (including grants) so that resources can be managed optimally and flexibly For any charity, earmarked donations are a COMPLETE PAIN IN THE ARSE, and frequently not worth the effort. There are all sorts of reasons for this. For one, the earmarked money can't be used for all the day-to-day infrastructure needed to support the earmark project unless it sets up its own parallel infrastructure. I refer the honourable gentleman to the Usability Project for the effects and side-effects of isolating a development effort. I do think, however, that such an earmarking system would make donating more attractive to some people, so it's worth discussing at least. Unless the donation is really quite substantial, this may not be entirely worth the effort. (Disclaimer: I speak only from personal experience with volunteer organisations in general, not with WMF in particular. I may be dead wrong. YMMV. etc.) - d. ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Re: [Wikitech-l] fundraising earmarks for code review, image bundle dumps, search failover auction, Wikinews independence, bugzilla queue maintenance etc.
On 9/3/10 9:05 AM, James Salsman wrote: Furthermore, how do you expect effective help with fundraising when the fundraising mailing list and archives are closed? You definitely don't need access to the fundraising mailing list to help with fundraising. I'm a full-time fundraising developer for the Foundation and I'm not even on the fundraising mailing list. My understanding is that it's mainly just used to communicate with the fundaraising reps at the chapters. If you want to be more involved, just hop on http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_2010 or the wikimedia-fundraising IRC channel. There's definitely a lot of work that we need help with, so any assistance is appreciated! Ryan Kaldari ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Re: [Wikitech-l] fundraising earmarks for code review, image bundle dumps, search failover auction, Wikinews independence, bugzilla queue maintenance etc.
Ryan Kaldari wrote: ... There's definitely a lot of work that we need help with, so any assistance is appreciated! What can I help with to prepare for experimental measurements? Do you already have a way to collect arbitrary radio button and checkmark form responses from your PayPal donations? What format do those get loged in? I would love to write an R script for doing the regression. Do you think this sort of thing would work better with radio buttons like the Red Cross uses, or a set of checkmarks with language specifying that the funds would be earmarked in equal proportions between all the checked options -- or is that another independent variable which should be tested? Have you looked in to http://www.wepay.com? They are supposed to be offering a lower overhead rate than PayPal. I know you have an account with moneybookers.com -- have you asked them all for a better deal from each of them to get some competition between them going? Aryeh Gregor wrote: On Fri, Sep 3, 2010 at 6:11 PM, James Salsman jsalsman at gmail.com wrote: Absolutely; a multivariate linear regression test to determine the extent to which each of the earmark options tends to maximize total contributions should be run in advance, with a sample size (assuming 30 earmark possibilities offered four at a time in a variety of different languages and locales) of between 5000 and 30,000 donations. Is that a practical number? According to http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Special:FundraiserStatistics there were more than 3,600 contributions on the second day of the 2008 fundraiser. During the first few days the independent variables should be presented in random permutations. After you've collected enough data for your desired confidence level (I used 95%) then you can start sorting them. But if you want to use a lower level of confidence you can vastly reduce the number of initial observations. If you want to use a 90% confidence level for 30 independent variables then you would need less than 290 observations (donations.) Ryan Kaldari wrote: ... There are a few potential problems with such a system: * More overhead for managing donations In most cases, could this be addressed by disclaimers? E.g., the Foundation reserves the right to cancel earmarked projects for any reason, and to override donor selections if funds fall short in any essential areas? * The Foundation is trying to move away from any type of strings attached to donations (including grants) so that resources can be managed optimally and flexibly If that presents an actual problem with small donations, under a sufficiently flexible disclaimer, please let me know why. I do think, however, that such an earmarking system would make donating more attractive to some people Isn't the reason that the Red Cross does it because it substantially increases donations? Rand Montoya said that he had measured that, and although I forget the numbers, I remember that it was a very significant difference. David Gerard wrote: Unless the donation is really quite substantial, this may not be entirely worth the effort. I know Rand said the effect was substantial, but it varies so much with all of the different permutations that there is literally only one way to find out the extent, and that is to measure it experimentally with actual donors. Merely discussing the possibilities can not arrive at even a vague idea of how much the presentation of each option serves to maximize donations. Best regards, James Salsman ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Re: [Wikitech-l] fundraising earmarks for code review, image bundle dumps, search failover auction, Wikinews independence, bugzilla queue maintenance etc.
On 9/3/10 5:48 PM, James Salsman wrote: Ryan Kaldari wrote: ... There's definitely a lot of work that we need help with, so any assistance is appreciated! What can I help with to prepare for experimental measurements? Do you already have a way to collect arbitrary radio button and checkmark form responses from your PayPal donations? What format do those get loged in? I would love to write an R script for doing the regression. Our donation analytics is very basic at the moment, but we're currently in the process of hooking up Open Web Analytics (http://www.openwebanalytics.com/) which should be a huge improvement. We will be posting lots of stats on meta and Foundation wiki during the fundraiser, so it would be awesome if you wanted to do some custom analysis with R. There are already some basic stats up at: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Special:ContributionStatistics http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Special:ContributionTrackingStatistics http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Special:FundraiserStatistics http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising_2010/Banner_testing/Stats To answer your question, we do currently have ways of tracking arbitrary form input from the contribution process. This is how we track the donor comments for example. The code that handles all of that is managed by Arthur Richards, so he's a better person to ask about it. Do you think this sort of thing would work better with radio buttons like the Red Cross uses, or a set of checkmarks with language specifying that the funds would be earmarked in equal proportions between all the checked options -- or is that another independent variable which should be tested? Have you looked in to http://www.wepay.com? They are supposed to be offering a lower overhead rate than PayPal. I know you have an account with moneybookers.com -- have you asked them all for a better deal from each of them to get some competition between them going? These are probably questions that would be better to ask on meta, so that you can get feedback from a broader group of people. As far as I know, we haven't looked into WePay. Ryan Kaldari ___ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
