Talk:Fundraising and Funds Dissemination/Wikimedia’s culture of sharing

executive summary?

could anyone sum up the most important issues discussed in this paper? that would be of great help. best,--Poupou l'quourouce 21:01, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

In my opinion, the part Fundraising_and_Funds_Dissemination/Wikimedia’s_culture_of_sharing#WE_NEED_TO_ACT:_six_propositions contains the core of the document. If you want to limit yourself to something, I suggest to read that. But please note that the document as a whole is available in several languages. Effeietsanders 22:35, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestion. Actually I already have read it completely. However, I am afraid that many others won't even start, because there is to much text and headlines are not really instructive either. Best,--Poupou l'quourouce 12:48, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

Wenn ihr beide Deutsch versteht, dann antworte ich mal in dieser Sprache. Was ich stark vermisse, sind konkrete Vorschläge - was ich sehe sind viele Schlagworte, die vielleicht gut ankommen, aber abgelehnt werden. Würd ich auch so machen, wenn ich an Sues Stelle wäre. Was will man wie handeln? We need to act - but how? Die Antwort fehlt hier leider und Sue hat eindeutig nach Antworten gefragt...--Angel54 5 23:01, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

Außerdem gibts das Dokument auch auf Deutsch - Kernsatz der Einleitung: Das Teilen von Ressourcen, von Wissen und von Leidenschaft ist das Fundament dieses Ansatzes. Das ist doch toll formuliert...--Angel54 5 23:06, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

Summary

1. Intro: This subject is really important.   +SEE FOOTNOTES
   • We share concerns about movement growth, fundraising, and accountability. we need to focus: debate over funds distracts from our priority - reversing editor decline.
   • We should all experiment. Suggestion: do things the wiki way, each group finding local solutions in their culture. following shared principles -- In editing, the five pillars. In fundraising, standards of accounting and accountability.
   • Aim for local independence and initiative, including decentralized fundraising. This is what the world's most successful NGOs do. It builds trust, partnerships, and a common end result.
   • All groups should share resources, responsibility, expertise, and success.

2. Localized fundraising is important.
   • Local messaging: WMDE has focused on this, running 24 tests and finding results different from the WMF's global results. Last year saw donations grow 70%, donors by 120% (incl. 10,000 recurring donors).
   • Local donor management: this is key to high-quality relationships. Prompt and topical responses in the local language require it. Central fundraising could limit this and strain existing relations (e.g., w/ 220,000 current WMDE donors)
   • Tax deductibility: this is of high importance to donors. It gains trust and value. in 2006: 60% of donations in DE were submitted for a tax deduction.
   • Large international non-profits do localized fundraising. WMDE commissioned fundraising firm Spendwerk to compile a (12 pg) report summarizing and analyzing fundraising methods of 11 large international non-profits with German offices. None used central fundraising; one switched from central to local fundraising as it grew.

3. Fundraising needs regulation to protect our reputation. This must be a prerequisite to handling significant funds (whether through fundraising or not).
   • A global advisory firm (like KPMG) should list financial and legal requirements, by July 2012. meeting these should be required for major fundraising, scaling with the size of funds.
   • Fundraising should be a means, not an ends. Chapters should support global goals with local means, and should have access to funds from the WMF and/or other chapters - if they do little direct fundraising.
   • An independent body [unspecified] should review requests to locally manage [sitewide] fundraising. Requesters need to show that such fundraising would be best for the movement. [according to the above ends]

   The "unspecified body" could be the Chapters Council or another body of self-governance. And I would not make a difference between fundraising via the Wikimedia-sites and fundraising offline. Because even with offline fundraising, "Wikimedia" and "Wikipedia" will be used in the messaging. Therefor, the same standards must apply for online and offline fundraising, because in case something goes wrong, the whole movement could suffer from it in both cases. --Pavel Richter (WMDE) 09:28, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

   • A Chapters Council should provide [peer] guidance and oversight for each chapter's use of funds. They would confirm they abide by their own standards, and intervene where necessary to protect the movement. [how?]

   Chapters would be required to report on a regular basis that and how they are in compliance with the standards. (This reporting needs to be defined within the whole process over the next weeks.) In case a chapter is not in compliance, a set of measures needs to be defined: Starting with a formal notice, the pressure would increase. In the end (so when there is a real danger that substantial financial or reputation risks are imminent), I would expect the Chapters Council to have the power to intervene in the internal processes of a local chapter, so that no more harm (financially and reputation-wise) could be done. I am sure that other organizations have already such mechanisms in place, and it would be worthwhile to investigate this further in the coming weeks. --Pavel Richter (WMDE) 09:28, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

4. Our ends: a global network of participants and projects.
   • Local agents lead to flexibility, visibility, and empathy. They can react quickly to advocacy issues. They can avoid the inflexibility of a central grants system (cf. the GLAM sector).
   • Local outreach is helped by local management and planning.
   • Horizontal/multilateral cooperation among local groups leads to collective self-empowerment. In the long run, this is more effective than vertical planning at bridging the digital divide - in our experience and in that of UN bodies.
   • Centralized fundraising will create a power bottleneck. It will raise questions of legitimacy, and aggravate rather than solve the current imbalance between well-resourced and less-resourced chapters/regions.
   • Centralized distribution will risk being ineffective. It may use a single list of global priorities rather than many context-sensitive lists: viewing a multitude of similar problems as a single problem.

5. Six recommendations:
   1. Cohere a strategy,
   2. Set standards,
   3. Build mixed teams,
   4. Attract new affiliates,
   5. Encourage solidarity,
   6. Fix both large and small communities.
   • Cohere a strategy - create a new Planning Council/Meeting to coordinate priorities + shared tasks + metrics. Through this, chapters can develop and evaluate projects in line with shared goals.
   • Set & enforce shared standards - Based on input from KPMG (or similar), the WMF Board should define auditing guidelines and standards, for [sitewide] fundraising eligibility and for general org/chapter development.

   As mentioned above, I would not make this distinction between sitewide and offline fundraising, because in the end, both make use of the reputation of Wikimedia and Wikipedia.--Pavel Richter (WMDE) 09:28, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

   A Chapters Council should be set up as a self-governing body to oversee and enforce these standards.

   • Develop mixed-player teams. Increase the scale and efficacy of collaborations by directing resources to projects implemented by mixed teams [from multiple chapters/groups/WMF]. Ex: multi-country projects, competitions, R&D, and PR campaigns.
   • Attract an affiliate network. Work to create new topically-focused entities. Partner with existing organizations in areas related to the Wikimedia movement. In each topic area, attract volunteers and build donor relations.
   • Encourage solidarity and emulation. Rather than segregating what entities can do what, encourage all chapters and orgs to build capacity. Make international efforts the work and pride of more than one player.
   • Coordinate shifts in large and small communities. Do not separate the goals of increasing participation in big old Wikimedia communities, and building capacity in small emerging communities. Fixing one supports the other; solve them together.

6. Conclusion: <rephrased intro>  
   • Table: Comparing resource allocation models of 11 international organizations
   • FOOTNOTES - largely from meta, wmf-wiki, the Spendwerk report, and websites of various international nonprofits

who wrote that

Who wrote that summary? Is this automatic generated? As I said above in German: Im missing out on concrete proposals - the phrase "We need to act" should be defined in which way? How? What numbers? Much text, low content...--Angel54 5 16:54, 30 January 2012 (UTC) And btw. To propose that KPMG should handle sth. means, not to be able to handle sth oneselves. Poor proposal.--Angel54 5 17:00, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Not automatic; I wrote it, as best I understood the original. Some topics were hard to understand clearly, or seemed to be undefined; they are noted in square brackets [above]. If anything was left out, feel free to fix it. –SJ talk | translate   18:31, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks a lot. I dont know, if I want to translate much more. U did do quite well, there wasnt any critic concerning the summary. I read the original (long) version in German and English...--Angel54 5 19:00, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

SJ, thank your very much for that summary! I just added some points, and where I removed the [ ], I agree with you :-) If you have any more questions, let me know.--Pavel Richter (WMDE) 09:28, 2 February 2012 (UTC)