>"Wikipedia’s workers are fighting to unionize because the institution hosting the world’s encyclopedia has started acting like a regular employer at exactly the moment when the world most needs it to act like something better.

>"The encyclopedia belongs to everyone. The labor that sustains it deserves the same protection."

If Wikipedia has excess reserves, that money should be directed to a worthy cause, not just the people at its office. The labor that sustains it is made up of many more people than those who are employees; trying to milk monopoly rents out of Wikipedia will be its (long and slow) death sentence.

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anigbrowl 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

You make it sound like they're demanding multi-mmilion $ bonuses. FTA:

The union’s demands are embarrassingly modest

This is what Wiki Workers United is asking for. Transparency and accountability from leadership toward both staff and movement communities. Real staff input on annual planning before decisions are finalized. An end to inconsistent hiring, firing, and promotion practices. The ability to safely dissent. Mental health support for the workers who deal with the community directly. Their organizing principle, borrowed from disability rights, is nothing about us without us.

I'm unclear why Wikimedia has brought in a wall Street finance guy as CEO, but complaining about labor while shrugging indifferently at the money people imposing a hierarchical model of control on a community-driven venture is absurd.

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bawolff 3 hours ago | parent [-]

In what world is Bernadette Meehan a "wall street finance guy"?

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eaglelamp 2 hours ago | parent [-]

From Wikipedia:

>After graduation, she worked on Wall Street, first at JPMorgan Chase and then Lehman Brothers. She later joined the United States Foreign Service.

Looks pretty wall street to me.

	▲	bawolff 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I wasn't actually aware of that, but key point here is that she quit that job in 2004. I'm not sure i'd describe someone who worked in wall street 20 years ago as a "wall street guy"

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xocnad 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I am not knowledgeable at all about the structure or internal politics but on the face of it (based solely on the representations in this "article") wouldn't the staff that were directly dedicated to implementing the communities priorities be a "worthy cause"?

	▲	benmusch 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I think "worthy cause" is a poor choice of words from the OP, but the idea is: WMF has goals that it wants to accomplish in the world, and they should staff on that basis, not on the basis of honoring historical contributions, which were already compensated with the wages at the time. I don't have an opinion on how that's used in this situation FWIW, this seems like an extremely reasonable engineering team to employ for that basis.

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12_throw_away 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

[flagged]

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card_zero 3 hours ago | parent [-]

It means that us lowly volunteer Wikipedians, who write the articles, have long mistrusted those who are paid to work for Wikimedia, and we are unsure what good they do, if any.

This may of course be unfair, but that's the background information.

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12_throw_away 3 hours ago | parent [-]

[flagged]

	▲	card_zero 3 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		I apologize for being a lizard person.
	▲	benmusch 3 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		you can disagree with that comment but its clearly not PR speak lmao. not everyone who disagrees with you is astroturfed

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throwaway894345 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I don't have a strong opinion on this particular conflict, but I have thought about this in the abstract a bit (and landed on no satisfying conclusion). Basically, I've always been a strong proponent of workers demanding their fair share from a traditional company where the entire game is squeezing employees / society to maximize shareholder returns at all costs. However, I'm much less convinced that the same applies when the employer organization has a genuine nonprofit mission (the thing that actually brought this to my mind was an Atlantic article about how Democratic Party employees were "squabbling" about perks while engaging in a literal fight against fascism). That said, I don't think those employees should sacrifice everything for some "greater good" particularly when the rest of us in society are not--like I said, no satisfying conclusions--just noting the different dynamics.

	▲	oytis 3 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		An organization genuinely dedicated to a mission for common good has even more reasons to share power with its employees in my view
	▲	foobarchu 2 hours ago \| parent \| prev \| next [-]
		As others have said, there's even more at stake with a nonprofit. Charities famously milk their employees dry by emphasizing what good and important work they're doing, to justify overworking and underpaying them. If someone chooses to work for a nonprofit, that should not be interpreted as "willing to be a human doormat".
	▲	gowld 3 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		Wikipedia owners are free to not have any employees, to prefer employees who donate some of their pay back to the organization, or solicit only volunteers. Workers are free to ask to be paid for their work.