By all accounts, Radiohead’s name-your-own-price album was downloaded millions of times. No one’s sure how much people paid, however. And although the Wikimedia Foundation has apparently received over 14,000 donations, the dollar value of those gifts remains unknown.
I don’t say point this out to imply there’s some shady ulterior motive in either case; instead, it’s just frustrating to have an incomplete picture. Anyway, in reference to Wikimedia, Nick Gonzalez writes, “Most of their revenue comes from private individuals, with donations averaging around $25. . . . The 10,000th one came from a contributor in Finland, who donated 10 Euros at 8:58 UTC (4.58 ET).”
The fundraising counter now sits at 14,540 donors, and Gonzalez adds, “[T]here’s still time for plenty more. The drive runs all the way through December 22.”
Wikimedia and Wikipedia have both been in the news several times recently. On a more positive note, a college professor actually had her students write articles for the online encyclopedia. In a not-so-good development, fans of webcomics are protesting the deletion of many, many entries.
The fans’ cry to ignore Wikimedia’s fundraiser doesn’t seem to have done much good, though. Assuming, of course, that 14,000 donations corresponds to a reasonable amount of money.
