Cite for your assertion that donations to Wikipedia go to line the pockets of Jimbo Wales.
Wikipedia is a marvel of the modern age. It might be the greatest repository of shared knowledge in the world. I bet most most of you use it multiple times a day. I do. I could not give one quarter of a fuck if Jimbo is an Ayn Rand fanboy, because there’s nothing to indicate that it negatively impacts Wikipedia itself in any way.
I donated. I might donate more if it would give me a way to close that damned yellow box on an ipad.
I think it’s rational to contribute money to wikipedia. If you get benefit from something, it’s reasonable to want to support it so that you can continue to get benefit from it and to provide some amount of compensation to those who provided it so that they have incentive to continue to improve it. That said, I don’t think you necessarily need to donate money to support them either. That there are people providing content to them free of charge is another way for people to pay back.
That said, I can also see rationale for not donating, because they aren’t exactly hurting for cash. Or one could make arguments that, regardless of the true legal technicalities, that all the content really belongs to all the people of the internet for creating it in the first place. Or, as I touched on, if you’re regularly contributing to and helping to maintain the content, one might feel that covers whatever moral obligation to pay if they weren’t.
So, it really comes down to what you feel your obligation is. It’s really not that much different from something like PBS, government funding aside, where a lot of people may watch it and never donate, but plenty of others do. I certainly don’t feel guilty if I were to watch a random show on PBS, but I might feel an obligation if I watched it regularly. How much do you use wikipedia? Do you feel like its worth $5, $10, or more? If not for wikipedia, how else might you get whatever content you get from them?
I would contribute if I actually had money. Wikipedia DOES help me with my homework. Regularly.
When I don’t understand something in a textbook or lecture, I look it up on wikipedia. If that doesn’t help, I used the sources to find more information. I fine tune what it is that I don’t understand before I come here asking for more help. It doesn’t usually get to this point though. I generally figure out what I need by reading a paragraph or less.
When I have to research something, I always ALWAYS start on wikipedia. I look up every aspect of whatever it is I’m researching. I use it to get the basics and to help me formulate a hypothesis or a theme. Then, once again, I use the wikipedia sources to find more information. When I create a bibliography I always put every wikipedia article I used in there. I have found that no professor minds using wikipedia as a source, as long as you have other sources to back up what you found there. It’s a starting point and it’s a great one.
As soon as I make more than $8/hour and work more than 8 hours per week (in other words, when I have a real job and not just work study), I fully intend to donate to say thanks for helping me so much in school.