Thank you for your donation to this year's fundraiser.
We're a little more than half-way toward our 2010 goal. We want to take down the fundraising banners from Wikipedia by January 1, as usual. But we have long-overdue upgrades to our infrastructure planned for the year ahead. So our goal is bigger this year than usual.
That's why I'm hoping you won't mind if I ask you to help again with a small monthly recurring gift of $3, $7, $13 or whatever you choose. It's easy to do right here:
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/WMFRE/en
Of course, you can also make another one time gift to help get us to our goal.
Most people don't know this, but I'm a volunteer.
I don't get paid a cent for my work at Wikipedia, and neither do our thousands of other volunteer authors and editors. When I founded Wikipedia, I could have made it into a for-profit company with advertising banners, but I decided to do something different.
Commerce is fine. Advertising is not evil. But it doesn't belong here. Not in Wikipedia.
Wikipedia is something special. It is like a library or a public park. It is like a temple for the mind. It is a place we can all go to think, to learn, to share our knowledge with others. It is a unique human project, the first of its kind in history. It is a humanitarian project to bring a free encyclopedia to every single person on the planet.
Every single person.
If all of Wikipedia's 400 million users would donate $1 each, we would have 20 times the amount of money we need. We're a small organization, and I've worked hard over the years to keep us lean and tight. We fulfill our mission, and leave waste to others.
To do this without resorting to advertising, we need you. It is you who keep this dream alive. It is you who have created Wikipedia. It is you who believe that a place of calm reflection and learning is worth having.
Please consider making a sustaining monthly donation of whatever amount you like to protect and sustain Wikipedia.
Thanks,
Jimmy Wales
Wikipedia Founder
P.S. — If you can't commit to a recurring monthly donation, I hope you'll consider making another to help us reach our goal before the end of the year. Please make your donation today.
—
Wikimedia Foundation
P.O. Box 894879
Los Angeles, California 90189-4879
United States