Wikipedia talk:Reward board/Archive 1

message: In case you're unsure, yes, this page does propose payment to individual editors contingent upon completion of whatever task payment is offered for. This is a very controversial idea, as demonstrated by the discussion at Wikipedia talk:Bounty board. WP:OWN and similar policies are likely to cause some trouble if one of these offers is not handled correctly.
Because of this, I have a few very basic ideas on how individual editors can be paid for their work while conflicts are avoided and the communal nature of Wikipedia remains intact:
*The employer can split the payment between all parties he feels made a substantial contribution to the article's promotion.
*The employer can pay individuals to integrate drafts submitted to him privately into the article.
etc. I know these aren't really novel, I'm just sort of brainstorming here. cookiecaper (talk / contribs) 21:51, 17 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: People really pay people to edit articles?  Wow... --M@thwiz2020 22:01, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

text: If you have to pay to have it done, it's called work. Goes against the philosophy of the project. It's Ok to make money with the outcome as per GFDL but not with the project itself. And yes, given enough money, it will violate NPOV. User:Ejrrjs  says What? 16:15, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I disagree. I think it's quite in line with the philosophy of the project. Free/open source software, a closely aligned movement to Wikipedia, and arguably its philosophical roots, routinely has people being paid to contribute code. We had Larry Sanger as a paid editor for many years. Moreover, this will not generate POV pushing. Why would it? We simply wouldn't allow people to post such bounties. — Matt Crypto 16:50, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: How would we know what the bounty actually entails?  It could easily be one of those situations where the ad says one thing and the job is really another, and we'd have no idea since no oversight is possible if we're not involved in the transaction. -Colin Kimbrell 17:37, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: What would be the benefit of someone doing half the deal here and the other half somewhere else? Wouldn't said person do the complete deal where we can't see it, if it were so nefarious as to be controversial? Basically, no oversight is possible. Period. -- grm_wnr Esc 17:45, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: As many security experts have noted, the illusion of safety is often more dangerous than a system with known failings.  Creating a policy like this would encourage people to think that these sorts of transactions are nothing to worry about, thus decreasing the level of healthy paranoia about questionable edits.  Also, providing a platform for prospective policy violators to more efficiently violate policy itself violates WP:BEANS. -Colin Kimbrell 17:51, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Yes, the illusion of safety is much more dangerous than a system with known failings. Hence, I say we should not pretend that people are only motivated by pure altruism and allow this page. Also, you should read BEANS more closely sometime, since it says the exact opposite of what you think it says (the BEANS interpretation of this situation is "we should not forbid paying for editing lest somebody get the idea of doing exactly that from the rule"). -- grm_wnr Esc 19:25, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No, the beans interpretation of the situation would be to create a board for pay-for-play work, then add the (absolutely necessary) lengthy disclaimers about which sorts of solicitations are not acceptable, thereby putting the idea of looking for that sort of work into people's heads in the first place. We don't need a prohibition on this either; a rejection of this proposal is not the same thing as the acceptance of a proposal banning paid contributions. -Colin Kimbrell 19:29, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

text: People also spam articles with commercial links; should we therefore create a tool for more efficient spamming on the toolserver, since it's impossible to prevent 100% of spamming?  Should the governments of the world create an assassin-for-hire system because murderers occasionally escape justice? -Colin Kimbrell 19:31, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Let's agree that BEANS is not related. As for the other point, your analogies are somewhat... besides the point. I am not saying that we should create a board where people are hired to break Wikipedia policy, as you seem to be implying. -- grm_wnr Esc 19:45, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I think the creation of "a board where people are hired to break Wikipedia policy" is the likely outcome of this policy, regardless of the intentions of its creators. -Colin Kimbrell 19:51, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  This is very unlikely. Has this happened on de:? We don't need to engage in speculations here. It's already been tried. We can witness the lack of doom and destruction on the German edition. — Matt Crypto 20:00, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

text:  How do we know that there isn't doom and destruction on German wikipedia (since most of us can't read German), and even if there hasn't been, how do we know that there won't be in the future?  You can build on a flood plain and be fine for a while, too, but that doesn't make it a good idea. -Colin Kimbrell 20:06, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

text: As it is work, I assume that taxes, social security, etc. will have to be paid (depending on your location(s)). No easy feat across international borders, in any case. User:Ejrrjs  says What? 19:07, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This, in turn, would raise issues about the anonymity of contributors and their contributions. -Colin Kimbrell 19:18, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Erm, none of this would be necessary. — Matt Crypto 20:00, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Why not?  Income is income from the IRS standpoint, isn't it? -Colin Kimbrell 20:04, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's up to the editor receiving payment to attend to his tax liabilities. — Phil Welch (t) (c) 19:48, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, if structured so that the editor receiving payment is an individual contractor this is true, at least in the U.S.  (I decline to speak to non-U.S. laws.) Individual contractor status would be fairly easy for this type of work, but we probably should have a protected terms and conditions page that an employment lawyer has drawn up.  GRBerry 16:51, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Paying individual editors 

message: That edit summary was supposed to be "I won't revert again but there seems to be pretty strong consensus that this is bad." Christopher Parham (talk) 06:42, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Reversion

message: People work on Wikipedia for all sorts of reasons, and money could be one of those motivations. I do not see why it is against the "spirit" of the project, as Ambi insists. We used to, for example, have a salaried editor-in-chief. In the open source/free software world, with which we share a similar "spirit", most contributors are indeed volunteers, yet a few people are hired to write code, and sometimes bounties are paid to add features or fix bugs and so forth. — Matt Crypto 07:24, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree, I think this could become a very good thing. I'm sure there are many poor Wikipedians; my rent is overdue right now, in fact. Editing Wikipedia is something we all love doing and I see no reason why someone shouldn't be compensated for it if somebody else who's rent isn't overdue is willing to do that. There are ways that this could be bad and conflict with WP's community, as stated above, but it could also be very good. Maybe we need to establish some guidelines. This could also be a good way to throw new users into the project and it'll almost surely get quality work done much faster than WP:BOUNTY. cookiecaper (talk / contribs) 07:34, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Moreover, if people are going to arrange to pay for Wikipedia editing of some kind, then it is much better that it be arranged on-site and thereby known to the community. — Matt Crypto 07:39, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I agree with the above and think this is an interesting idea which I'd like to be able to support. However, I share the same concerns voiced below about what this might lead to. --kingboyk 05:44, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

text: If someone wants to help Wikipedia for financial reasons then more power to them but let them go to the bounty board and do it to help the foundation.  Helping themselves off of editing Wikipedia is just selfish as well as being unwiki since it is pretty much freeloading of Wikimedia resources for their own gain and they're editing for their own profit rather than for the good of the encyclopedia.  Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 05:50, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Strongly disagree with the "freeloading" statement. The time an active editor puts into the project is way more than the resources they have used. My bill would come to thousands of dollars. Furthermore, Wikipedia content is already monetised - just look at the many mirror sites (answers.com being perhaps the most notable). --kingboyk 06:35, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

text:  I agree with what Kingboyk wrote. Moreover, for many Wikipedians, the actual financial investment in their hobby (as opposed to merely time) is larger than any bounty system could reimburse. For example, some of us spend significant amounts of money on acquiring obscure sources, or visiting sites to obtain photographs etc. Finally, gaining reward of any type from Wikipedia is emphatically not immoral ("selfish"). For example, gaining the respect of your peers is a reward, but is not selfish. Feeling good about having written a fine article is not selfish. And so forth. Most people edit Wikipedia for some mix of motivations -- and not out of pure altruism. — Matt Crypto 08:43, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Money

message: OK, I've now nominated this for deletion. Let's take the argument there. --OpenToppedBus - Talk to the driver 08:46, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Nominated for deletion

message: Added proposed template to page. In Mfd, I voted speedy keep because I do not think Wikipedia deletion process is the best method to resolve policy disputes. Concerned that the set time limit in deletion process prematurely ends the discussion before true community consensus is developed. --FloNight talk 14:38, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Proposed template

message: It's a bulletin board, nothing more. It doesn't need to go through the same process as proposed policies, and it is quite different from the other articles in that category. I believe that the proposed policy template should be removed and that the content should be restored, but I'll not do it because of the 3RR. If this is a proposed policy, WP:BOUNTY is as well and ought to be given the same treatment (that is, blanking of all bounties) until it becomes "accepted policy". Somebody else do it please. cookiecaper (talk / contribs) 19:15, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Why? cookiecaper (talk / contribs) 20:48, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: To eliminate the impression that there is anything "official" or "Wikimedia-approved" about it. --Carnildo 21:24, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Why wouldn't Wikimedia approve of its editors being paid for their contributions? cookiecaper (talk / contribs) 21:25, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Carnildo, why don't you propose a policy to ban paid-for contributions? I'm serious! Once you do that, why don't you try and remove everything Larry Sanger ever contributed? — Phil Welch (t) (c) 21:32, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Let us not forget what happened with that though, once he couldn't get paid his salary he left the project, shows how loyal and dedicated he was to the goal of a free encyclopeedia... NOT Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 21:37, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I fail to see your point. — Phil Welch (t) (c) 22:36, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: My point is that the moment the funding dried up to pay his salary he left without a look back and if this goes through we'll end up with contributors who don't care about the project.  They'll just take their money and leave since they'll have no dedication to the project itself. Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 06:45, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: OK, but those people most likely wouldn't contribute to Wikipedia without being paid in the first place. That means they aren't contributing now. So given the alternative between encouraging them to contribute and not encouraging them to contribute, you'd...not encourage them to contribute? I think it's sickening that people like you favor ideological purity over product. — Phil Welch (t) (c) 07:29, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: And I think it's sickening that your willing to sellout the project at the snap of a finger and quality to boot btw, what do you think will happen to the overall quality of articles when people get paid to make something that looks pretty but in reality could be crap and by the time someone figures it out and cleans it up the person's already gone up and split with the money.  Plus, I have no urge to edit alongside people are doing it for the money rather than for the good of the project, they are perfectly welcome to have "Paid for edis-opedia" for which I'd suggest the tagline "The free encyclopedia that you can get paid for editing". Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 07:40, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Concerning your first point about the quality of articles, has this happened on the German Wikipedia? I was under the impression that they were afflicted with rather high quality articles. You've offered neither explanation nor evidence as to why financial motivation (as opposed to any of the myriad other types of motivation on Wikipedia) will suddenly cause a sharp decline in quality. Concerning your second point, while you are entitled to your wishes about the motives of other editors, I'm afraid they must take second place behind our goal of writing a free encyclopedia. Personally, I'd like everyone I work alongside on the project to be a nice person, but -- believe it or not -- many aren't. However, we put up with them because they help us more than they hinder us. — Matt Crypto 08:37, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

text:  The point I'm trying to make is that we aren't going to get a high quality encyclopedia this way, we're gonna get crap made by people who are motiviated by their own greed rather than creating a good resource for everyone including other people and I don't have the stats on the German Wikipedia nor do I speak German (thus cannot get them myself) on the quality of the articles and trends in them before and after the creation of a way to pay contributors. Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 08:45, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I disagree with your point. Money can motivate people to produce excellent work. — Matt Crypto 16:02, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I think that it should be done off-site because I don't like the idea of creating multiple tiers of contributors here.  It'll encourage the creation of a new set of systemic biases into the article distribution, unless you think a bunch of people are going to sponsor 12th-century African leaders and such. It also creates a very problematic conflict of interest.  If you had money riding on the Featured Article status of a particular submission, could you really be trusted to make an impartial determination in FA discussions about that article (or its "competition")?  Wouldn't it create additional incentive for bad actors to run sock factories to try and game the system? If people want to set up some kind of person-to-person relationship on content outside of the site, there's nothing we can really do to influence that, but we can certainly oppose it here. -Colin Kimbrell 16:32, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Fortunately, WP:FAC is set up in such a way that it's immune to sockpuppeting. --Carnildo 18:20, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Using images on the encyclopedia to enhance articles and paying editors to edit Wikipedia are entirely different. Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 06:12, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: In both cases we're still using content that was produced for pay. It's a rather arbitrary distinction to make beyond that point. — Phil Welch (t) (c) 07:29, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, but you'll notice that people have and still are vocally resistant to the answers.com deal and I think it's a poor comparison to compare the placement of a single link on a project page and paying people for their actual contributions to articles. Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 07:41, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The distinction between the two is crucial.  Adding public domain material to the site is an act of altruism, even if that material had originally been created for pay.  Personally creating content for pay is basically structural POV-pushing with a veneer of legitimacy.  -Colin Kimbrell 16:32, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

text: This doesn't even begin to compare to the answers.com deal, since that wasn't with an independent editor who's checked by a few thousand others at least and can be slapped with a banhammer if there's anything fishy going on, but with an entity that has absolute control over anything that happens here whatsoever. -- grm_wnr Esc 16:56, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  This isn't a policy, guideline, or procedure . 

message: Assuming that this stays around, here are some ground rules that I think ought to apply:
#Bounties that are deemed contrary to Wikipedia policy may be removed by any editor, subject to the usual rules for content disputes and reversion.
#Payment is at the sole discretion of the payer. Whether the task has been completed and who completed it are facts to be determined by the payer. The poster of a bounty does not incur any actual obligation to pay anything whatsoever.
Possibly others. Christopher Parham (talk) 22:14, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Support: these those sound sensible. People taking on bounties should only do so under the understanding of your point #2, and therefore might wish to take into consideration the reputation of the payer. — Matt Crypto 08:18, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Ground rules

message: Of course the red-baiting right is all for this proposal, people who have the money to buy articles will tend to promote their view as npov. This is a farce and they know it. They're just going through the motions: commercializing the project 1 inch at a time. El_C 11:53, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The "this will piss off the socialists/commies" comments on the MfD are very lame, but there's not a risk of a slippery slope here, intentional or otherwise. The only bounties that would stand for even a minute here are those that are evidently harmless. For example, I'd quite like to have some diagrams made for certain cryptography pages. If I can't convince anyone to get round to it on Requests for Images, I wouldn't mind paying someone for their trouble. This is the sort of thing that this page is for, and anything with a whiff of monetary coercion for a POV will get stamped on quickly, even by the supports of this page. — Matt Crypto 14:11, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm not confident that these sort of slippery slope instances could be easily identified by many here, since I'm thinking about more systemic and subtle trends as opposed to the more obvious cases. I have no issue with you offering someone $20 to do this or that if the notice is placed on the Wikipedia:WikiProject Cryptography, WP:VP, or WP:RA, but I have great concern in institutionalizing the practice of hire-for-pay on Wikipedia. The AfD might have been ill-advised (I, at least, refrained from voting), but I do not see this policy meeting consensus, although, I do see it ratified & expedited by the higher ups via a majority vote as a real, and disturbing possibility. El_C 19:58, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's not a policy, it's a noticeboard. — Phil Welch (t) (c) 05:36, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Uhuh. El_C 07:00, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Since when aren't we allowed to make playful jabs at the other side in deletion arguments? — Phil Welch (t) (c) 19:45, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Of ocurse you are permitted to demonstrate that your proposals are divisive. This is not a deletion argument; and the assumptions that Wikipedia has two sides, and that proposals are ideological, are throughly undesirable. Septentrionalis 20:55, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Most of the opposition to this proposal is ideological. — Phil Welch (t) (c) 21:23, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thinking that opposition is limited to offending abstract ideals unrelated to future problems, is ideological just the same. El_C 18:47, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Money pov

message: What problem is this supposed to fix, exactly? Herostratus 21:52, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Wikipedian poverty, of course! But this isn't particularly a problem-fixing proposal, exactly, unless you can view it somehow as part of the general problem of how we motivate and reward editors. No, this would simply be useful, to a small extent. — Matt Crypto 23:24, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I have to agree with the dog (see photo on right) on this one that this was a bad choice from the get go and should be abandoned. Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 07:24, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Reasoning is better than assertion. — Matt Crypto 17:25, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Well, not sure if anything else is thinking this, but it could be used to chip away at the chronic maintenence backlogs. We have tens of thousands of orphaned, deadend, uncategorized and articles needing cleanup, wikification, verification, context, etc. Probably 10-20% of our million articles need basic maintenence performed. So it would be interesting if you could get payed $10 to say, properly categorize 100 articles, or $5 to go address 10 articles that need updating or context added. Honestly I don't see those backlogs ever getting dealt with considering the current level of interest in maintenence. --W.marsh 15:31, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Oh and what about having a full time staff, earning several 1000s USD a months, paying their taxes, with their labour rights guarantees and doing a professional work with the proper (verified) credentials...? Too late, it's called Britannica :-Z User:Ejrrjs  says What? 17:52, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I wasn't aware that the idea of a well-maintained encyclopedia was so controversial! --W.marsh 01:07, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the controversy is about that nickel-and-dime, piecemeal payments proposed seem like an effort to spread a Ferengi-like culture within Wikipedia, at odds with the altruistic or barn-raising ideals that  the project is supposedly based on.  Someone getting $5 to update 10 articles is getting a fraction of minimum wage, so the money is meaningless--you get the bad effects of monetizing what used to be volunteer work, without  doing anything about editor poverty.  The kinds of tasks you're suggesting paying for, if they need to be paid for, could more beneficially be handled by a staff editor tasked with such things and getting a livable salary, just like Brion is getting a salary for maintaining the servers.  Alternatively we could have some sprints at events like Wikimania where editors would get together in person and knock off those tasks collaboratively. Phr 19:34, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well I am talking about backlogs of thousands of articles... with hundreds added every week. Even if a quickie effort cleared the log it would be back in a month. The bottom line is that the volunteer system doesn't seem to be effectively dealing with these problems, for a variety of reasons. It's also important to realize that this would just be supplimental income for the participants, and systems like this have been shown to work, e.g. Google Answers. A staff editor is another way to do it, but this is less formal and possibly more cost effective, I think. People will hapilly do some quality, finite work for a small bounty, if they can do it freelance and on their own terms. This is all hypothetical of course, I really doubt people'd be putting up a lot of bounties like this, but it would nice if some random millionare decided to finance it! --W.marsh 17:03, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Phr, I think that of all commentators you have offered the most interesting critique of the project. You're perfectly right that we're talking about paying people a pittance - I've compared it to poker-for-pennies or Amazon Mechanical Turk. I'd like to know more, in terms as concrete as possible, about what you consider to be the harmful effect of monetizing. Haukur 20:18, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  What problem is this supposed to fix??? 

message: Who is going to pay apart from people with a biased agenda to promote? How many people would be driven away by the mere existence of it? Most likely many. You couldn't trust any Wikipedia article if you knew it might have been paid for by a politician, corporation or publicist. Wikipedia woudl degenerate into a compendium of press releases before it died altogether because no one wanted to visit any more so there was no longer an audience for people to pay to get in front of. Sumahoy 03:36, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There's many legitimate reasons to pay people. Chiefly, if you don't have a specific ability: for example, to create diagrams, or to speak a foreign language (for translation requests), or photography, or to be able to write good English, and so forth. Moreover, and this bears repeating, we simply wouldn't allow any bounties that promoted a biased agenda. Regarding the issue of trust, we have Wikipedia articles on, I dunno, say, mormonism and abortionism, even though they have been edited by mormons and pro-life/pro-choice people, right? Why would people trust Wikipedia articles any less if they knew someone had edited it who was merely being paid for it? — Matt Crypto 09:13, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

text: So you would let that happen? Interesting. Actually, the existence of this board means you know EXACTLY who paid for what. It increases transparency, it doesn't reduce it. On the other hand, when paid PR teams edit Wikipedia on company time, no one is the wiser unless some serious CheckUser is done. — Phil Welch (t) (c) 20:38, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: This is a terrible idea

message: I find the hyberbolic levels the opposition to this poliy has risen to rather humorous. Not intending to be offensive to those that oppose, but come on people. The same things were said about Linux and other open source software. There are many, if not hundreds of people paid to work on the Linux kernel. Has the claimed doom and gloom occured? Is the Linux kernel worse off or rather better? More than that, the people claiming doom and gloom should back it up with evidence from how this worked on the German Wikipedia. Find someone that is active in it there and have them summarize how it's going. But other than that, improved articles are improved articles whether the work was paid for or not, so there's nothing wrong with this going ahead just like any other Wikiproject. The people that want to do it, do it, and those that don't can work on something else, or monitor for any percieved ills and correct them. - Taxman Talk 14:23, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Not to insult the intelligence of those who support (hyper-amusingly & otherwise), but Linux does not involve pov content, it is code.  El_C 17:55, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Don't forget though that if there are more 1's than 0's in the binary version of the kernal code then it's POV against the 0's. Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 18:33, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No. - FrancisTyers 18:53, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

text: So all other printed reference works are worthless because they were paid for too and can involve a POV? - Taxman Talk 18:58, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No. - El_C 19:27, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

text: You should grep through the source for comments some time. Definitely POV, definitely not safe for polite company. --Kickstart70-T-C 19:32, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: That [heated] debate did not involve encyclopedia entries, it involved linux. El_C 19:41, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Right, and this issue doesn't have anything to do with Linux either, so why did you add to the metaphorical discussion which included it? --Kickstart70-T-C 17:56, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I presume the reason people bring up Linux is because of the ideological objections about the "spirit" of the project. Since Wikipedia's license and development model, and (arguably) spirit, has much in common with free software, it's not unreasonable to consider how bounties work in free software. — Matt Crypto 16:31, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Linux 

message: What do you all think of this format, and do you think we should insist bounties by posted according to some protocol as RfAs, etc. are?
FYI, this isn't real. It's only an example. Don't expect me to pay it, because I can't.
===Wikipedia:Now Hiring===
description Now Hiring needs a lot of help. There are a lot of people spewing hyperbole that it'll destroy Wikipedia. These people are wrong. $20 US to whoever doesn't suck. sig cookiecaper (talk / contribs) 02:45, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Needs expiration date. Since this is a contract really, it needs more detail who can claim, how determined, when it could be rescinded, etc etc. But general idea is good. Renata 17:11, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  What's been proposed above, and what is in practice on the German Wikipedia, is that the person offering the bounty chooses whether or not the bounty is paid. I think we'd do well to use that principle. — Matt Crypto 17:23, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposed format 

message: description Now Hiring needs a lot of help. There are a lot of people spewing hyperbole that it'll destroy Wikipedia. These people are wrong. $20 US to whoever doesn't suck. sig cookiecaper (talk / contribs) 02:45, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Needs expiration date. Since this is a contract really, it needs more detail who can claim, how determined, when it could be rescinded, etc etc. But general idea is good. Renata 17:11, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  What's been proposed above, and what is in practice on the German Wikipedia, is that the person offering the bounty chooses whether or not the bounty is paid. I think we'd do well to use that principle. — Matt Crypto 17:23, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: [[Wikipedia:Now Hiring]]

message: Since it was kept per MfD, what are the reasons not to go live? Renata 17:52, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: the reasoning behind why it was kept on MFD was mainly due to the fact that nobody could agree on it's status and many people voted ot keep assuming it was a proposal (a fact that's disputed).  It still needs support though which it being kept on MFD is not an endorsement of and it does not have, if you'll see from this talk page there is strong opposition to this. Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 18:00, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There is also strong support for this. --Kickstart70-T-C 18:02, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Whoa, no. The MfD was, if nothing else, endorsement of keeping this as an example of a bad idea. It should not "go live" until consensus is established here, which from the looks of it won't be happening any time soon. --W.marsh 18:03, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't believe 100% consensus is a requirement, though. Some people will stick to their preference in the face of overwhelming evidence opposing it, in any issue. --Kickstart70-T-C 18:12, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Until there is policy forbidding it, I believe we should carry on with it. Given that Wikipedia has had paid editors in the past (Sanger), I'm afraid it's up to those opposing to establish a consensus against the proposal. — Matt Crypto 06:51, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed. — Phil Welch (t) (c) 06:52, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You can't compare this proposal with the Sanger situation and therefore claim that this is nothing new. There's a huge difference between someone paid by the Wikipedia foundation and someone paid by other Wikipedians. --OpenToppedBus - Talk to the driver 10:49, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  The principle, however, of people being paid to edit has precedent. Until there's policy forbidding it, I see no reason why this page shouldn't go live. If you think about it, we have much more right to have a say in how the Wikimedia Foundation spends its money than we have to try and dictate how individual Wikipedians should spend their money, and here the latter is suggested, not the former. — Matt Crypto 10:55, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I, on the other hand, believe that allowing this is a fundamental change in policy, and would argue strongly that there needs to be consensus in favour before it goes live. Since it looks from the strawpoll that we're not going to get 75% either way (at the time of writing it's 10 support, 14 oppose) we have an impasse, and I don't know how to resolve it. --OpenToppedBus - Talk to the driver 11:03, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  How about we trial it for a couple of weeks (or whatever), and then reevaluate whether there are any pragmatic problems? Of course, that won't really appeal to the people who are opposed on ideological grounds, but I have to confess I'm really struggling to understand where they're coming from on this. — Matt Crypto 15:57, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Going live

message: Do you Support, Oppose, or Abstain this proposal? Please don't answer with some other choice so we can get this to a resolution, but feel free to add comments to your strawpoll vote. --Kickstart70-T-C 18:01, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Strawpoll 

message: #Support: No one has yet come up with a logical reason why this would cause POV edits, which appears to be the main contention. The usual requirements for a Wikipedia entry apply, and offers of money for things that violate Wikipedia policy are opposed by everyone involved in this debate so far, and would be quashed as they came up. In addition, this has worked with the German Wikipedia without any of the negatives that opponents have claimed will happen. Therefore I put my support behind this. --Kickstart70-T-C 18:01, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Support

message: #Strong Oppose This is overall a bad idea since editors should be in it for the love of the project not for money and for the fact that this will just lead to people getting paid for POV edit wars which is an extremely bad thing. Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 18:06, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Oppose

message: #Abstain - this proposal isn't ready for implementation. There needs to be some established sort of structure to how someone offers a reward and how someone goes about claiming it. BigBlueFish 21:59, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Abstain

message: It seems to me that offers like the following would be harmless:
:I offer 10 GBP to any editor who brings the Orkneys article up to featured article standard. I reserve the right to cancel or withdraw this offer at any time for any reason including but not limited to the use of undesirable methods on the part of editors involved in the required work or disapproval of the board of the Wikimedia Foundation. Judgment of how, when and to whom the payment should be made, if at all, resides solely with myself. If more than one editor does a substantial amount of work I may decide to split the sum between them. The Wikimedia Foundation does not bear any responsibility for any part of this offer and does not endorse it in any way. Nor does any other person or organization.
I appreciate that people can legitimately be concerned about offers of larger sums to work on articles where a corporation could possibly gain significant promotion by having an article on itself or one of its products as a featured article. Perhaps this is something that should be discussed more on the FAC level. In the past people have objected to articles on things like Pokémon characters or computer games on the grounds that be featuring them on the main page Wikipedia is promoting the products. Even if such an article is completely neutral and includes criticism of its subject the very presence of it as a featured article would probably constitute net gain for the company in question. I'm not overly concerned about large corporations like Microsoft, where any Wikipedia attention is an insignificant fragment of the firm's total PR campaign. But small, yet notable, corporations could hypothetically get a significant publicity boost from appearing on Wikipedia's main page and its list of featured articles.
I think this is something to ponder irrespective of the present discussion on bounties. I don't think it's a serious problem, though, and I don't think it will spell doom for the project. Haukur 18:17, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: When you say that you can revoke paying for any reason that includes the article not fitting your POV which again is another way that this is gonna become a POV pushing tool. Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 18:21, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: If they revoke it because it doesn't fit their POV, that really does mean that Wikipedia has done its job: the article has improved, yet it doesn't support any side's bias. --Kickstart70-T-C 18:24, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  But the general threat of it being revoked if it doesn't meet their POV is still usable as a POV pushing tool. JoshuaZ 18:34, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Poeple, where is your 'assume good faith'? WP was not supposed to work at all, and here - it works! This is not supposed to work, but here - it works in Germany! Everything can be used for evil purposes, but does that mean it will be? I say, give it a test run, for a week or two. I am sure no atomic bombs will explode. Renata 18:46, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Good point. Existing 'guideline' link: Wikipedia:Assume good faith. --Kickstart70-T-C 18:50, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  WP:AGF applies to individual editors. It doesn't mean we need to make mechanism that make systematic POV pushing easier. And as I said in the strawpoll, we have heard very little from German editors to know how well it has worked there. JoshuaZ 18:53, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Right now, if someone wants to push their POV, they can do it themselves, or hire someone to do it without anyone on this site knowing about it. By making this mechanism we open this up to full view and accountability. Not only do I think this needs to be done, I think it needs to be handled on Wikipedia where we all can watch it and take care of it in an open and democratic fashion. --Kickstart70-T-C 19:01, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Luckily AGF only applies to editors not to ill thought out schemes to pay editors, and I say that with all due respect to whoever thought up this idea.Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 20:47, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

text:  I'm sorry, I just don't see how this would make us any more vulnerable to POV pushing than we already are. If someone wanted to get their POV into a featured article, wouldn't they, er, just try and write it in themselves? Why would they go to the expense of spending money to try and get someone to do it for them through a Bounty Board which would be watched like a hawk by dozens of highly-suspicious Wikipedia admins? If you want to push a POV, you want to be sneaky about it.— Matt Crypto 16:09, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's buying an ally for the revert war. Septentrionalis 21:41, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  And would be spotted in an instant. — Matt Crypto 06:33, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sample offer 

message: As Angela pointed out, Wikimedia Foundation isn't hiring. Your fellow editors are. I think "Paid editor job board" is a good name, don't you? — Phil Welch (t) (c) 19:52, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sounds reasonable :) --Kickstart70-T-C 19:57, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Certainly an improvement, although I'm not sure if people would necessarily want to be implicitly labeled as "paid editors." But the avoid the possibility of multiple moves, any changes should probably be held off until debates on whether to keep the proposal have wrapped up. Tijuana Brass¡Épa!-E@ 22:37, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I don't really like this name or the old one... but I can't think of anything dramatically better as of yet. Wikipedia:Editors for Hire? Meh. --W.marsh 01:11, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I think it would be better, if it is accepted, to just incorporate it as a subpage of the bounty board: "/Editor bounties" vs. "/Foundation bounties". They are both in the same general family. Christopher Parham (talk) 04:59, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd support that, especially since the current name has too much monetary connotations - I'd imagine this not only useful for real cash bounties, but also for editing tradeoffs (like the German implementation is mostly used, e.g. "get article x featured and I'll destub 10 articles in category y"), or for "get me something off my Amazon wishlist", or "I'll send you one of my prize-winning homemade cupcakes" type arrangements, which I personally prefer to cold, hard money anyway. :) -- grm_wnr Esc 12:14, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

text:  I prefer "Editor bounties" to "Paid editor job board". — Matt Crypto 16:12, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  "Editor bounties" sounds good to me, too.  And I don't see why the current bounty board can't just be re-worked to include both.--ragesoss 22:09, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the suggestion "reward board" below works quite well. Editor bounties or a reworking of the bounty board would be ok as well. Dislike the current title a lot. BigBlueFish 08:10, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rename 

message: Phil, I see you added a mention of the FSF hiring programmers.  I think you got that info from my oppose vote.  Could you please add the rest of the description, namely that being a full-time employee of the FSF has no resemblance at all to being offered 10 or 20 dollars to do some isolated task, which is what this proposal seems to be (going by the scale of rewards offered on the bounty board and on the German page--the German payments are referred to as "Kopfgeld" which also means bounty).   The FSF salary made it possible to cover your living expenses while working there, so that you could quit your day job and devote all your energy to free software (or docs, I should have mentioned that, the FSF also hired doc writers), which you couldn't afford to do without a salary.  If you were already making a living some other way that you weren't willing to give up, the FSF wasn't interested in offering supplemental part-time income--that's what Ebay is for.  The bounties and rewards that I see becoming available here aren't remotely enough to make a living; they'd basically just be symbolic and cater to mercenary fantasies that I don't wish to encourage.
Also, most FSF staff worked in FSF office space--a few worked remotely but IMO that didn't work out as well.  So an FSF job was like any other: you were expected to show up at work and get stuff done every day, and to some extent, the tasks you did were the things that couldn't easily be done by volunteers.  So whatever it is you're trying to say about Larry Sanger or the FSF, I don't think it supports your conclusion.  The Wikimedia foundation does in fact employ some people--Danny and Brion and maybe some others--and will presumably hire some more (technical, admin, editorial, or whatever) as WP keeps expanding even if it's not doing so at this moment.  That's the type of position Larry Sanger's old job, or FSF staff jobs, should be compared with.  If you want to fund such hiring, it's better to donate to WMF through the usual channels.
I'd possibly be more supportive of creating some real paid editorships, i.e. I might contribute to a fund to hire someone to edit full time for a minimum of 3 months, hopefully getting some substantial project done in that time.  Summer is coming and maybe some Wikipedian currently in college would be interested in such a gig.  Phr 00:17, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You are of course free to continue drawing pointless distinctions. — Phil Welch (t) (c) 04:14, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Since I don't see anyone objecting to the FSF or WMF hiring full-time staff members, but most participants in the strawpoll so far oppose the current proposal, I think the community mostly does not share your opinion that the distinction is pointless.  Perhaps that's a sign that you're not thinking it through.  Phr 11:49, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No, I think it says more about the people opposing this proposal than it says about me. Some people are more prone to fallacious thinking than others. — Phil Welch (t) (c) 14:05, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: OK, time out, you two. As with an awful lot of tricky issues, there are perfectly valid arguments on both sides of this proposal. I'm not sure whether we'll ever reach consensus on this issue, but we certainly won't do so if we start out by insulting each other's intelligence or powers of reasoning. --OpenToppedBus - Talk to the driver 15:42, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I'll second that (Hypocrite warning: I've also been rude on this page, which I regret. Let's disagree with civility, even if we've strong feelings one way or the other.) — Matt Crypto 16:21, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  re: FSF example 

message: How about just changing the name to "Rewards board"? Make it explicitly non-exclusively monetary. E.g. the reward could be almost anything; books, cookies, editing-in-kind, money, postcards, a subscription to a journal, anything. - FrancisTyers 19:04, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: As I've said above, I'm all for it. -- grm_wnr Esc 19:46, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I strongly support this suggestion. It needs a name-change; it currently still implies employment, or regular payments being made, whereas this is about random spontaneous individual rewards. Rewards board is catchy. BigBlueFish 22:09, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Name change

message: As Wikipedia:Requests for comment/United States Congress shows us, even congressional staffers in the United States federal government have spent time "on the job" trying to skew Wikipedia.
Isn't there currently only one known case of editing being done "on the job", as opposed to people merely doing their own thing while at work? Andjam 06:56, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well this kinda thing is hard to document, you know. But there was certainly a spyware IM client that had an article up for months, written by the company, and it was finally revealed that they were bragging about using WP for free advertising. So there's definently more than one case. Bodog for example, too, I personally got a message on my talk page from the company VP that he had had a staff writer rewrite the article I'd copyvio'd, and apologizing that the initial version he had had posted wasn't acceptable... which was kind of disturbing. I've seen publicists and agents blatently adding fluff for their aspiring model and actor clients. It does happen, and it happens a lot. --W.marsh 13:25, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Congressional edits 

message: In essence, this board is a project of WP community, very similar to Esperanza or Counter Vandalism Unit. And since when these projects need straw pools to begin? Did Esperanza or CVU had straw pools? No. Did Bouty board had straw pool? No. So why here? Ok, the topic is controversial and there is a lot of opposition, so we have a straw pool. OK. But then it should be a consensus to oppose to terminate the project because the default is that similar projects are up and running as long as someone wants them. No? Renata 11:32, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Straw poll, I think ;-) But I agree with you. Presumably those opposing might argue that it's such a radical page that the opposite is true; i.e., we need a consensus to set it up, but I simply don't think that's the case. If the German Wikipedia experience is anything to go by, then it's hardly going to radically change anything about how Wikipedia works. Still, because it's controversial, I'd propose activating it for a trial period. — Matt Crypto 11:44, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  As Matt Crypto said, because this is a huge departure from the standard way of doing things I think any activation even a trial one requires consensus, I also think that CVU is a bad example since even though there was some objection to it it was only after it's adoption that people objected not before or during it's creation. Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 19:58, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Straw pool for WP project?

message: I think it would also be useful to have a section for requests for funding, e.g. "I'd like £20 towards purchasing this source in order to improve the article on X". The payment could be in advance or after the article is improved, or the benefactor could purchase the item for the requester, and so forth. — Matt Crypto 07:24, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Aghr... Let's just focus on first on "regular bounties." If they work, we could try this too. One step at a time, please. Renata 13:04, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I think this is a good idea, but one definitely outside the scope of this proposal. How about creating an additional proposal for this (and let me know where it is, so I can vote in the strawpoll ;-) --Kickstart70-T-C 16:52, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

text: "What does 'Computational and evolutionary aspects of language' in Nature (416), 2002 say about 'Cultural evolution of language with constant universal grammar'?"
And someone with access to that article could post an answer. Obviously taking copyright into account. - FrancisTyers 22:03, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Requests for funding

message: After a week, the poll was 30/20 in favor of support. Since a sizable majority actually favor this proposal, there's clearly  no consensus against it. So we're underway. Incidentally, I'm also taking the initiative to move this to "Rewards Board" as previously discussed. — Phil Welch (t) (c) 23:29, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: WTF? 'No consensus against it'? Since when did we initiate new processes with 'no consensus against them'? If there is no consensus, then we keep talking until such times as there is. --Doc ask? 23:41, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This isn't a process, it's a noticeboard. Bounty board didn't gather a consensus in favor of itself before starting, and neither has any Wikiproject. Consensus would only come into play if, say, you tried to ban or regulate rewarding editors, which would be a new policy, and you would have to have consensus in favor of that policy. — Phil Welch (t) (c) 23:44, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Exactly. Nobody has to get involved with bounties if they don't want to, unlike policy. — Matt Crypto 23:46, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I agree, and brave move. Still, I predict great fiery brouhaha about whether this needs consensus to go ahead, or whether it needs consensus to be blocked. I'm ever hopeful: perhaps critics could agree to come back in, I dunno, a month and evaluate whether it's indeed as terrible a thing as they feared? — Matt Crypto 23:45, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, if you are going to try this. And I still say you've no consensus to do so, please let's make it very clear that this is in effect a bullitin board and is not in any sense 'official' or sanctioned or approved by wikipedia or the WMF. --Doc ask? 00:03, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Some disclaimer would be good. I'd be quite happy to have a statement saying that it had not been sanctioned or approved by the WMF — that's perfectly accurate. I'm not sure it would be true for "Wikipedia", in the sense that at least some of the community (maybe even a "majority", judging by the poll) support it. — Matt Crypto 00:07, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sure, but it isn't official. It isn't policy. It may have a majority support, but we don't adopt 'official' processes on mere majorities. Anyway, we are haggling over words - the main thing is to say that there is no official encoragement (or discouragement) of offering or seeking rewards -  and it is, and remains, an arrangement between parties concerned - so don't bother e-mailing wikipedia if you don't like the outcome of any transaction, and don't try to use our dispute resolution mechanisms to settle or enforce any understandings reached. --Doc ask? 00:28, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Yup, OK, sounds sensible. — Matt Crypto 00:35, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Let's do it

message: After re-evaluating my previous stance on this I don't see why we can't at least give it a trial run (I'm assuming that's what it'll be), I've even put up a post and am willing to pay my own money to get Megatokyo up to featured.  The great thing about this though is that anyone who gets one of these requests can actually get more than one at once.  For example if someone completes mine they get also have completed Philwelch's as well as my bounty board post (meaning I owe $50 do the foundation) so it's a reward for them and the foundation. Pegasus1138Talk | Contribs | Email ---- 00:30, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Okay 

message: Per the discussion two headers above, it's clear that those in favor of a cash incentive program are currently outweighing those against it (at least out of the editors who participated in the straw poll). I'll concede that willingly, but I want to underline how important I feel it is to include a notice that rewards/cash/whatever are in no way connected to the Wikimedia Foundation at the top of the page. That way there'll be no misunderstanding that any payment comes from a private individual or party — a clarification not so much for the editors who'll take up the work, but for outsiders who could potentially misinterpret who's footing the bill. Tijuana Brass¡Épa!-E@ 04:37, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: K. I've added a note to that effect. — Phil Welch (t) (c) 06:37, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks Phil. Well written. Now, onto another potential issue (listed below)... Tijuana Brass¡Épa!-E@ 07:19, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Disaffiliation with WMF 

message: I have to take issue with reverting this back without further discussion. I won't add to that, but I do find that not allowing this to go through for reasons that Ambi you never articulated why you're against is a bit heavy handed. No other volunteer process that doesn't relate to deletion, etc, needs consensus to go forth. After the FAQ was up and discussion had developed the recent votes were something like 10-3 in favor of the proposal. This is not a policy that will be enforced. It's just something some people want to try. Deciding that there has to be a consensus to go forward is not right. - Taxman Talk 04:48, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Indeed. There's no consensus for Ambi's reversions.— Phil Welch (t) (c) 06:42, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  The reverts 

message: Another thing came to mind concerning potential legal issues. While I recognize that payments offered here can take a number of forms, many unique (i.e. Phil Welch's offer of a limerick... and who could turn that down?), there should probably be a guideline created to prevent things which would create legal (and possibly ethical) problems. While Wikipedia is very much a worldwide project and is not bound by the laws of any particular country — I think — it would be wise to avoid any future problems by prohibiting some forms of payment... i.e. narcotics, sex, etc. I realize there may be some subjectivity to this, but leaving it wide open is just asking for serious problems, not to mention an early end to a project that I know many have taken an interest in. Any suggestions? Perhaps a starting point would be to prohibit payments of goods or services which are outlawed in the country of origin of the offering party, the responding editor's origin, and the countries which host the Wikimedia servers (to prevent lawsuits which could arise over facilitating such an exchange). Tijuana Brass¡Épa!-E@ 07:26, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't disagree with you, but my instinct would be to postpone crafting complex sets of rules until people actually start doing silly things like offering narcotics or sex etc, both to avoid instruction creep and WP:BEANS. If it does happen, we can use common sense to remove such bounties. — Matt Crypto 08:11, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Isn't this website bound under the laws of the United States?  That's where Wikipedia Foundation and this English Wikipedia originates, right -- Florida?  20:35, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Regulation of  payments 

message: The FAQ above says: "In particular, it could be used to help combat systemic bias. Bounties could be set to encourage work in areas that Wikipedia currently covers poorly". 
If there's no defined formula to which articles are chosen, then there will be a lot of articles picked that don't match this desire.
We need to encourage work on articles that Wikipedia covers poorly. Otherwise the perception that Wikipedia is just good for a few science and nerdy articles will be increased.
I suggest targeting some articles.
#Benin    
#Burkina Faso
#Burundi    
#Cameroon
#Central African Republic
#Chad        
#Comoros    
#Congo Democratic Republic
#Congo Republic
#Côte d'Ivoire
#Ethiopia
#Gambia
#Georgia
#Guinea
#Guinea Bissau
#Kyrgyzstan
#Madagascar
#Malawi    
#Mali
#Mozambique
#Burma AKA Myanmar
#Niger
#Papua New Guinea
#Suriname
#Tajikistan
#Tanzania
#Togo
#Turkmenistan
#Western Sahara
The above list was compiled by Ethan Zuckerman - and it's of the most under-represented countries. If these countries could be targeted, then a lot of Wikipedia's short-comings could be reduced. In relation to the countries listed, I'm talking about these articles:
*History of x
*Politics of x
*States and territories of x
*Foreign relations  of x
*Geography  of x
*Flora and fauna of x
*Economy of x
*Demographics of x
*Languages of x
*Culture of x
Given Wikipedia's general antipathy towards experts, the Reward Board may become vital to get them to contribute to Wikipedia. After all, what expert would want to contribute to Wikipedia when he will probably be reverted by a 14 year old a few minutes later. Being paid for the edit would lessen the irritation a bit.
-Xed 11:37, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Added Languages of X. — mark ✎ 12:25, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Targeting 

message: I'd like to attempt to get consensus on one of the guidelines I suggested earlier.  I'm hoping to do this one-at-a-time.  I suggest the following guideline:
*Users who are offering or fulfilling a reward request on an article should not support or oppose administrative actions on that article, particularly WP:AFD and WP:FAC.  Comments should be prefaced with a statement of reward involvement.
Obviously, if you're paying me to bring an article to FA status, I have a strong incentive to see that it becomes a featured article, and you have a strong incentive to see that it doesn't ("Nope, sorry, keep improving it").  I think that this is a very common-sense guideline, and I'm probably going to suggest it on Wikipedia:Bounty board too. -- Creidieki 12:44, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The restriction on administrative actions makes sense, but I think using Featured Article status could be a problem. The "Featured Article" process on Wikipedia is rather politicised and argumentative. There is also a very high barrier for achieving Featured Article status. I can imagine someone working for hours on an article, only for that article to miss Featured Article status by one vote. The editor would be resentful, and why make encourage resentfulness when someone is prepared to do so much work? Therefore I would suggest lowering the barrier, and using good article as the main quality target. Or at least having two separate bounties, say $30 for Good and $50 for Featured. - Xed 14:25, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The question of bounty design is kind of separate from this guideline proposal.  Featured Articles bounties certainly aren't the only type possible, and may not always be the best type.  But the guideline doesn't speak on that at all.  It simply says that if there *is* a Featured Article bounty on an articles, the offerer and fulfiller can't vote in the FA discussion. -- Creidieki 15:07, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, I agree with that.  - Xed 15:11, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think WP:GA is a good target for a reward. Only one person is needed to promote the article. I think disallowing voting is a good idea, though of course they should be permitted to make comments, since consensus discussion is an important part of Wikipedia. BigBlueFish 15:48, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I think people should declare any bounty involvement on FAC, just like if you're a primary author ("self-nom" etc...). I'm not sure about forbidding votes, though. For example, we don't (AFAIK?) forbid votes from co-authors, some of whom may have a similar drive to get it featured. The very wise FA director can use common sense when counting bounty votes on FAC. — Matt Crypto 18:24, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Suggested guideline to avoid bias 

message: Okay, I've read this page a few times now, and each time it's bugged me. Shoudn't the person offering the reward be called the "offerer", not the "requestor"? I know that they're requesting something done, but this board is a list of rewards, and the relationship between the reward and the author isn't requesting. Any objections if I change the current list? BigBlueFish 15:54, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No objection! --Kickstart70-T-C 15:56, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Naming style 

message: One of the things that worried people about this idea is that it risked opening up the project to bias in some way - one way around this, especially if substantial rewards are available or if substantial work was done in the hope of receiving a reward, would be appropriate templates to place in the talk page. This would increase the amount of openness in the process. Does anybody else agree?TheGrappler 20:46, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There was a discussion about it at Wikipedia talk:Bounty board#Template. Another problem really is that a number of rewards are for a group of articles ("anything related to medicine") so you cannot have templates on all medicine-related articles. However, I see nothing wrong with posting a little note on WikiProject's, Portal's, or Notice Board's talk page. Renata 21:06, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Speaking about notices, I put one on WP:CBB. Renata 21:51, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Since the actual giving out of a reward will presumably be linked to work on a particular page, perhaps that would be a cue to include a template saying "User:Blah received a reward of $50 from User:Foo and €30 from User:FooToo for bringing this article to featured status"... and if a request is available for a specific page only, a notice saying "A reward of $30 has been offered by User:Moneybags for bringing this article to featured status; for more information, see WP:RB". I agree that in a lot of cases it would be problematic or just plain overkill ("User:RewardSeeker received a personally dedicated rude limerick from User:PoeticMischief for bringing this article to featured status") but in some cases it would probably be a good idea to be more open. TheGrappler 18:07, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

text: It would seem to me that bounty offerers would naturally want to mention the bounty on the talk page anyway, in order to increase the chances of finding a taker. — Matt Crypto 18:25, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Talk page notices 

message: It looks like there's no agreed order to the entries on the Board. People are adding entries to both the top and the bottom. The bounty board uses alphabetical order, but that's based on article titles, and the entries here have more creative titling. Maybe newest should go first, to make it easier for people following the list. Sound fair? If so, I'll rearrange the current list based on history. BigBlueFish 11:13, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Please do! It would also be useful, I think, if each bounty was also marked with the date it was listed, so people can spot ancient bounties and perhaps ping the requester before accepting it etc. — Matt Crypto 18:20, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Done. I also added a little guideline section about posting rewards. BigBlueFish 22:35, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Order 

message: When I went to de:Wikipedia:Auftragsarbeiten to see if they were linking to this page as an alternative language, I found that it already links to the Bounty board and the Bounty board links back to it. I don't speak a word of German, so how similar are the two? Does the German version combine both private gifts and donations to the Foundation? Or maybe the mutual linking was only because they were the only close equivalents. Somebody German please enlighten us! BigBlueFish 22:55, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Mmh, it's not really similar but the idea is the same: at the german site you will not find any donations of money for articles. The site now runs for nearly a year and it is one result, that those donations like tit-for-tat or translations, where the Donator writes another article for one of his choice as payment, are the best working fields. Greetings from germany -- Achim Raschka 09:58, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Equivalence to [[de:Wikipedia:Auftragsarbeiten]] 

message: I have to say I was very surprised to find this at WP:SIGN. It's very similar to the offer I have at my wiki of US$5 for a 200 word article. Great minds think alike. Gerard Foley 23:21, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  I have this 

message: In addition to have people request the completion of a project and offer a reward, we could also allow people to offer the completion of a project and request a reward. A little bit similar to my now long defunct Free Software Bazaar. Cheers, AxelBoldt 16:27, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Now that is against WP spirit. Renata 16:39, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Somebody mentioned requesting things like reference books in order to improve articles. That might be acceptable... saying "I'll work on this article if you give me money" isn't. If somebody thinks they have a valid proposal, how about they bring it up here and we'll see whether it should start a new part of the board. BigBlueFish 17:13, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Agreed. Reliable sources can often be expensive to get hold of, yet we demand editors cite them. It's not in any way a moral failing to ask for financial assistance for that sort of thing. — Matt Crypto 21:50, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

text: In one sense, no, but perhaps the typical motivation would be different. I don't think it matters enough that we have to ban requests for rewards or anything; people are likely to be put off by overly-mercenary posts. — Matt Crypto 15:12, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Allowing proposals in addition to requests? 

message: I reorganized the requests based on award type, as I imagine this list is eventually going to get quite long, and people coming here might only want to look at requests offering money or requests offering edits (tit for tat), etc. This way, people who come here looking for reward opportunities can hopefully find what they are looking for quickly. For example if some impoverished teenager in South Africa decides that he wants to make a living by writing Wikipedia articles, he can come here, jump to the Money section, find a few articles of interest, go to the library, write some articles, and collect his payment. Of course such a techno-utopian wet dream may be absurd, but at least now it's possible :) How do other people feel about this kind of organization? Kaldari 20:09, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's good, just don't re-organize it again :) Renata 20:34, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed :). Although I do think the idea of anyone earning a living off these things certainly far-fetched! Half of the current requests are pretty difficult to fulfil, and I make the board total $209 at the moment. BigBlueFish 10:52, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think we should organize by topic type...just a thought. --Osbus 22:34, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: If the board got a lot larger then this might be something to consider. The problem with categorising by topic is that Wikipedia is very broad. Even with liberal categorisation you would only be able to find a couple of offers that come under the same category. There also have to be a good number of rewards for someone to come here with a certain topic in mind. For now, this order works best. BigBlueFish 12:55, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

text: One additional possibility would be to organize by reward type and then by expiration date. My offer on Nazanin is about to expire, but it's a little hidden. Maybe someone has a better way to handle the expirations? --Kickstart70-T-C 23:59, 8 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think it's a bit unrealistic to expect people to choose a reward because it's soon to expire. For most cases the expiry date is a sigificant time off, for the purpose of protecting the offerer if they forget about it. Finding a reward that you're able to do is more difficult, so being able to check for new items easily is somewhat more useful. If other people do want to be able to browse soon-to-expire offers, maybe a section could be added to the top/bottom listing "offers to expire soon", linking to their section further down/up the page. BigBlueFish 16:46, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

text: The Nazanin offer was easy money.  Extend your deadline, and I'm sure someone will take it.  Wareh 03:18, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  organizing based on reward type 

message: Well so far the results of this project have been:
* One completely new article has been written
* One new photograph has been created for an article
* $12 have been donated to the Wikimedia Foundation
Maybe this project isn't going to single-handedly destroy Wikipedia after all :) Kaldari 17:13, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: And an hour of work on Winneba (city in Ghana). Indeed, a time of apocalpyse for our beloved project ;-) — Matt Crypto 17:34, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The problems with this project aren't the sort that will become apparent right away.  It'll be months or years down the road before things obviously go 'round the bend, but it's basically inevitable that they eventually will.  When you build on a flood plain, you might not have wet feet a month later, but sooner or later the day will come when your furniture's floating out the front door. -Colin Kimbrell 16:07, 2 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually, the opposite is true in this case.  Over time, we'll be singing the praises of this venture much more loudly.  Mark these two diffs down somewhere and we'll see who ends up being right.  I'll contribute US$100 to the Wikimedia foundation if 5 years from now this was deemed (by consensus of a straw poll advertised in a neutral fashion to the village pump) to have done more harm than good. Johntex\talk 16:55, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

text:  Your assertion is unproven, and the evidence indicates the opposite. — Matt Crypto 17:10, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

text: It wouldn't be a wiki without the drama queens. If this project will indeed lead to problems, you have been presented with a choice. Either continue to contribute, and when things start going wrong do something about it, or abandon Wikipedia and let it go on without your input. You chose the second, solving nothing. You can't justify abandoning this when it's working at the moment, pre-emptively of misuse. That would be like deleting George W. Bush under office actions because someone is bound to use the article to defame him at some point. BigBlueFish 16:25, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I have elected to "abandon Wikipedia and let it go on without [my] input", and I only posted here again in response to a post by Matt on my talk page (which he also cross-posted here), as it seemed uncivil not to reply to his direct remarks.  As for WP:RB "working at the moment", we are (as I noted earlier) far too early into the process for any evidence one way or the other.  Cheering because the entire project has not collapsed within a week of this project's inception is both naive and unseemly; even Enron didn't come apart that quickly.  You'd do much better to try and address some of the critical flaws of this board BEFORE a crisis develops.  With the minimal guidelines in place right now, what will happen the first time someone welches on payment of a proposed bounty?  How will you address the conflict of interest inherent in having an editor eligible to vote on the AFD/GA/FA status of an article in which they have a financial stake?  How will you ensure that a patron doesn't help create/perpetuate a systemic bias by offering a large number of low-dollar bounties in a particular field, in order to swamp coverage of rival perspectives in that field?  How would you deal with a news pundit's accusation that article coverage in Wikipedia can be bought like ad space?  If someone feels that they have been treated unfairly here, where can they seek redress or arbitration?  If you don't have answers to these questions (and many others), you need to take some time out from the self-congratulating and start devoting some serious thought to the issues. Either way, though, I guess it's not my problem anymore. -Colin Kimbrell 20:04, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The site has mechanisms to deal with people that want to write POV articles, people who seek redress for being treated unfairly, etc.  Our systems will work just as well at resolving complaints by/about/between paid editors as they work with unpaid editors. Johntex\talk 20:13, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

text: Your questions are already answered. If someone doesn't pay a reward, nothing happens, except people learn not to trust that person. On AFD and FAC, people will presumably comment if a commentor has posted a reward related to that article. I'm willing to--are you? Systematic bias fostered through this process will be countered the same way we already counter plenty of systematic biases already, and this process is a tool towards that end. Media relations are the Foundation's problem, not the community's, but in putting this forward as a reward board instead of a job board we're already addressing that misunderstanding. If someone thinks they've been "treated unfairly" here in terms of not being paid, there's nothing he can do about it--he just didn't win the reward. We have answered all these questions. You simply refuse to listen. Let's make a bet here, alright? On May 4, 2007, if the reward board hasn't destroyed Wikipedia, you have to come back and keep editing. If it has destroyed Wikipedia, then I'll MfD it myself. — Phil Welch (t) (c) 20:46, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

text: Fine. Then leave. You're not doing a wonderful job of that yet, but maybe with practice you'll be able to pull it off. — Phil Welch (t) (c) 22:42, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I have posted only in response to remarks that were addressed to me, because I felt that it would be rude to ignore them.  If anyone has anything further that concerns me, please take it to my talk page. -Colin Kimbrell 23:21, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Thanks for your replies Colin, and while you quitting over this is one of the strangest things I've seen on this site for a while, I wish you the best. Don't forget to check back in a year or two, and if your fears aren't materialised, maybe we might see you around again? — Matt Crypto 23:54, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Over a year later, the world has not ended... --Grey Knight ⊖ 16:39, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Results so far 

message: I hope this hasn't been addressed up the page .. if it has been, I apologize.
Given a paid editor's work on an article, would the article be automatically semi-protected in order to protect the investment in the article? User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 22:42, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Hell no.  That would defeat the whole point of Wikipedia being a wiki. --Carnildo 23:25, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

text: I can't see anyone who supports this venture supporting article protection in this regards...as Carnildo says, that goes completely against the project's principles. --Kickstart70-T-C 23:34, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with you that it would be a bad idea ... but that doesn't mean it might not be done and I'm wondering if such a thing should be explicitly stated as a matter of policy rather than depending on the spirit of the project to make it anathema. User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 02:25, 2 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: To be honest, I'm a bit confused about your question.  Articles can only be semi-protected under the semi-protection policy.  Having a bounty on the articles doesn't change this.  It's already a policy matter that administrators shouldn't use their administrative powers on articles they have a content intrest in, and that doesn't change because of bounties either.  If an administrator semiprotected an article they were editing against policy, that would be reverted when found, and I'm sure that the various disciplinary procedures would not look at the bounty as a favorable motive.  But all of these policies already exist.  -- Creidieki 04:40, 2 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Let's make this clear. Rewards on this board are gifts not wages. Nobody but the reward offeror takes any responsibility for delivery of the reward, and offering it doesn't change anything about the policies regarding how people go about editing the Wikipedia. The contributions made by editors are still free to the Foundation and licensed under the GFDL. BigBlueFish 12:50, 2 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Changes by volunteer editor of paid editor's work 

message: I saw this on the main page:
:Reward board is similar to the bounty board, where a donation to the Wikimedia Foundation is awarded for an article's promotion to featured status instead of payment to a specific editor.
So who does the money one gets from doing one of these monetary tasks go? Can I, say, collect it myself as I have heard from other sources, or must I donate it to the Foundation? (I'm not greedy, just curious ☺.) → J@red  22:13, 6 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The rewards from the Reward Board are paid to you or (by your request) can be paid to the Foundation instead. — Phil Welch (t) (c) 23:25, 6 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Payment question... 

message: Could we have the reward board listed at the community portal under the "things to do" heading? This is the most logical place for it to be listed, otherwise there is no obvious way to find this page. It just took me 5 minutes to get here and I knew what I was looking for. What about all the people who do not know this exitst? Witty lama 14:53, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  List Reward board at the community portal 

message: ...this message from Jimbo, and thought it might be of interest to the people offering rewards. Nothing that isn't already common sense, but still... -Hit bull, win steak(Moo!) 21:14, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: I saw...

message: Even when we have the opportunity to work for money, we turn it down. Truly we are doing this for the love of knowledge! Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 16:47, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Altruistic 

message: Considering the increasing criticism of WP as a result of the recent events, I suggest that the money part be removed. Not that it has done any harm to WP, but that it does provide a possible opening to adverse criticism  Even though trivial sums of money are involved, any criticism of it will be adverse indeed,  Someone with unfriendly preconceptions will notice it sooner or later, especially because its listed on the Community Portal.  DGG 18:33, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's fine the way that it is now. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 23:23, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

text: Money good. Welcome to open content. "if they won't do it for $0, maybe they'll do it for $30000" --Richard Stallman   --Kim Bruning 17:31, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

text: Personally I'm actually impressed how well this is working. I don't see any improper requests on the attached page, and who cares if folks are getting paid? Hell, I wish I was getting paid (and am available for hire! :P) --kingboyk 17:33, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: vulnerability

message: This idea is all wrong. If we fairly spread out all the payment to those who deserve it, everybody  would be get such a trivial amount of money. The argument that monetary reward will better unpopular articles has damaging consequences. Others contributing for free would then feel aggrieved for not getting paid. The whole spirit would be gone. We should invest the money in the technical side, like paying programmers etc. We shouldn't let money  near the content, or (while i am at it) marketing. Chendy (talk) 20:57, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Don't quite see how any of your arguments relating to content providers do not apply to programmers either. Why should they be paid? Conversely, if they should be paid, why should content contributors not be paid? GreenReaper (talk) 23:10, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Plus, not many people know about this board or even give a damn about it. Plus, it has been done on other Wikipedias before we started ours, so it wasn't a totally new concept. As for building articles on small topics a bad thing; just because it is offered doesn't mean it will be taken up by anyone. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 23:17, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

text: Put up an offer to pay a programmer to add a certain feature.  That won't guarantee that the code will be accepted.  -- SEWilco (talk) 06:25, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  A known problem. That's why you proceed carefully. At the end of the day, coders still get paid though. :-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 00:37, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: This will kill wikipedia

message: *Editor A requests that an article is to be raised to GA status, with a reward of whatever amount.
*Editor B raises the article to a somewhat better standard, but is in e-mail contact with Editor C and requests that the article pass GA no matter what.
*Editor C passes the article, Editor A sends Editor B the money and Editor B sends editor C half of that money.
This doesn't work with the featured article process of course, but since GA requires only one unrelated editor to pass or fail it, the process can easily be abused.--h i s   s p a c e   r e s e a r c h 14:28, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: If editor C is being paid, editor C is not unrelated and thus not qualified to pass the article.  -- SEWilco (talk) 16:53, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: But that's the point. If Editor B and Editor C communicate off-wiki and do not show any sign of affiliation, nobody'll know that there's something going on. But yeah, GA is becoming more thorough than it used to be, I definitely agree.--h i s   s p a c e   r e s e a r c h 16:55, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: But usually around this time, it is out of Editor's A hands once the bounty has been paid. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 17:06, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Does anyone really think someone is going to pay someone money for improving an article without actually verifying that it is improved to whatever standard was requested? And even if the article was not improved to GA quality, at least it was improved "to a somewhat better standard". I fail to see how this scenario hurts Wikipedia. If editors want to waste their money by giving it away to people without verifying the improvements, that's their problem, not Wikipedia's. Kaldari (talk) 17:07, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: And it will be delisted immediately if there are significant sourcing issues. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 17:09, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

text: As I was going to say - it does not prevent person requesting the GA raise from also requesting that the raise be reviewed by other editors, if they feel that it is inadequate. Certainly, I would not want to reward articles that did not meet the grade. I have held back on one payment when it was unclear whether or not someone was going to challenge the elevation to GA. In the end, they did not. If they had, it would have been simple enough to wait until it was resolved one way or another. GreenReaper (talk) 20:46, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

text:  Collusion is hard to hide without improving the encyclopedia.  Everyone will accept the Editor B+C team as long as the work which they produce is following WP standards.  If Editor C repeatedly approves B's GA when it is not GA then the approvals will be challenged.  If Editor B tries to pay more GA judges, eventually B will get reported.  -- SEWilco (talk) 18:49, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  This definitely has the potential for abuse 

message: Is there a "a reward has been offered to improve this article" template than can be added to discussion pages of the articles? 
BTW, discussion here is old enough (and so oriented to the pre-deletion-keep) that it should be archived I think. Someone better at that than me do so? Thx. --Kickstart70-T-C 22:46, 28 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think such a template is necessary or wise.  It's better that this information is only found by those specifically looking for it, rather than shoved in everybody's faces.  Nutiketaiel (talk) 11:36, 29 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Especially after surviving the deletion, I don't think we had anything to hide. There are plenty of projects that do these templates and certainly they don't get in anyone's way. --Kickstart70-T-C 00:37, 30 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't know, I'm just kind of leary of it.  It's one thing for these rewards to be posted here, but here people have to search them out.  To put them on all the pages seems just... I don't know what I mean.  I'm having trouble articulating my concerns; it just seems wrong to be throwing it out there like that instead of letting people come here to find the info.  Nutiketaiel (talk) 18:44, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

text: Try . Duh! :) Kaldari (talk) 22:19, 30 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks, added to the page I am offering for. --Kickstart70-T-C 02:54, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Template? 

message: I think it would be prudent to set a maximum post time for challenges, as some editors may post a challenge and then abandon Wikipedia. I was thinking a one year max post period and then it's moved to Expired. If the posting editor wants to repost the challenge, that's fine, but I think this would help remove some of the clutter. --Eustress (talk) 00:23, 24 January 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I think your challenges are on the brink of conflict of interest. I hope you don't abuse this system to the point of getting this board shut down. miranda 01:26, 24 January 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I would absolutely love to see this board shut down myself,  or at least restricted to non-material rewards as I think its a disgrace to the spirit of NPOV and COI. But, given that it';s here,  and that my view does not seem to have current consensus, it is perfectly in order to advocate making modifications in it, even if they would limit it somewhat. I think an expiration date is an excellent idea--there's no point in old challenges not likely to be followed up. DGG (talk) 01:51, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

text: There's no objection, so I'm going to be bold and set a max expiration date at one year. —Eustress talk 02:53, 17 April 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Suggested expiration date max

message: I discovered this via a note left at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Guild of Copy Editors and as an uninvolved editor who'd never heard of it I do think, at a minimum, this should be merged with the "bounty board". Whether it's eliminated entirely depends partly on how often it's used successfully (i.e. tasks completed). Recognizance (talk) 23:17, 24 May 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Nah...the two boards have different motivations and are each long enough in their current, separated forms. --76.4.33.124 (talk) 03:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Bounty

message: Of interest, including's Jimbo promise to ban anybody editing for $... --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk  17:52, 16 June 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Paid editing]] 

message: Can we add another tag for each reward by indicating a challenge level perhaps? Some awards are harder to do than others. The offerer can define his/her opinion on how hard the challenge would be to meetOttawa4ever (talk) 01:42, 18 June 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: The challenge should be reflected in the reward. GreenReaper (talk) 18:35, 18 June 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Minor proposal 

message: The user Suburban_Express was criticized and blocked because some user(s) felt that it seemed to be shared username. Pursuant to the block, our posts to the reward board and bounty board were deleted, presumably because the username was blocked. I have registered a new username that is specific to an individual and is therefore compliant with wikipedia rules, and re-posted our entries on the two boards.  Suburban Express President (talk) 20:23, 26 October 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Suburban Express 

message: See . Rather than offering rewards or bounties, here we have the approach from the other end. Any thoughts on this? Should this model be mentioned on this page? Cc User:NittyG and User:bobrayner. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 05:05, 2 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Getting funds for the hardware or physical material needed to contribute isn't new.  WM grants are given out for this all the time.  That was a great example of a kickstarter: someone with the personal bandwidth to take as many photos as he can get objects to photograph, working with both a physical museum and WP and the Internet Archive to create a combined physical + digital collection.  – SJ + 16:13, 5 November 2013 (UTC)

text: I'm happy to see someone getting with the times and using a kickstarter. In an ideal world, it would "kickstart" the community away from supporting self-righteous and self-destructive ideologies and monopolies. Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. ) while signing a reply, thx 09:27, 11 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Example of Wikipedia related Kickstarter campaign 

message: I just looked at the archives; it looks like rewards given out are almost entirely barnstars, and those are clustered into a few successful backlog drives.  Other uses of the board have been mostly unsuccessful.  Only 5% of the rewards have been individuals getting cash; and half of those were for a single topical drive (for which we've since developed better contest-like tactics).  
: - 160 barnstars given out as part of four backlog drives (ce & wikification); 60 other barnstars, 1 reverse barnstar (someone offered ce in exchange for a new barnstar design), 2 on-topic gifts.
: - 12 cash rewards, 4 asked for money to go to the wmf or another charity.  
Perhaps what we need is a board for barnstar-challenges and contests, highlighting regular topical and backlog drives.   – SJ + 18:16, 5 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Stats from the archive 

message: Given this page is now kept (which I can understand given the voting), my question is whether we need to tighten up the criteria. Hence I have a couple of proposals below.
===Should we eliminate cash rewards?===
Given all the hoohaa about this, do we in the spirit of eschewing paid editing eliminate cash rewards on this page? Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 05:05, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree. Looks like we have a little cottage industry here, with what appear to be contractors and subcontractors. Given the lack of COI strictures, not even disclosure to other editors (much less the reader), allowing paid awards is a scandal waiting to happen. I'm surprised Wikipedia hasn't already been skewered over these bounties. Can't say we don't richly deserve it. Coretheapple (talk) 01:01, 3 December 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Perhaps this is too complicated. We might easily get into more discussion than the matter is worth, by adding yet another venue for it.  DGG ( talk ) 20:31, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Can you elaborate on where? I thought a veto process was fairly local to this page. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 22:02, 9 November 2013 (UTC)

text: Interesting idea. Need to think about this one. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 06:28, 10 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  As we are going to keep this, do we need to tighten the criteria a bit? 

message: Given all the hoohaa about this, do we in the spirit of eschewing paid editing eliminate cash rewards on this page? Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 05:05, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree. Looks like we have a little cottage industry here, with what appear to be contractors and subcontractors. Given the lack of COI strictures, not even disclosure to other editors (much less the reader), allowing paid awards is a scandal waiting to happen. I'm surprised Wikipedia hasn't already been skewered over these bounties. Can't say we don't richly deserve it. Coretheapple (talk) 01:01, 3 December 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Should we eliminate cash rewards?

message: #They are completely anomalous in our present situation. It's absurd of us to strongly discourage paid editing, and then openly provide a place to advertise it. (Needless to say, I have no objection to awarding barnstars, and I am uncertain about merchandise--depending of course on its value. But cash , regardless of amount, is unequivocal.  DGG ( talk ) 20:06, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Eliminate

message: # In my proposal below, I added the line "while posters may offer items of monetary value as rewards, posters cannot offer items of monetary value if they are affiliated with the article they want worked on". As I don't really see the difference between "Improve this and I'll give you twenty bucks" and "Improve this and I'll give you a twenty buck video game", I think that this is the best solution. Sven Manguard Wha? 05:36, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Do not eliminate

message: *Discuss here. Personally I find this a really tricky one for myself and am finding myself sitting on the fence (initially wanted to eliminate but now not so sure...). Happy to see what others think. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 05:05, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree. Looks like we have a little cottage industry here, with what appear to be contractors and subcontractors. Given the lack of COI strictures, not even disclosure to other editors (much less the reader), allowing paid awards is a scandal waiting to happen. I'm surprised Wikipedia hasn't already been skewered over these bounties. Can't say we don't richly deserve it. Coretheapple (talk) 01:01, 3 December 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Discussion

message: Enable the ability of an editor to raise concerns about any particular entry and raise it for discussion on the talk page. Thus, if an entry was deemed by consensus to run contra to the aims of a NPOV encyclopedia then it would be removed. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 05:05, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Perhaps this is too complicated. We might easily get into more discussion than the matter is worth, by adding yet another venue for it.  DGG ( talk ) 20:31, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Can you elaborate on where? I thought a veto process was fairly local to this page. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 22:02, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Strengthen ability to get rid of questionable rewards

message: # In my proposal below, I added the line "If an editor thinks that a posting made on this page is inappropriate, they may challenge it at Wikipedia talk:Reward Board, and if there is a consensus there that the posting is inappropriate, the entry will be closed and archived.". I think this is the best option (and yes, I did steal the idea from someone at the MfD). Sven Manguard Wha? 05:38, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Veto ability

message: # It is currently not clear that the "Veto" means in this proposal. If any anonymous or SPA account can say no, this does not look like robust enough against the obvious abuse. If we talk about "consensus", any content or proposal can always be rejected by consensus so some special rule seem not necessary. Audriusa (talk) 07:38, 11 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: No veto ability

message: *Discuss here. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 05:05, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Perhaps this is too complicated. We might easily get into more discussion than the matter is worth, by adding yet another venue for it.  DGG ( talk ) 20:31, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Can you elaborate on where? I thought a veto process was fairly local to this page. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 22:02, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Discussion

message: This might be the loop hole that allowed this idea to go bad: someone created an account, then immediately went to this page & put up cash offers for specific articles. If this is limited only to established Wikipedians -- suitably active for a reasonable amount of time -- it will make monitoring a lot easier. What exactly is meant by "suitably active for a reasonable amount of time" can be hashed out if the general idea is found acceptable.
==== For ====
==== Against ====
# Treading into the slippery slope of "outing" other Wikipedians, and also sounds very "bitey" of the newbies. The last thing we need is more arrogant "regulars" saying that while it's okay for them to post requests at the Reward Board, the posts from the unwashed others are unwelcome. - I'm not that crazy (talk) 03:14, 11 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Interesting idea. Need to think about this one. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 06:28, 10 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Limit sponsors to established Wikipedians in good standing 

message: # Treading into the slippery slope of "outing" other Wikipedians, and also sounds very "bitey" of the newbies. The last thing we need is more arrogant "regulars" saying that while it's okay for them to post requests at the Reward Board, the posts from the unwashed others are unwelcome. - I'm not that crazy (talk) 03:14, 11 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Against 

message: * Discuss here. -- llywrch (talk) 05:27, 10 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Interesting idea. Need to think about this one. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 06:28, 10 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Discussion 

message: In light of the recent MfD discussion regarding this page, I am proposing that the introduction to Wikipedia:Reward board be replaced with the following:
The reward board is page where users who want a specific task related to Wikipedia (such as the improvement of an article to featured article status, the clearing of a backlog, or the editing of an image) can offer a reward to editors willing to take on and complete that task. 
While it is up to the person posting the reward to set the terms of the request (what is being asked for, what is being offered in return, and how long the request is valid), certain terms are expressly prohibited. While it is perfectly acceptable to ask that an article be improved in general ("my favorite rapper is MC Example, please bring his article up to GA status"), it is not acceptable to ask for specific content changes ("my favorite rapper is MC Example, please remove or alter the criticism section in his article"). Additionally, while posters may offer items of monetary value as rewards, posters cannot offer items of monetary value if they are affiliated with the article they want worked on. See Wikipedia:Conflict of interest for information about monetary compensation and possible conflicts of interest. Finally, it should go without saying that posters cannot ask for someone to violate site policies or engage in meatpuppetry on their behalf. If an editor thinks that a posting made on this page is inappropriate, they may challenge it at Wikipedia talk:Reward Board, and if there is a consensus there that the posting is inappropriate, the entry will be closed and archived. 
The Wikimedia Foundation is not hiring contributors through this venue and no payments are made by the Foundation. This is purely a page for editors to offer rewards to other editors. Challenges may remain open for a maximum duration of one year. After that period of time, the challenge will be moved to expired requests; however, the author of the challenge may repost the challenge with a new expiration period. The aim of this policy is to keep the board clutter-free, ensure editors are available to fulfill such challenges, and to ensure the challenges are still valid.
The reward board is an informal page where users who want a specific task related to Wikipedia (such as the promotion of an article to featured article status or the editing of an image) can offer a reward to editors willing to take on the task. The execution and details of the transaction are the responsibility of the participating parties, and the reward can be monetary, goods (books, cookies, etc.), barnstars, or tit-for-tat editing (like improving another article).
Reward board is similar to the Bounty board; however, instead of a donation to the Wikimedia Foundation, payment is made directly to a specific editor.
The Wikimedia Foundation is not hiring contributors and no payments are made by the Foundation. This is purely a page for editors to offer rewards to other editors. Challenges may remain open for a maximum duration of one year. After that period of time, the challenge will be moved to expired requests; however, the author of the challenge may repost the challenge with a new expiration period. The aim of this policy is to keep the board clutter-free, ensure editors are available to fulfill such challenges, and to ensure the challenges are still valid.
See Wikipedia:Conflict of interest for information about monetary compensation and possible conflicts of interest.
Thoughts? Sven Manguard Wha? 05:31, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: I think we need something like this to really clarify how it works, despite it being quite a long intro. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 06:32, 9 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: the key thing is removing the cash, but a cut off date would help.  DGG ( talk ) 20:29, 9 November 2013 (UTC)

text: Sounds like yet another attempt to turn Wikipedia into a witch hunt, what with saying that people with money in their pocket, interested in the expansion of freely-licensed content about a subject, may not be "affiliated" with the subject.  How can we say this with a straight face, when the Wikimedia Foundation politically supports "Wikipedian-in-Residence" programs and personnel? - I'm not that crazy (talk) 03:19, 11 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Proposed revised introduction

message: I understand the concern about developing policies that are more in-line with modern Wikipedia, but there's no indication that this will ever take off.   It's not well advertised, and someone would have to basically find it by accident.  We can just let it continue its quiet fade into obscurity.  Gigs (talk) 17:54, 11 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Alternatively, people could cross-post their reward board postings to relevant WikiProjects and increase awareness of the board. More eyes on the page means more people to weigh in if there's a problem, and a higher likelihood that positive/constructive postings get answered. Sven Manguard Wha? 20:28, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: I am unhappy with letting things slip into obscurity - wikipedia suffers greatly with large numbers of wikispace boards and areas where people's posts, comments, queries and ideas go unanswered. We need to be more aggressive in keeping things active or marking them inactive/historical. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 22:00, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: In an ideal world where people didn't vote to keep obsolete boards at MfD to make an unrelated political point, that would work. Gigs (talk) 20:32, 14 November 2013 (UTC)

text: There's also redirecting. What was the noticeboard that shut down recently? Biosthmors (talk) pls notify me (i.e. ) while signing a reply, thx 09:50, 18 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  The future of this 

message: For awareness, especially those who expressed dismay at this becoming an ad board for paid corporate editing: WP:COIN#Kitchen remodeling companies (permlink) is discussing the recently-posted cash bounty for Home improvement in the context of appearance of COI editing in related articles. – Brianhe (talk) 20:16, 22 October 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Home remodeling conflict 

message: Wondering peoples thoughts about using this page for tech requests. For example I am wanting this new color scheme created as an option for Wikitext editor syntax highlighting but have no idea how to make it myself. User:DGG your thoughts? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 11:10, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
thread_title: Tech requests