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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: July 1st, 2023

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  • I’m going to try to keep this super simple:

    Salaries and wages have increased 22% compounding year-over-year for the last four years on average. This is a 120% increase in only four years (from $46,146,897 to $101,305,706).

    Didn’t you just get super offended that I pointed out that paying the people who work for you is, in fact, a “core reponsibility”, and so this argument doesn’t make sense?

    At this point, I sincerely think you are being obtuse; unless you believe everyone at Wikipedia, on average, is receiving 22% raises, every single year. This is not Wikipedia “paying the people who work for you,” it’s aggressive expansion, at an exponential level. In the words of Guy Macon from almost a decade ago, “Wikipedia has Cancer.” I don’t believe any company, non-profit or for-profit, can sustain this limitless expansion in the long run. And Wikipedia’s management does this all while trying to guilt trip people for donations, usually under the guise of needing it to survive. In sum, I don’t agree with the financial decisions of Wikipedia’s management, and therefore, no longer donate to them.

    On the other hand, I don’t dislike Wikipedia or the services they provide. I’ll echo your own words: I like Wikipedia, I think it’s good, and I never said otherwise. I even referenced their website when writing all of my responses on this topic. I find it unfortunate that you interpret these sort of critiques as “and so Wikipedia sucks.” Furthermore, I don’t like how you justify your hostility based on critical responses. This is a discussion board, not an echo chamber. However, I’m very thankful that you didn’t respond with “go fuck yourself” or “kiss my ass” like you did in your last response to me. Also, I hope your having a good start to the weekend. ✌




  • Is it your impression that paying the people who work for you is optional for a technology company?

    What a bad-faith argument. You seem willfully obtuse towards any data presented to you and unnecessarily hostile in all of your comments. I took a look at the most recent 990 form you reference, and it lists compensation for a mere 13 individuals, with a total compensation just over $4-million in sum. This is in no way counter-evidence that spending (ultimately due to the decisions of these executives) is at runaway levels. Salaries and wages have increased 22% compounding year-over-year for the last four years on average. This is a 120% increase in only four years (from $46,146,897 to $101,305,706).

    These trends have been continuously called out for almost a decade now, but this exponential growth continues nonetheless. All while expenses for core responsibilities remain flat. Wikipedia should be setup to succeeded indefinitely at this point if it weren’t for these decisions.


  • Kiss my ass. Get the fuck out.

    Yikes, wow! Totally not an unhinged response. You seem hyper-focused on whatever what said today and assume everything is related to it. I haven’t even read Musk’s statements because his opinions don’t mean anything to me. In reality, concerns with Wikipedia’s financials are nothing new. One of the OG posts highlighting concerns circulated in 2016 (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guy_Macon/Wikipedia_has_Cancer) and has continuously been updated with each new year’s disclosures. I believe I first saw it when the author did a Q&A on r/IAmA, 8 years ago (link). In sum, nothing has been done to change course and spending has only increased. In reality, the Wikipedia Foundation and Endowment have over $400-million in assets and core functionality should be able to continue indefinitely. I want to see Wikipedia succeed, and I think it could easily be set for lifetimes if managed appropriately. Looking at core responsibilities (internet hosting), there is no reason why Wikipedia can’t thrive on their investment income. I can only assume those encouraging Wikipedia’s current path hope for someone with a bigger checkbook to come by and bail them out (with strings attached, of course).


  • Their own charts in your link show that web hosting expenses have flatlined over the last decade. Digging into the PDFs in the sources, you can see this was only $2,335,918 in 2019. They even spent more on travel and conferences that year. As contributions continue to grow, the spending category that is growing far faster than any other is salaries and wages. Their CEO made $789k in 2021, all while content is created by volunteers. I like Wikipedia and the content they host; however, I think any increase in contributions is just going to line the pockets of the executives.

    Edit, just to be clear: I’m not defending the wildly inflated numbers quoted above; however, I believe they are right in concept. The executives are the ones bleeding the foundation dry. The chart I previously mentioned is below. Internet hosting and many of the other smaller expense categories have been relatively flat year-over-year, but salaries and wages are increasing at an unsustainable runaway pace.







  • From what I’ve seen, middle of the road 300 mm Voron V2.4 kits are around $1300. I believe the lowest I’ve seen was around $950, excluding printed parts (which the same company was selling separately for over $200). When I tried compiling a BOM with self-sourced high quality parts, the total reached over $1700 before I gave up on that idea. Where have you seen $600 kits? If these are still available, I may consider one. However, I’m hesitant to go with a kit that may have lower quality components. Personally, I’m really excited for this new Prusa and will probably pick up a kit once they are available. Unless, of course, Vorons are really that affordable.



  • This is not their first core XY and they redesigned the hotend with the PrusaXL and MK4. As far as I’ve seen, they are the only printer company using a strain gauge in the hotend for bed leveling, that they also use for detecting clogs while printing. Also, the new printer’s price is comparible to the similar model from Bambu with a metal frame and enclosed print bed (X1C). And, as you pointed out, they always maintained the same serviceability (I’ll add upgradability). Therefore, I definitely don’t agree that they are playing catch up.



  • From your source:

    {The upper flow is faster and from Bernoulli’s equation the pressure is lower. The difference in pressure across the airfoil produces the lift.} As we have seen in Experiment #1, this part of the theory is correct.

    Sure, it might be more complicated and there are other forces at play. Also, top and bottom air molecules may not reach the backside of an airfoil at the exact same time, but that doesn’t diminish the effects of this pressure differential on lifting force.


  • That lift explanation is innacurate/incomplete. While there may be some equal and opposite forces depending on the angle of attack, the primary reason for lift is due to Bernoulli’s Principle. Airfoils have a rounded upper surface with a longer path for air to take, relative to the underside. This requires air to move at a higher velocity over the top, and since A1 x V1 x P1 = A2 x V2 x P2, pressure over the airfoil decreases. It is this pressure differential that creates lift.

    In regards to aircraft, Newton’s third law of motion applies to thrust from a propeller or jet engine.




  • I must say I don’t like the idea of a social-credit-score bot.

    Regarding your implementation, I saw the summary of your own comments elsewhere in this post and I noticed all the annotations were on upvoted/blue segments. Other summaries you posted focused more on negative/red segments. Would it be possible to enforce a minimum of 1 or 2 from both categories?

    Also, would you be kind enough to read my tea leaves? Am I an acceptable citizen of the Lemmy community?