A specific task force is going to be set up to study financial sustainability. Another answer is: central servers aren't sustainable in the long run, and total decentralization would be the answer. Dedalus16:14, 21 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
It certainly seems to be working well so far. Donations are more than covering essential costs (ie. keeping the servers running) even during a recession and there is no sign that they won't be able to in the foreseeable future. We should, however, prepare for the unforeseeable future as much as possible. I think a large endowment would help in that regard, it would allow us to guarantee minimal functionality regardless of future drops in donations. I think now is the time to start building that endowment - it is tempting to say we can make better use of the money by spending it now, but it will always be tempting to say that so we need to resist the temptation. --Tango14:00, 22 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Donations support many much richer organisations than Wikimedia, so unlike advertising it is a viable model for us. But we need to move away from one off donations and start encouraging our donors to sign up for an annual donation, or other regular donations, and we need charitable status in more countries - in the UK it would add 28% to most of our donations. WereSpielChequers00:28, 2 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
