Dear Jimmy Wales, aka “Scary Beard Face” (okay, actually you look like a nice, interesting dude),

It’s all well and good that you’re appealing to the public for funding, but do remember that all encyclopediae have struggled in their creation. That in mind, Wikipedia is organic, even fungous, in existence: larger than most know, with more accumulated information than most are willing to admit; it will ALWAYS benefit from extra funding.

Do we need to see your well-groomed face leering at us every time we seek information? I know that when I’m inundated with information, I tend to ignore it, regardless of the value (take, for example, solicitation of donation).

But…

I will still talk about this, and support you, and link to “you” (wikipedia?)… is that “good enough”? Does that work with your solicitation/support mandate? I hope so.

Aside/Conclusion

I’m under-employed, or, “not-acceptably-employed-according-to-the-tax-collectors” (whom I HAPPILY pay), and all I can afford is coherently written paragraphs… If you have it, do it. Give the wikipeeps some money to keep going.

Encyclopediae were never that current or correct, anyway (What? You think the Encyclopedia Britannica you used in elementary school in 1985 was the be-all and end-all? I can’t even comment on that.) To quote a colleague, “Do it. DO it. DO IT!”