bg3wiki talk:Ads Announcement 1

No thanks

We can't trust your word if you do this, so promises to keep it from becoming "an annoyance" are moot. You've here sworn that any promises you make may be freely broken "if the promise was made under ignorance" of the financial windfall.

I'd urge extreme caution before going through with this plan. A probing of altering Creative Commons licenses to prevent other sites from "ripping off bg3.wiki" is at odds. The point of the license is to allow other people to "rip off" the site. The Creative Commons license means this site's contributions can be entirely replicated on a different site, e.g. https://baldursgateiii.wiki/, without needing to consult anyone.

This site's utility is within its content, and that content is easily, and legally, replicated.

Ultimately, I do not want money for my contributions, and I will not relicense them to allow the site owner to make money from the same.

Kelpto (talk) 16:20, 20 July 2024 (CEST)

Hi Kelpto,

Your opinion is valuable to me, but the vast majority of people seem to see it differently. In most people's eyes, I seem to have demonstrated my commitment to making and keeping bg3.wiki a great resource, and I hope you'll eventually be convinced too. As a logged in user, you won't even see ads, so this change will basically not affect you at all. (I suppose it might if you view the wiki from other devices on which you're not logged in, and if you don't have an ad blocker on those devices.)

I think you misunderstood what I was trying to explain regarding preventing other sites from "ripping off" the wiki. Let me explain:

1. The CC BY-NC-SA license, being irrevocable, grants everyone the right to create a separate wiki and host the content there, but only under the NC condition, meaning that this secondary wiki could not serve ads. (LATE CORRECTION: Apparently, showing ads aside NC content may be fine. I'll still go through the re-licensing effort for avoidance of doubt, to honor the wishes of those who contributed under the assumption that the wiki would never serve ads and don't want their content to stay up, etc.)

2. Past contributors, who made their content available under the CC BY-NC-SA, have a choice regarding what additional license to grant bg3.wiki to allow monetizing the content.

3. The main offer I will make to past contributors is that they agree to re-license their content under CC BY-SA, meaning that not only bg3.wiki but also everyone else will be allowed to monetize the content.

4. As a secondary option, if someone says "I want only bg3.wiki to be allowed to monetize my content," then they could decide to only grant bg3.wiki a license (not a CC one) to monetize their past content. In this situation, their content would still be available to everyone else under the NC license. However, exclusively to bg3.wiki, it would also be available under an additional license that permits commercial use.

So, there's no desire from my end to prevent other websites from copying content from bg3.wiki (which, as you've correctly pointed out, they can do under the irrevocable NC license). I don't even intend trying to prevent others from making money with content taken from bg3.wiki; that choice will belong to the past contributors who so far haven't granted anyone a license to monetize their content. To be honest, I doubt anyone will actually use the secondary option I've described above; I'm pretty sure everyone will simply agree to re-license their content to CC BY-SA, so that not only bg3.wiki but also everyone else will be allowed to monetize it. I just want to make sure people know that they have options.

By the way, note that starting from July 20 (today), new content on bg3.wiki is released under CC BY-SA. So, I've already chosen a license for new content that explicitly allows other websites to make money with new content that appears on bg3.wiki. (Even though I don't do it myself yet! Will probably start soon though.) Just to further prove that I have no intention of claiming ownership over the content or trying to keep it just for myself in any way.

If you're absolutely sure that you don't want to accept payment in exchange for re-licensing your content to CC BY-SA, then I will sadly have to go through your contributions and delete any that are still live. From a quick look, it doesn't look like it's all that much, so overall it shouldn't hurt the wiki. I'll only start doing it once we start serving ads though (probably start of August) and I would greatly appreciate it if you change your mind.

Sorry about the long response, but I wanted to be as detailed as I could.

Taylan (talk) 21:46, 20 July 2024 (CEST)

"I can make a lot of money off of ads" is a terrible premise to break a promise

The costs of hosting this wiki have already been covered for 2024. Hosting this wiki does not need to be your job, and I am extremely skeptical that you could make enough money from ad revenue to make it so. Who have you been talking to about putting ads on the wiki? What level of compensation have they suggested to you? Who would be serving the ads? What would the ads consist of?

How do you plan on obtaining the consent of anonymous contributors? Or will you actually undertake the effort of systematically deleting and replacing all of their contributions? (Keeping in mind that whatever contributions replace those of the non-consenting contributors, will have to actually be unique and differentiated contributions under copyright. I am also extremely skeptical it will even be possible to replace those contributions with sufficiently differentiated works, as to make those contributors' claims of copyright null and void on the resulting work, and the resulting work not just a derivative of their earlier contributions.)

There is not nearly enough actionable, concrete information provided by you for anyone to make a serious decision or give serious consent to this proposal. As it stands this is legally, ethically, and morally a bad idea. I strongly oppose it.

Furthermore, please consider the fact that this wiki's utility and service to the game's community has been intrinsically linked to the wiki being provided for free and without advertisement. If this wiki, its maintenance, or its administration are becoming an undue burden on you financially, emotionally, or otherwise, then please seek out a replacement administrator and host to take over that burden. In that case, I would specifically recommend you reach out to Larian themselves to see if they would prefer to host and administrate this wiki.

Otherwise, no, "I never knew just how much money ads can apparently make" is a terrible reason to break your promise and compromise your morals and ethics.

— unsigned comment by 98.199.7.246 (talk) 01:42, 21 July 2024 (CEST)

Dear anonymous commenter,

As mentioned in the page, donations would be refunded. Projections show that I will be able to make enough money to pay a more than fair sum to all non-trivial past contributors, and still have enough for myself. If that plan doesn't pan out, I'll simply roll back on the plan; it's not a big deal. The company which contacted me regarding ads is a fairly reputable one, and I've verified that their projections are credible by checking with numerous other sources.

The consent of anonymous editors is difficult to attain, but anonymous editors don't often contribute so much that their edits would constitute a significant copyrighted work in its own regard. If an anonymous editor who contributed a lot has a problem with this change to the site, they can always contact me and we'll see what can be done. There's no point worrying about highly theoretical issues.

"There is not nearly enough actionable, concrete information provided by you for anyone to make a serious decision or give serious consent to this proposal."

If you are a past contributor who added non-trivial amounts of content to the wiki, then please tell me what more information you need. Regarding your opinion that this is a bad idea on multiple fronts, I hear you, but the vast majority of people seem to disagree.

"Furthermore, please consider the fact that this wiki's utility and service to the game's community has been intrinsically linked to the wiki being provided for free and without advertisement."

The wiki will obviously continue being provided for free. The small amount of ads will be simple to disable for those who don't want to see them, by creating an account or using an ad blocker.

"If this wiki, its maintenance, or its administration are becoming an undue burden on you financially, emotionally, or otherwise, [...]"

No, I greatly enjoy the technical work involved in systems administration, working with HTML/CSS/JS/PHP/Lua/Wikitext, templates, Cargo, and so on. I'm really happy that I'll be able to turn this passion into full-time work. But thank you for the concern.

"Otherwise, no, "I never knew just how much money ads can apparently make" is a terrible reason to break your promise and compromise your morals and ethics."

As I've mentioned, I'm only doing this because I'll be able to pay past contributors good amounts as well. Everyone who actually created the wiki, and helped it otherwise, will benefit.

Taylan (talk) 12:40, 21 July 2024 (CEST)

The point is not that donations will be refunded, the point is that you do not need to serve ads to cover the cost of hosting this wiki. Those costs are already covered by donations. You have made it very clear that the only reason you want to put ads on this wiki is so you can apparently make a lot of money off of them. I maintain that this is a terrible (and incredibly unrealistic) reason to break the promise you made years ago of keeping the wiki ad free:

https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/86980/baldurs-gate-3-wiki

https://www.polygon.com/23871726/baldurs-gate-3-bg3-fan-wiki-fextralife

https://old.reddit.com/r/BaldursGate3/comments/rtielk/announcing_unofficial_bg3_community_wiki/

"Essentially, if you add something to their wiki, you're doing unpaid work for their company. Not to be a hater, but I dislike that."

So now, essentially, if people add something to this wiki, they're doing unpaid work for you. You are in the process of becoming the very thing you created this wiki to get away from. It makes you untrustworthy and it makes you a hypocrite.

"Projections show that I will be able to make enough money" ... "The company which contacted me regarding ads is a fairly reputable one" ... "I've verified that their projections are credible by checking with numerous other sources"

Projections from who? Which company is it? What are the numbers they're throwing at you? What sources did you apparently verify these numbers with? Why is none of this information front and center in your proposal? This is incredibly important information. You should have shared these details from the very beginning.

From what platform will the ads be served? Google AdSense? What type of ads, exactly, will be displayed? Where exactly will they be displayed? Will they merely be pushed off into the sidebar of the page? Will there only be a single ad? Will they be injected into the content of the site directly? Will they be static ads? Interactive? Videos? Again, all of this information should have been made available day one.

If you actually enjoy systems administration so much, go make a career out of that. Don't ruin this wiki and your own reputation by going through with this plan. I seriously doubt whatever "projections" for ad revenue have been shared with you are realistic. This game's release date was a year ago, it's daily active player count is now one tenth of what it was at its peak, and the game is about to receive its last major patch. I promise you whatever "projections" you have been given are the absolute peak of what you will "earn" by placing ads on this wiki.

You clearly understand how and why ads are terrible and how and why they ruin sites that should be for communities. Are you actually willing to throw away your own morals for what will inevitably be a disappointing paycheck?

My ultimate advice, if you are so seriously concerned with making money off of this wiki, is to reach out to Larian directly and ask for a job. You're currently unemployed. You have been hosting this wiki for years now. This wiki has been a great community resources. You have demonstrated that you have the skills and knowledge necessary to deploy, host, administrate, and moderate this wiki. Ask them for a job and see what they say.

If Larian is not interested in hiring you then, and only then, should you even begin to consider placing ads on this wiki to support yourself financially, and only for as long as necessary until you find an actual job. You should absolutely not try to turn hosting this wiki into your career. That is a terrible and unsustainable idea.

I will not log back into my account on this wiki or contribute to it any further until this matter is resolved. 98.199.7.246 06:23, 25 July 2024 (CEST)

This is a bit long and asking too many detailed questions (not to mention the tone is way off) but there will be another announcement soon that may answer some of the questions anyway. Taylan (talk) 10:46, 29 July 2024 (CEST)

Consent Given

I trust you, so you have my consent. Viktoria Landers (talk) 18:53, 23 July 2024 (CEST)

Let the enshittification begin

Your site beats fextralife's site by a mile and more. It's an example that shows that monetization is harmful to a collaborative project than when the content is given freely and voluntarily.

Sure, no one likes to work for free, but paying past contributors feels like you are actually trying to bribe them to further your own agenda of monetization. You euphemistically admit to your own greed.

I advise you not to follow this dark path or, like the fextralife wiki, you will be replaced. 91.184.167.72 09:53, 24 July 2024 (CEST)

Me when I make money: https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/starwars/images/7/7f/Emperor_Palpatine_TNsR.jpg Taylan (talk) 17:16, 24 July 2024 (CEST)

This feels very dismissive of this poster's very valid concerns. Schism (talk) 07:39, 29 July 2024 (CEST)

I don't think accusations like "you're just trying to bribe people" and "you admit to your own greed" can be classed as valid concerns. I'm not a politician, or doing company PR... I've tried to be as open and honest as I can, and anonymous comments who still jump to bad faith assumptions like the one above are just really annoying me, sorry.

The plan is to redistribute the majority of the funds, paying almost 120 people (you're one of them), if revenue is high enough. New announcement probably coming later today. I just can't promise anything yet since I've no clue how much money will really come in.

Here's what I'd actually do if I were greedy: Plaster the site with ads, easily making tens of thousands per month (yes, check the Google AdSense revenue calculator; the site has 40 Million page views per month and the calculator literally caps out at 10 Million), and I'd just pocket all that money. Would be perfectly legal by the looks of it (other BY-NC-SA wikis do it), and it would take a long time for a new wiki to get higher Google rankings so I'd be getting mad rich. But I'm not going to do it, and have instead been agonizing this whole time over how to fairly pay so many people around the globe and with vastly different levels and types of contribution to the wiki.

Sorry, this became a bit of a rant. It's just really frustrating when you're doing your best to stick to principles, and genuinely try to make sure everyone is happy and treated fairly, and some people still jump on you with accusations, you know? Happy to respond to people who have actually contributed and have genuine concerns. Hope this didn't come across too salty. Taylan (talk) 09:40, 29 July 2024 (CEST)

It is a perfectly valid concern when what you do to refute it is post a meme and don't actually try to alleviate their concerns. This just increases their concerns. That can be how you feel on the inside, but it doesn't instill confidence. They're saying everything most others are saying, just in a more polite way.

In the thread we made where you answered some of my concerns, you said you've been running the site like a High-Grade professional, this kind of stuff DIRECTLY contradicts your words and make what you say less reliable. Accusations or not, you are suggesting you make this site your full time job, and the moment you said that, you set a bar for yourself, and that one response is NOT making us feel great about this. A "High-Grade" Professional doesn't respond to criticism, incorrect or not, with a meme. Schism (talk) 17:15, 29 July 2024 (CEST)

Sorry, professional sysadmin doesn't mean professional PR. I don't really know how to respond to someone who just throws accusations at me like this and talks like it's going to be the end of the wiki, when you can just create an account or use an ad-blocker and the wiki is going to look basically 100% the same as before. (Tip for Android users: Firefox on Android supports uBlock Origin.) Taylan (talk) 17:56, 29 July 2024 (CEST)

Disappointed and alarmed

Your latest update says you will not be removing content that is requested to be removed immediately, which I assume means you will be making money off content that contributors specifically didn’t want monetized. That’s extremely unsettling and sets a horrible precedent for wikis going forward. Why is making money off ads more important than the wishes of your contributors to not be part of your monetization plans? And how long are you planing on keeping this content up? A day? A week? A year??? Depending on how long you intend to keep this up, you may make more money with ads off of content explicitly asked to be removed than whatever you are paying the contributors. 181.215.169.201 16:07, 24 July 2024 (CEST)

Are you a contributor to the wiki? If not, please cease the panicked alarmism. Content will not be mass-deleted in a hurry, since this could harm the integrity of information on the wiki. If you are a contributor and have concerns, I will gladly listen. Taylan (talk) 17:33, 24 July 2024 (CEST)

Again, how long? Regardless if I am a contributor or not, you have been so open and transparent so far, why not with this?

Will contributors work that does not want to be monetized be kept during the time monetization goes up? Why are you taking away their choice from them when their content comes down, content that they made but you want to make money off of? 181.215.169.201 18:39, 24 July 2024 (CEST)

If someone who actually contributed to the wiki asked me that question, they would be entitled to a response. You aren't. You just come across like a troll. The answer would depend on the amount and nature of their contributions, and a few other factors, which is why it's not possible to provide a blanket statement. If you have more questions, feel free to ask politely and I'll gladly respond. Otherwise, I'll have to ignore you. Taylan (talk) 20:20, 24 July 2024 (CEST)

I believe that monetizing the wiki is a bad idea. You've obviously already made up your mind, so I won't bother rehashing the points that other people have made. I do not consent to having my contributions re-licensed, and have already removed the only notable contribution I made. Paradoxiii (talk) 21:06, 26 July 2024 (CEST)

Why not set up a Patreon or make Kofi more accessible?

Avoids ads while allowing you to gain an income for hosting and stuff. While I don't know about trust (I'm very generously assuming this is just about hosting fees, even though I personally don't believe it), I still think there's better ways to gain some form of compensation to achieve said goal. I personally don't want someone suddenly making money off of things I've contributed to the site, especially when previously this was not the case. We also have no way of trusting you'll "pay" people to compensate. Overall, this feel very kneejerk. A Patreon would work better, and would feel much more "moral" than putting up ads. Schism (talk) 07:26, 29 July 2024 (CEST)

Too add onto this, past contributors literally did not ask to be paid for their efforts, and did this because they wanted to. I know I did. You're not introducing the idea that past contributors would be paid, which could then create a divide between past contributors and future contributors. This all-around feels like a terrible idea that could, again, be fixed simply by making a Kofi more accessible, or creating a Patreon, which are much less intrusive methods, and I believe you should attempt before trying to go fully into ads. Schism (talk) 07:42, 29 July 2024 (CEST)

No, it's not about hosting fees. Those are very small compared to what ads could make. It's mainly about 1. me working on the wiki full-time going forth and being paid a proper salary for it, and 2. fair compensation for those who contributed in the past because the wiki wouldn't be where it is now without them.

We took Ko-Fi donations to cover the hosting fees for 2024, and already reached the goal a while ago, since it was just 600 bucks for 12 months. Those will be refunded if this goal pans out. Some may be surprised to hear the wiki only costs 50 bucks a month and serves millions of people with good performance. Other wiki admins have told me this is "seriously impressive." I think I tend to under-value my own work. I've already been running the site like a fairly high-grade professional the whole time, but didn't ask for anything because it's still a community effort in the end of the day. Being able to do this full-time would be really nice though. I'll be improving MediaWiki extensions, bringing Nginx modules on Debian up to date, writing detailed technical documentation, etc., so the whole MediaWiki community will benefit from these things as well as a side-effect. Taylan (talk) 10:41, 29 July 2024 (CEST)

You are simultaneously saying you undervalue your work while suggesting you make money off the work of others (which is what a community wiki is all about). This is exactly why people hated Fextralife and loved this placen it felt like an actual proper place, by the people for the people.

it starts at ads first, but what then? What happens after that, with no notice, no polls anything? We have no guarentee it stops there. You want your full time job to consist of this wiki, and the 90% content of volunteer contributors (likely an exaggeration, but I doubt by much. Most of it is still community volunteer work)

You haven't done much to convince me that this choice wasn't made out of greed. Using your logic, I can claim that I should be paid each time someone looks at a page I had initially created, even if the bulk of the current iteration is provided by other people. That is essentially what you are trying to tell me you are doing, which I, and seemingly several other people, do not agree with.

I think the most important part here is broken trust. The issue of broken promises, like you have done here, is a loss of trust. Right now, it's ads. Unintrusive, but ads nonetheless. But what then? Intrusive ads? Autoplaying ads? An eventual devolvement into the same state as Fandom and Fextralife? You can tell us all the time that this won't happen, but we can no longer trust you when you say this is where it'll end. That's what this is about; user trust. Anyone who's been here long enough to contribute meaningfully have been directly betrayed by this new development, as it feels like a bait and switch, and we no longer have any idea if it'll be the first.

Out of all the posts here, only one is positive and giving you consent. Outwardly, nobody agrees with this development either.

The important thing is this: It's not that we don't want to trust you. We literally can't. Schism (talk) 16:58, 29 July 2024 (CEST)

OK, I should have probably said the following earlier; I tend to forget whom I've given which details already and who doesn't know yet:

There's going to be over 100 people who are going to be paid with the money that comes in. Including you BTW. (But it may not be that much, because it depends on activity level.) The majority of these people aren't even active anymore. In the coming months, it looks like I'm going to be running after people I don't have any contact with anymore just so I can throw money at them, purely because I'm trying to do this fairly. About 60% of the money is planned to be redistributed, if not more; I just need to make sure I can cover business expenses and have a good salary and the rest is for the community. (I'm in the process of writing a new announcement that includes these details and sort of forgot that most people don't know yet.)

Here's my suggestion: Since all content on the wiki is licensed under CC licenses, it can literally all be copied over to another domain without any legal problems. If the wiki really goes south like you fear, you can just do that. Once I start working on wiki stuff full-time, I'll even make this easier for others to do, because I'll be writing a ton of documentation and uploading the whole configuration publicly, since I'm a big fan of Free Software principles. I've been meaning to do it forever and simply didn't have the time. Taylan (talk) 18:17, 29 July 2024 (CEST)