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Comment by ShinTakuya | Hacker News Reader

I knew a guy who was a software engineer for Wikipedia back in uni. At least back then (around 2011 or so) they were flying him and other software engineers working for them to conferences across the world to Europe. Not only that but the guy booked the tickets on a premium airline business class. He said that everyone did that. You'd think working for a non profit you'd be looking at discount airline economy class tickets.

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I worked at the Wikimedia Foundation from 2012 to 2016. The Foundation did fly me across the world several times, either to attend professional conferences like FOSDEM or (more commonly) to participate in events hosted by a local chapter, like a community hackathon. I never flew anything but coach. I can recall one occasion when a colleague was able to get a free upgrade by using his frequent flyer miles. I am not aware of the WMF ever paying for business class for one of its employees.

This sort of comment is really pernicious. If you bring up such an accusation, you should really be prepared to back it up.

Unfortunately I can't back it up since I'm not the person in question, nor am I willing to drag this person into the spotlight since he's a good guy who doesn't deserve it.

It's possible that they'd already cut down on the spending by the time you joined. After checking back when I would have seen the case I mentioned, it was in fact 2010 and not 2011.

Also is it possible that the foundation has different practices in different countries? I was in Australia at the time for reference.

Out of curiosity, how common were these local community hackathons? Even flying economy it seems a bit excessive to be flying people across the world for that...

It is not a lot of money when you consider the amount of value it generates in terms of fostering relationships between volunteer developers and providing assistance to interested first-time participants who later go on to make meaningful contributions to the MediaWiki software stack.

Here is a detailed breakdown of the costs associated with the most recent hackathon, and some of the things that came out of it: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Hackathon_2017/Repo...

It is also possible that " the guy you knew who was a software engineer for Wikipedia back in uni." was flat out lying to you to show off.

I am the author of the Wikipedia essay "Wikipedia has Cancer". I have recently had extensive private correspondence with several current and former Wikimedia foundation software developers. The developers are not living lavishly. They are doing about as well financially as developers in other industries. In addition, the developers are not doing a poor job. Every problem with the software that the WMF has released was caused by bad management decisions, mostly by managers who no longer work there.

Travel for business is usually not fun, especially if you have to do it more than a few times a year. And economy class is getting worse every day. I totally understand if they let people fly business class.

Sorry, but I fully disagree. There's nothing wrong with economy class. It's a bit tight space wise, sure, but you can easily chill out with movies for the day. Non-profits shouldn't be splurging out on things like this.

Non-profit doesn't mean non-comfortable.

I'm not even a tall person, but economy is tight enough that my whole body hurts 1 hour into a ride. It's impossible for me to find a sleep position and watching last year's mediocre movies isn't a plus to me.

For a rare trip, I can deal with it to save money. But for frequent trips, I could see myself being quite pissed off if I had to take business trips regularly and sit in economy each time.

I mean it's not like attending conferences and hackathon if critical to the job of a Wikimedia engineer. I'd get it if you were being flown out for some mission critical job that couldn't be accomplished remotely or by someone local, but imo if you're being flown out by a non profit for something like the things I mentioned upgrading to a more comfortable class should be paid for by you, not the organisation.

For non-execs, economy is pretty much the standard at most organizations these days. Not necessarily some "steerage minus" deal but definitely not business unless you can get upgraded on your own. I do travel enough to get a slightly better version of economy but I don't get many upgrades to full business.

By that same token though, we wouldn't be fitting offices with ergonomic chairs and standing desks - regular furniture is good enough and it's a lot cheaper.

Really, if you're spending a lot of time in $place, be it an office, a plane, a house - whatever, you want it to be as comfortable as possible. Business class gets cheaper the more you use it, and even then for a business with revenue well into the tens of millions the price difference on a single airfare is negligible. You might pay a few hundred extra on a ticket, but in return, you get a happier and more comfortable employee.

This was talking about international flights. The difference is much, much more than a few hundred bucks. If you’re buying an international economy ticket from the US for $1500, the business class seat on that same flight will often cost $6,000 - $9,000. The price difference is massive.

That's true, but it still doesn't offset the other benefits of not spending hundreds of hours each year crammed into economy if you're a regular flyer. Not to mention the discounts and other little benefits you start to get when you rack up more mileage.

It's in the same basket as every other 'quality of life' improvement a business could make like nice desks, social events, fancy coffee machines, free food etc. If it fits into their budget, and offers a benefit to their employees that makes them more productive and more inclined to stay - then I'd say it's money well spent.

Why? Why would you expect a software engineer working for a nonprofit to look at discount airline economy class tickers?

I mean, maybe it's just the culture I am used to, but I would expect everyone/anyone to be looking at discount airline economy class tickets by default.

Why? You're working. You may well be traveling on your own time. I travel within guidelines but that doesn't mean traveling in the cheapest possible way even if it's more painful than it has to be.

I'm not arguing for cheapest way possible no matter how painful, just that I am used to a cost-conscious approach by default that starts at the cheap options and works upward and that's what I would tend to expect in this scenario.

You specifically referred to discount airlines which in my limited experience with them are mostly pretty awful to start with.

As an academic who travels a fair amount, I try to pick the cheapest available flight (within reason), and I've certainly never even considered flying business class. I think flying business class is permitted under certain conditions if there's still money in our travel budget, but it wouldn't feel like a good way to use taxpayer money. I think I would feel the same way working for a nonprofit funded by donations.

> but it wouldn't feel like a good way to use taxpayer money

Thanks. Curious, because this comes up on HN now and then: Do you make your research public? I understand this might not just be in your hands though.

I do publish in paywalled journals but all my papers are freely available as preprints from arxiv. Also, all software is open source.

Hey, thanks!

Because they're spending funds donated by people who were sold on the idea that Wikipedia was desperate for cash? If its own employees aren't trying to do simple things to save cash here and there I'm certainly not inspired to send money their way.

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