Situations where static addresses are appropriate

[Cubic Earth]

Wikipedia just announced the are accepting bitcoin.  They are using Coinbase, and as a result their receiving address is different for each donation.  Using a fresh address for each transaction enhances privacy, but it also makes it a little harder to verify that you are sending funds to the correct party.  If the address is static, it can be printed in magazines and newspapers or displayed on a charity's main website without too much dynamic code.

Are there reasons why a charity wouldn't want to have a publicly know, static donation address?  Maybe they should at least provide a fresh, private address if requested, but it seems like the sender should be protecting their own privacy if they care.

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[AliceWonder]

Using a fresh address for each donation I believe is the right thing to do.

Static addresses on things like forum posts are fine, but when you can provide a fresh address it avoids issues where third parties analyze donation rates and sizes.

[AliceWonder]

With respect to validating the address, hopefully there is an SSL page available so you know there probably wasn't a MITM between wikipedia and your browser.

[WoopDeBoop]

No ones going to type out the btc address from a printed advertisement

[Cubic Earth]

No ones going to type out the btc address from a printed advertisement

You are correct.  That is why we have QR codes.

[Anduck]

Static addresses work well when you use it as OTP method. I for example have an address linked to my #bitcoin-otc WoT account. Whenever I need to identify, I'll request the bot to serve me a string which I will sign with my associated bitcoin address. You can use this method even if the address has never been used / seen in the network.

[Cubic Earth]

Using a fresh address for each donation I believe is the right thing to do.

Static addresses on things like forum posts are fine, but when you can provide a fresh address it avoids issues where third parties analyze donation rates and sizes.

But for charity donations, wouldn't transparency be a good thing?  When bitcoin becomes widely used and understood, organizations will have to weigh the pros and cons of a transparent financial structure vs a private one, or what combination to employ.  I was hoping people would use the case of Wikipedia as an example.  Should they offer a static address, and what would be the pros and cons?