Considering how much mud was being slung around the FTX collapse, “clearing CEA’s name” and proving that no one there knew about the fraud seems not just like PR to me, but pretty important for getting the org back to a place where it’s able to meaningfully do its work.
Plus, that investigation is not the only thing mentioned in the reflection reform paragraph. The very next sentence also says CEA has “reinvested in donor due diligence, updated our conflict-of-interest policies and reformed the governance of our organization, replacing leadership on the board and the staff.”
reinvested in donor due diligence, updated our conflict-of-interest policies and reformed the governance of our organization, replacing leadership on the board and the staff.
I don’t know of any staff that was let go as a result of FTX reflections (and I have asked about this repeatedly). Many people quit, but nobody was fired for any FTX things among leadership, and nobody who quit would have been fired. There is some small chance I am missing some supposed staff changes here, but claiming that CEA “replaced leadership on the staff” as a result of FTX seems straightforwardly false (though if there was something behind the scenes that I don’t know about, I would love to hear it, but I currently disbelieve the bolded section).
The rest of the statements here seem pretty vacuous and almost impossible to falsify, and very hard distinguish from being done for PR reasons as opposed to genuine reflection. Briefly going through the areas where change is claimed:
Donor due diligence: I mean, I don’t think the right lesson to take away from FTX is to be much more hesitant about accepting money from people. The key thing to understand is why EA seems to have created FTX in the first place. So I don’t see the relevance of this. Yes, accepting the money was bad PR, I don’t think it was bad for the world (there is some decision-theoretic argument here that maybe by refusing to accept money from bad people would have disincentivized the bad things happening, but I think that’s very weak).
Conflict-of-interest policies: This seems maybe real. Conflicts of interest did possibly play a substantial role in FTX, but it really doesn’t seem like the primary dynamic going on. I do struggle to understand how anything like CEA-internal conflict of interest policies would have helped with anything like FTX.
I also haven’t seen these conflict of interest policies, and judging whether they seem like meaningful reform would require engaging with the details.
Reformed the governance of our organization: EV is shutting down, which seems like the biggest governance reform. It is the case that EV was a huge legal mess, and that FTX did seem like mild like evidence that you should have fewer shell companies and stuff, and maybe value standard operating practices more. It’s not completely unrelated, but I really struggle to see how “things like EV don’t exist” would somehow have made a difference for FTX happening.
Within CEA, I don’t know of any governance reform that seem downstream of any FTX reflection, and I have talked to many CEA employees about this. If there are substantial governance changes downstream of learning from FTX, then I would love to hear them, but none such changes have been announced and when I have asked the literal question “why has nothing happened at CEA as a result of FTX?” people have not usually responded with “oh, what do you mean, we have made substantial governance changes like X”.
Overall, I don’t think Zack gets to claim any of the things in this paragraph as substantial evidence of reform or of a substantial internal reflection process. I think the COI policy maybe is real, but I don’t know the details and I presently doubt it.
(Edit: I realized I forgot that Zack also refered to changes to the board composition. Those do seem more real, with both Nick and Will stepping down. My best sense is that Nick would have been a good board member and better than alternatives, so I would take that as a step backwards, not forwards, despite his FTX ties. Overall my sense has been that changes to the board have been primarily driven by burnout and stress related to FTX, and not the result of FTX-adjacent reform. At least I haven’t heard of any plans or any intentional selection of board members with specific FTX-reform adjacent ideas in mind. But overall I do think that “changes in board composition were part of an internal reform effort” is the most defensible part of that paragraph and doesn’t seem disingenuous the way the others seem to me)
‘I mean, I don’t think the right less to take away from FTX is to be much more hesitant about accepting money from people. The key thing to understand is why EA seems to have created FTX in the first place.’
In your view, what are the right lessons and why did EA create FTX?
I also have lots of other thoughts and would love to talk more about the details with people, though this specific comment thread seems probably not the right place for it.
Considering how much mud was being slung around the FTX collapse, “clearing CEA’s name” and proving that no one there knew about the fraud seems not just like PR to me, but pretty important for getting the org back to a place where it’s able to meaningfully do its work.
Plus, that investigation is not the only thing mentioned in the reflection reform paragraph. The very next sentence also says CEA has “reinvested in donor due diligence, updated our conflict-of-interest policies and reformed the governance of our organization, replacing leadership on the board and the staff.”
I don’t know of any staff that was let go as a result of FTX reflections (and I have asked about this repeatedly). Many people quit, but nobody was fired for any FTX things among leadership, and nobody who quit would have been fired. There is some small chance I am missing some supposed staff changes here, but claiming that CEA “replaced leadership on the staff” as a result of FTX seems straightforwardly false (though if there was something behind the scenes that I don’t know about, I would love to hear it, but I currently disbelieve the bolded section).
The rest of the statements here seem pretty vacuous and almost impossible to falsify, and very hard distinguish from being done for PR reasons as opposed to genuine reflection. Briefly going through the areas where change is claimed:
Donor due diligence: I mean, I don’t think the right lesson to take away from FTX is to be much more hesitant about accepting money from people. The key thing to understand is why EA seems to have created FTX in the first place. So I don’t see the relevance of this. Yes, accepting the money was bad PR, I don’t think it was bad for the world (there is some decision-theoretic argument here that maybe by refusing to accept money from bad people would have disincentivized the bad things happening, but I think that’s very weak).
Conflict-of-interest policies: This seems maybe real. Conflicts of interest did possibly play a substantial role in FTX, but it really doesn’t seem like the primary dynamic going on. I do struggle to understand how anything like CEA-internal conflict of interest policies would have helped with anything like FTX.
I also haven’t seen these conflict of interest policies, and judging whether they seem like meaningful reform would require engaging with the details.
Reformed the governance of our organization: EV is shutting down, which seems like the biggest governance reform. It is the case that EV was a huge legal mess, and that FTX did seem like mild like evidence that you should have fewer shell companies and stuff, and maybe value standard operating practices more. It’s not completely unrelated, but I really struggle to see how “things like EV don’t exist” would somehow have made a difference for FTX happening.
Within CEA, I don’t know of any governance reform that seem downstream of any FTX reflection, and I have talked to many CEA employees about this. If there are substantial governance changes downstream of learning from FTX, then I would love to hear them, but none such changes have been announced and when I have asked the literal question “why has nothing happened at CEA as a result of FTX?” people have not usually responded with “oh, what do you mean, we have made substantial governance changes like X”.
Overall, I don’t think Zack gets to claim any of the things in this paragraph as substantial evidence of reform or of a substantial internal reflection process. I think the COI policy maybe is real, but I don’t know the details and I presently doubt it.
(Edit: I realized I forgot that Zack also refered to changes to the board composition. Those do seem more real, with both Nick and Will stepping down. My best sense is that Nick would have been a good board member and better than alternatives, so I would take that as a step backwards, not forwards, despite his FTX ties. Overall my sense has been that changes to the board have been primarily driven by burnout and stress related to FTX, and not the result of FTX-adjacent reform. At least I haven’t heard of any plans or any intentional selection of board members with specific FTX-reform adjacent ideas in mind. But overall I do think that “changes in board composition were part of an internal reform effort” is the most defensible part of that paragraph and doesn’t seem disingenuous the way the others seem to me)
‘I mean, I don’t think the right less to take away from FTX is to be much more hesitant about accepting money from people. The key thing to understand is why EA seems to have created FTX in the first place.’
In your view, what are the right lessons and why did EA create FTX?
I’ve written a post about some of my best guesses here:
https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/MMM24repKAzYxZqjn/my-tentative-best-guess-on-how-eas-and-rationalists
I also have lots of other thoughts and would love to talk more about the details with people, though this specific comment thread seems probably not the right place for it.