Your conflict of interest here feels enormous (even if declared) and its hard to read this and not feel like it might be a bid to directly protect your own interests by asking others to not step into your turf here as a lobbyist.
I think you could also read it as him attempting to solve the problem he’s describing.
That’s true, and that could well be the case. However his job is to raise more money for his fund, and discouraging others from lobbying could help him raise more money while increasing the power/influence of the fund he works for. This may well be an unfortunate coincidence, but a higher level lobbyist asking lower level people not to lobby invites at least a bit of scrutiny.
Hi Nick, thanks for engaging. I agree that in writing this, there is a level of scrutiny I’ve opened myself up to. I’ll respond to some of the main points:
I agree that everything I’ve said in this post conveniently aligns with my job. I also have said them not to gatekeep but because I think it is true and has signficant implications for the future of funding in EA.
I endeavour to provide services to Anthropic staff that sit at the intersection of valuable to them AND good for the world. For example, I’ve spent a fair bit of time advocating for recommended default splits across cause areas based on feedback from a few Anthropic staff. We’ve also developed resources on some of the main fund options in the animal advocacy space and run an event in SF to ask questions of the fund managers.
The default preference to defer to funds has come from Anthropic staff communicating that for most of them, that’s their preference due to lacking the time or expertise. If individuals at Anthropic have wanted to donate to individual organisations, we’ve been happy to make introductions or specific recommendations.
I agree there is a collective action problem at the level of funds, and how that is navigated is important. I just think that it is a much smaller pool of pitches than at the organisation level. FWIW there have been ongoing efforts among the funders in FAW to coordinate to reduce the collective action problem.
Apologies, by that I mean a few Anthropic staff said one thing that was missing from the donor advisor space was recommendations of what % of their donations to allocate across cause areas, so this is something I tried to make happen by advocating for a few other organisations and individuals to do this.
I think you could also read it as him attempting to solve the problem he’s describing.
That’s true, and that could well be the case. However his job is to raise more money for his fund, and discouraging others from lobbying could help him raise more money while increasing the power/influence of the fund he works for. This may well be an unfortunate coincidence, but a higher level lobbyist asking lower level people not to lobby invites at least a bit of scrutiny.
Hi Nick, thanks for engaging. I agree that in writing this, there is a level of scrutiny I’ve opened myself up to. I’ll respond to some of the main points:
I agree that everything I’ve said in this post conveniently aligns with my job. I also have said them not to gatekeep but because I think it is true and has signficant implications for the future of funding in EA.
I endeavour to provide services to Anthropic staff that sit at the intersection of valuable to them AND good for the world. For example, I’ve spent a fair bit of time advocating for recommended default splits across cause areas based on feedback from a few Anthropic staff. We’ve also developed resources on some of the main fund options in the animal advocacy space and run an event in SF to ask questions of the fund managers.
The default preference to defer to funds has come from Anthropic staff communicating that for most of them, that’s their preference due to lacking the time or expertise. If individuals at Anthropic have wanted to donate to individual organisations, we’ve been happy to make introductions or specific recommendations.
I agree there is a collective action problem at the level of funds, and how that is navigated is important. I just think that it is a much smaller pool of pitches than at the organisation level. FWIW there have been ongoing efforts among the funders in FAW to coordinate to reduce the collective action problem.
Thanks @ElliotTep that’s all very reasonable. As a side question I was wondering what you mean by this exactly?
”I’ve spent a fair bit of time advocating for recommended default splits across cause areas based on feedback from a few Anthropic staff.”
Apologies, by that I mean a few Anthropic staff said one thing that was missing from the donor advisor space was recommendations of what % of their donations to allocate across cause areas, so this is something I tried to make happen by advocating for a few other organisations and individuals to do this.