[Third edit to add my current position on 22/12/23]
I said below that I would read the arguments from both sides and then make a final decision. I haven’t done that because I didn’t have time, and it didn’t feel like high value. Especially in light of later posts and comments by people who are better qualified. I feel that it is still better (or at least closer to keeping my prior commitment) to state my current position for future readers than to not say anything further. With that in mind, this (copied from elsewhere) is where I ended up:
Before BP post: NL are a sort of atypical, low structure EA group, doing entrepreneurial and coordination focused work that I think is probably positive impact. After BP post: NL are actually pretty exploitative and probably net negative overall. I’ll wait to hear their response, but I doubt it will change my mind very much. After NL post: NL are probably not exploitative. They made some big mistakes (and had bad luck) with some risks they took in hiring and working unconventionally. I think they are probably still likely to have a positive impact on expectation. I think that they have been treated harshly. After this post: I update to be feeling more confident that this wasn’t a fair way to judge NL and that these sorts of posts/investigations shouldn’t be a community norm.
I am still pretty uncertain overall. I definitely think that NL should be more careful and conventional in their hiring and work practices in the future.
I added this as an edit because I didn’t think it warranted a new comment, and a new comment would provoke more engagement and distract more people, etc.
[Second edit to say that I am not sure if I fully endorse this comment anymore. I briefly re-read some of the previous post by Ben and saw various claims that I didn’t recall and that I am not sure are refuted. I will try to find time to review everything in more detail tomorrow.]
[First edit: To split the comment into two parts because I want to know which part people are disagreeing/agreeing with. The removed content is in my first reply below]
I sympathise with everyone involved in this (and everyone like me who planned to do something productive and then stumbled across this or the original post).
It is very unfortunate that this saga does not seem to have resulted in a clear conclusion for the majority of readers. I doubt it ever will.
Personally, I have updated back to being relatively unconcerned about bad behaviour at Nonlinear (and feeling weakly positive about them in general, but very uncertain). It seems that some things were probably not done well but not to some exceptionally bad degree and I assume ignorance/fallibility, not malice.
I personally feel bad for not reaching out to Kat or others at nonlinear to offer support, commenting something on the original post expressing that I would withhold judgement until they responded, or managing to withhold judgement at the time.
[I probably won’t reply to any responses to this comment due to a lack of time].
One lesson I see in this saga that we, as a community, and hopefully as a society, should be more aware of the fact that accusations are sometimes false and a little slower to pass judgement or react to them.
I think that EAs are particularly vulnerable to a sort of ‘moral hazard’ of being especially receptive to perceived victims; many of us are empathetic people who feel strong moral obligations to help others. In this case, I can imagine Ben feeling a strong need or even obligation to do something and acting according. If so, what he did was actually very admirable, even if it turns out to have been misguided in hindsight.
I’ll also just quickly say that I am still somewhat conflicted about how to interpret the threat of legal action made by NL. On one hand, that seems extreme and a very bad signal for an EA organisation.
On the other hand, as we see here, someone publishing a lot of (in your view) false information about your organisation is extremely harmful and time-consuming to those who are invested in that organisation. It does irreparable damage to reputations and trust.
So this does seem like an exceptional circumstance where you might consider exceptional actions/threats—especially if you have a background in business and entrepreneurship, areas where threatening and taking legal action is normal and necessary.
Having written that, I am realising that I feel NL acted reasonably, knowing what I now know.
[Third edit to add my current position on 22/12/23]
I said below that I would read the arguments from both sides and then make a final decision. I haven’t done that because I didn’t have time, and it didn’t feel like high value. Especially in light of later posts and comments by people who are better qualified. I feel that it is still better (or at least closer to keeping my prior commitment) to state my current position for future readers than to not say anything further. With that in mind, this (copied from elsewhere) is where I ended up:
Before BP post: NL are a sort of atypical, low structure EA group, doing entrepreneurial and coordination focused work that I think is probably positive impact.
After BP post: NL are actually pretty exploitative and probably net negative overall. I’ll wait to hear their response, but I doubt it will change my mind very much.
After NL post: NL are probably not exploitative. They made some big mistakes (and had bad luck) with some risks they took in hiring and working unconventionally. I think they are probably still likely to have a positive impact on expectation. I think that they have been treated harshly.
After this post: I update to be feeling more confident that this wasn’t a fair way to judge NL and that these sorts of posts/investigations shouldn’t be a community norm.
I am still pretty uncertain overall. I definitely think that NL should be more careful and conventional in their hiring and work practices in the future.
I added this as an edit because I didn’t think it warranted a new comment, and a new comment would provoke more engagement and distract more people, etc.
[Second edit to say that I am not sure if I fully endorse this comment anymore. I briefly re-read some of the previous post by Ben and saw various claims that I didn’t recall and that I am not sure are refuted. I will try to find time to review everything in more detail tomorrow.]
[First edit: To split the comment into two parts because I want to know which part people are disagreeing/agreeing with. The removed content is in my first reply below]
I sympathise with everyone involved in this (and everyone like me who planned to do something productive and then stumbled across this or the original post).
It is very unfortunate that this saga does not seem to have resulted in a clear conclusion for the majority of readers. I doubt it ever will.
Personally, I have updated back to being relatively unconcerned about bad behaviour at Nonlinear (and feeling weakly positive about them in general, but very uncertain). It seems that some things were probably not done well but not to some exceptionally bad degree and I assume ignorance/fallibility, not malice.
I personally feel bad for not reaching out to Kat or others at nonlinear to offer support, commenting something on the original post expressing that I would withhold judgement until they responded, or managing to withhold judgement at the time.
[I probably won’t reply to any responses to this comment due to a lack of time].
One lesson I see in this saga that we, as a community, and hopefully as a society, should be more aware of the fact that accusations are sometimes false and a little slower to pass judgement or react to them.
I think that EAs are particularly vulnerable to a sort of ‘moral hazard’ of being especially receptive to perceived victims; many of us are empathetic people who feel strong moral obligations to help others. In this case, I can imagine Ben feeling a strong need or even obligation to do something and acting according. If so, what he did was actually very admirable, even if it turns out to have been misguided in hindsight.
I’ll also just quickly say that I am still somewhat conflicted about how to interpret the threat of legal action made by NL. On one hand, that seems extreme and a very bad signal for an EA organisation.
On the other hand, as we see here, someone publishing a lot of (in your view) false information about your organisation is extremely harmful and time-consuming to those who are invested in that organisation. It does irreparable damage to reputations and trust.
So this does seem like an exceptional circumstance where you might consider exceptional actions/threats—especially if you have a background in business and entrepreneurship, areas where threatening and taking legal action is normal and necessary.
Having written that, I am realising that I feel NL acted reasonably, knowing what I now know.
Yeah, I think that is my current position.