If they’re students, they’ll most likely be studying at a university outside Blackpool and might not be able to do so remotely.
Regarding studying, it would mainly be suitable for those doing so independently online (it’s possible to take many world class courses on EdX and Coursera for free). But could also be of use to university students outside of term time (say to do extra classes online, or an independent research project, over the summer).
they’ll very likely be able to get funding from an EA donor
As John Maxwell says, I don’t think we are there yet with current seed funding options.
the hotel would mainly support work that the EA community as a whole would view as lower-quality
This might indeed be so, but given the much lower costs it’s possible that the quality-adjusted-work-per-£-spent rate could still be equal to—or higher than—the community average.
.. without the leadership and presence of highly experienced EAs (who work there as e.g. hotel managers / trustees).
I think it’s important to have experienced EAs in these positions for this reason.
Regarding “bad” EA projects, only one comes to mind, and it doesn’t seem to have caused much lasting damage. In the OP, I say that the “dynamics of status and prestige in the non-profit world seem to be geared toward being averse to risk-of-failure to a much greater extent than in the for-profit world (see e.g. the high rate of failure for VC funded start-ups). Perhaps we need to close this gap, considering that the bottom line results of EA activity are often considered in terms expected utility.” Are PR concerns a solid justification for this discrepancy between EA and VC? Or do Spencer Greenberg’s concerns about start-ups mean that EA is right in this regard and it’s VC that is wrong (even in terms of their approach to maximising monetary value)?
the enthusiasm for this project may be partly driven by social reasons
There’s nothing wrong with this, as long as people participating at the hotel for largely social reasons pay their own way (and don’t disrupt others’ work).
Regarding “bad” EA projects, only one comes to mind, and it doesn’t seem to have caused much lasting damage. In the OP, I say that the “dynamics of status and prestige in the non-profit world seem to be geared toward being averse to risk-of-failure to a much greater extent than in the for-profit world (see e.g. the high rate of failure for VC funded start-ups). Perhaps we need to close this gap, considering that the bottom line results of EA activity are often considered in terms expected utility.” Are PR concerns a solid justification for this discrepancy between EA and VC? Or do Spencer Greenberg’s concerns about start-ups mean that EA is right in this regard and it’s VC that is wrong (even in terms of their approach to maximising monetary value)?
Just wanted to flag that I disagree with this for a number of reasons. E.g. I think some of EAF’s sub-projects probably had negative impact, and I’m skeptical that these plus InIn were the only ones. I might write an EA forum post about how EA projects can have negative impacts at some point but it’s not my current priority. See also this facebook comment for some of the ideas.
Regarding your last point, VCs are maximizing their own profit, but Spencer talks about externalities.
Following on vollmer’s point, it might be reasonable to have a blanket rule against policy/PR/political/etc work—anything that is irreversible and difficult to evaluate. “Not being able to get funding from other sources” is definitely a negative signal, so it seems worthwhile to restrict guests to projects whose worst possible outcome is unproductively diverting resources.
On the other hand, I really can’t imagine what harm research projects could do; I guess the worst case scenario is someone so persuasive they can convince lots of EAs of their ideas but so bad at research their ideas are all wrong, which doesn’t seem very likely. (why not
‘malicious & persuasive people’? the community can probably identify those more easily by the subjects they write about)
Furthermore, guests’ ability to engage in negative-EV projects will be constrained by the low stipend and terrible location (if I wanted to engage in Irish republican activism, living at the EA hotel wouldn’t help very much). I think the largest danger to be alert for is reputation risk, especially from bad popularizations of EA, since this is easier to do remotely (one example is Intentional Insights, the only negative-EV EA project I know of)
This basically applies to everything as a matter of degree, so it looks impossible to put in a blanket rule. Suppose I raise £10 and send it to AMF. That’s irreversible. Is it difficult to evaluate? Depends what you mean by ‘difficult’ and what the comparison class is.
Regarding studying, it would mainly be suitable for those doing so independently online (it’s possible to take many world class courses on EdX and Coursera for free). But could also be of use to university students outside of term time (say to do extra classes online, or an independent research project, over the summer).
Fully-funded living expenses could also open up the option of The Open University for some people.
the enthusiasm for this project may be partly driven by social reasons
There’s nothing wrong with this, as long as people participating at the hotel for largely social reasons pay their own way (and don’t disrupt others’ work).
I think vollmer just meant to caution against readers taking upvotes as a proxy for the value of a project.
Regarding studying, it would mainly be suitable for those doing so independently online (it’s possible to take many world class courses on EdX and Coursera for free). But could also be of use to university students outside of term time (say to do extra classes online, or an independent research project, over the summer).
As John Maxwell says, I don’t think we are there yet with current seed funding options.
This might indeed be so, but given the much lower costs it’s possible that the quality-adjusted-work-per-£-spent rate could still be equal to—or higher than—the community average.
I think it’s important to have experienced EAs in these positions for this reason.
Regarding “bad” EA projects, only one comes to mind, and it doesn’t seem to have caused much lasting damage. In the OP, I say that the “dynamics of status and prestige in the non-profit world seem to be geared toward being averse to risk-of-failure to a much greater extent than in the for-profit world (see e.g. the high rate of failure for VC funded start-ups). Perhaps we need to close this gap, considering that the bottom line results of EA activity are often considered in terms expected utility.” Are PR concerns a solid justification for this discrepancy between EA and VC? Or do Spencer Greenberg’s concerns about start-ups mean that EA is right in this regard and it’s VC that is wrong (even in terms of their approach to maximising monetary value)?
There’s nothing wrong with this, as long as people participating at the hotel for largely social reasons pay their own way (and don’t disrupt others’ work).
Just wanted to flag that I disagree with this for a number of reasons. E.g. I think some of EAF’s sub-projects probably had negative impact, and I’m skeptical that these plus InIn were the only ones. I might write an EA forum post about how EA projects can have negative impacts at some point but it’s not my current priority. See also this facebook comment for some of the ideas.
Regarding your last point, VCs are maximizing their own profit, but Spencer talks about externalities.
Following on vollmer’s point, it might be reasonable to have a blanket rule against policy/PR/political/etc work—anything that is irreversible and difficult to evaluate. “Not being able to get funding from other sources” is definitely a negative signal, so it seems worthwhile to restrict guests to projects whose worst possible outcome is unproductively diverting resources.
On the other hand, I really can’t imagine what harm research projects could do; I guess the worst case scenario is someone so persuasive they can convince lots of EAs of their ideas but so bad at research their ideas are all wrong, which doesn’t seem very likely. (why not ‘malicious & persuasive people’? the community can probably identify those more easily by the subjects they write about)
Furthermore, guests’ ability to engage in negative-EV projects will be constrained by the low stipend and terrible location (if I wanted to engage in Irish republican activism, living at the EA hotel wouldn’t help very much). I think the largest danger to be alert for is reputation risk, especially from bad popularizations of EA, since this is easier to do remotely (one example is Intentional Insights, the only negative-EV EA project I know of)
This basically applies to everything as a matter of degree, so it looks impossible to put in a blanket rule. Suppose I raise £10 and send it to AMF. That’s irreversible. Is it difficult to evaluate? Depends what you mean by ‘difficult’ and what the comparison class is.
I agree research projects are more robustly positive. Information hazards are one main way in which they could do a significant amount of harm.
Fully-funded living expenses could also open up the option of The Open University for some people.
I think vollmer just meant to caution against readers taking upvotes as a proxy for the value of a project.