I’ve recently been writing a long-form post, and I realised that it’s taking a while. I was sort of struck by the thought: is everyone doing this? When I see people talk about spending too much time on the forum (and I usually don’t—I think I’ve only seen two or three people say this), it’s usually to do with doom scrolling, or something like that. But might people also be spending a lot of time just writing stuff? I’m not sure of the concrete opportunity cost here, but I’m sure there’s some. I’m not especially well-versed in the “meta trap” thing—I think this was a debate people had before I got interested in EA—but it seems like this is way it could (or does!) happen. Thoughts?
It takes a lot of time, and is inadequately rewarded. Some people who write long-form stuff are exceedingly smart, so it’s easier for them. Which is why easier-to-write & at-best-shallowly-researched stuff is the norm.
I’m not really too concerned with quality—I’m just much more worried about time. Actually, I think a lot of stuff on EA Forum/LW is really good, and I’ve learned a lot here. It just seems like an awful lot of people write an awful lot of stuff, and I’m not really sure everyone needs to spend so long writing. That said, I’m not sure how you’d fix this other than implementing something like the existing quick takes feature.
I’ve recently been writing a long-form post, and I realised that it’s taking a while. I was sort of struck by the thought: is everyone doing this? When I see people talk about spending too much time on the forum (and I usually don’t—I think I’ve only seen two or three people say this), it’s usually to do with doom scrolling, or something like that. But might people also be spending a lot of time just writing stuff? I’m not sure of the concrete opportunity cost here, but I’m sure there’s some. I’m not especially well-versed in the “meta trap” thing—I think this was a debate people had before I got interested in EA—but it seems like this is way it could (or does!) happen. Thoughts?
Yes, writing good stuff is hard.
It takes a lot of time, and is inadequately rewarded. Some people who write long-form stuff are exceedingly smart, so it’s easier for them. Which is why easier-to-write & at-best-shallowly-researched stuff is the norm.
I’m not really too concerned with quality—I’m just much more worried about time. Actually, I think a lot of stuff on EA Forum/LW is really good, and I’ve learned a lot here. It just seems like an awful lot of people write an awful lot of stuff, and I’m not really sure everyone needs to spend so long writing. That said, I’m not sure how you’d fix this other than implementing something like the existing quick takes feature.