I’ve concluded that Dustin Moskowitz shouldn’t go full Dark Brandon after all. It’d not just be suboptimal. It’d be too risky and could backfire. I don’t know at what point it’d happen specifically, though at some point there’d be diminishing marginal returns to Dustin adopting more of Dark Brandon-esque personal style. In hindsight, I should’ve applied the classic too for so much effective altruism, thinking on the margin, to the question: what is the optimal amount of Dark Brandon Dustin Moskowitz should embrace?
Dustin leaning in a more Dark-Brandon-esque direction couldn’t totally solve any problems EA faces. There are some kinds of problems Dustin doing so couldn’t solve. It could ameliorate the severity of some problems, in particular some image problems EA has.
For those who don’t know at all what I’m getting at, I’m thinking about how Dustin Moskowitz might tweak his public image or personal brand than to improve upon its decent standing right now. Dustin is not the subject of as many conspiracy theories as many other billionaires and philanthropists, especially as one who had his start on Silicon Valley. He’s not the butt of as many jokes as Mark Zuckerberg or Jeff Bezos about how he’s a robot or an alien. If you asked a socialist, or someone who just hates billionaires for whatever reason, to make a list of the ten worst billionaires they hate the most, Dustin Moskowitz is one name that would almost certainly not make it onto the list.
The downside risk of Dustin becoming a more controversial or bold personality gets at the value he provides to EA by being the opposite. That he has been a quieter philanthropist has caused him not to be seen nearly as much as the poster boy for EA as a movement. Hypothetically, for the sake of argument, if Asana went bankrupt for some reason, that would not be nearly as bad for EA as the collapse of FTX was. Dustin not feuding with so many people like Elon Musk has means he doesn’t have nearly as many enemies. That means the EA community overall has far fewer enemies. It’s less hated. It’s not as polarized or politicized. These are all very good things. Much of that is thanks to Dustin being more normal and less eccentric, less volatile and more predictable, and more of a private person than blowhard.
I thought more this morning about my shortform post from yesterday (https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/KfwFDkfQFQ4kAurwH/evan_gaensbauer-s-shortform?commentId=SjzKMiw5wBe7bGKyT)and I’ve changed my mind about much of it. I expected my post to be downvoted because most people would perceive it as a stupid and irrelevant take. Here are some reasons I disagree now, though I couldn’t guess whether anyone downvoted my post because they took my take seriously but still thought it sucked.
I’ve concluded that Dustin Moskowitz shouldn’t go full Dark Brandon after all. It’d not just be suboptimal. It’d be too risky and could backfire. I don’t know at what point it’d happen specifically, though at some point there’d be diminishing marginal returns to Dustin adopting more of Dark Brandon-esque personal style. In hindsight, I should’ve applied the classic too for so much effective altruism, thinking on the margin, to the question: what is the optimal amount of Dark Brandon Dustin Moskowitz should embrace?
Dustin leaning in a more Dark-Brandon-esque direction couldn’t totally solve any problems EA faces. There are some kinds of problems Dustin doing so couldn’t solve. It could ameliorate the severity of some problems, in particular some image problems EA has.
For those who don’t know at all what I’m getting at, I’m thinking about how Dustin Moskowitz might tweak his public image or personal brand than to improve upon its decent standing right now. Dustin is not the subject of as many conspiracy theories as many other billionaires and philanthropists, especially as one who had his start on Silicon Valley. He’s not the butt of as many jokes as Mark Zuckerberg or Jeff Bezos about how he’s a robot or an alien. If you asked a socialist, or someone who just hates billionaires for whatever reason, to make a list of the ten worst billionaires they hate the most, Dustin Moskowitz is one name that would almost certainly not make it onto the list.
The downside risk of Dustin becoming a more controversial or bold personality gets at the value he provides to EA by being the opposite. That he has been a quieter philanthropist has caused him not to be seen nearly as much as the poster boy for EA as a movement. Hypothetically, for the sake of argument, if Asana went bankrupt for some reason, that would not be nearly as bad for EA as the collapse of FTX was. Dustin not feuding with so many people like Elon Musk has means he doesn’t have nearly as many enemies. That means the EA community overall has far fewer enemies. It’s less hated. It’s not as polarized or politicized. These are all very good things. Much of that is thanks to Dustin being more normal and less eccentric, less volatile and more predictable, and more of a private person than blowhard.