If there are existing bounties, what’s stopping random people from just going after the bounties themselves? For example, there was recently a writing contest on imagining positive AI futures; anyone could have written a piece.
My impression is most of the talent bottlenecks are in areas where random people just don’t have the skills, and where you need to be confident people are well-aligned. E.g. government/policy, management, entrepreneurs (broadly construed, to include starting charities). The third category you can’t really even hire; you just have to make money available and let ppl come and get it if they’re working on something relevant.
what’s stopping random people from just going after the bounties themselves?
Simple answer—they don’t know the bounties exist. Bounties are usually only posted in local EA groups, and if you’re outside of those groups, even if you’re looking for bounties to collect, the amount of effort it would take to find out about our community’s bounty postings would be prohibitively high (and there’s plenty of lower-hanging fruit in search space). Likewise, many large companies hire recruiters to expressly go out and find talent, rather than hoping that talent finds them. The market is efficient, but it is not omniscient.
If there are existing bounties, what’s stopping random people from just going after the bounties themselves? For example, there was recently a writing contest on imagining positive AI futures; anyone could have written a piece.
My impression is most of the talent bottlenecks are in areas where random people just don’t have the skills, and where you need to be confident people are well-aligned. E.g. government/policy, management, entrepreneurs (broadly construed, to include starting charities). The third category you can’t really even hire; you just have to make money available and let ppl come and get it if they’re working on something relevant.
Simple answer—they don’t know the bounties exist. Bounties are usually only posted in local EA groups, and if you’re outside of those groups, even if you’re looking for bounties to collect, the amount of effort it would take to find out about our community’s bounty postings would be prohibitively high (and there’s plenty of lower-hanging fruit in search space). Likewise, many large companies hire recruiters to expressly go out and find talent, rather than hoping that talent finds them. The market is efficient, but it is not omniscient.