Our funding bar is higher now than it was in previous years, and there are projects which EAIF funded in previous years that we would be unlikely to fund now.
Could you expand on why that’s the case? Is the idea that you believe those projects are net negative, or that you would rather marginal donations go to animal welfare and the long term future instead of EA infrastructure?
I think it’s a bit weird for donors who want to donate to EA infrastructure projects to see that initiatives like EA Poland are funding constrained while the EA Infrastructure fund isn’t, and extra donations to the EAIF will likely counterfactually go to other cause areas.
Could you expand on why that’s the case? Is the idea that you believe those projects are net negative, or that you would rather marginal donations go to animal welfare and the long term future instead of EA infrastructure?
In some cases there are projects that I or other fund managers think are net negative, but this is rare. Often things that we decide against funding I think are net positive, but think that the projects aren’t competitive with funding things outside of the EA Infrastructure space (either the other EA Funds or more broadly).
I think it makes sense that there are projects which EAIF decides not to fund, and that other people will still be excited about funding (and in these cases I think it makes sense for people to consider donating to those projects directly). Could you elaborate a bit on what you find weird?
and extra donations to the EAIF will likely counterfactually go to other cause areas
I don’t think this is the case. Extra donations to EAIF will help us build up more reserves for granting out at a future date. But it’s not the case that eg. if EAIF has more money that we think that we can spend well at the moment, that we’ll then eg. start donating this to other cause areas. I might have misunderstood you here?
Could you expand on why that’s the case? Is the idea that you believe those projects are net negative, or that you would rather marginal donations go to animal welfare and the long term future instead of EA infrastructure?
I think it’s a bit weird for donors who want to donate to EA infrastructure projects to see that initiatives like EA Poland are funding constrained while the EA Infrastructure fund isn’t, and extra donations to the EAIF will likely counterfactually go to other cause areas.
In some cases there are projects that I or other fund managers think are net negative, but this is rare. Often things that we decide against funding I think are net positive, but think that the projects aren’t competitive with funding things outside of the EA Infrastructure space (either the other EA Funds or more broadly).
I think it makes sense that there are projects which EAIF decides not to fund, and that other people will still be excited about funding (and in these cases I think it makes sense for people to consider donating to those projects directly). Could you elaborate a bit on what you find weird?
I don’t think this is the case. Extra donations to EAIF will help us build up more reserves for granting out at a future date. But it’s not the case that eg. if EAIF has more money that we think that we can spend well at the moment, that we’ll then eg. start donating this to other cause areas. I might have misunderstood you here?