I haven’t really thought this through in any detail, but I wonder if the EA/rationalist obsession with deeply analyzing and debating everything makes them bad at memes.
This seems really plausible to me. I think I’m above average among EAs at memes.
It’s more than really plausible. It’s definitely true. In general, effective altruists tends to suck at making memes. More than a humble opinion, it is a fact that you’re in the top half of the top decile for making memes in EA. I wouldn’t be surprised if you’re in the top percentile. It’s not hard. Most effective altruists are just not that good at making memes.
So after releasing a tentative summary of research done by a coworker and I, I thought it’d be really cool to summarize our (very long) post in a few quick memes. But every time I try to do this (and seriously, I’ve spent ~30 minutes by now across multiple false starts), I get stuck because I worry too much about the memes not conveying the appropriate level of nuance or whatever, plus I worry about seeming too irreverent and accidentally making light of some people’s life’s work, plus… :/
You should have come to me. You could have messaged any major meme-maker in dank EA memes. This wouldn’t be hard. Even with concerns with being too irreverent, the solution is to run the memes by whoever did the work first. We’ve done that in dank EA memes before with Brian Tomasik or David Denkenberger.
It’s more than really plausible. It’s definitely true. In general, effective altruists tends to suck at making memes. More than a humble opinion, it is a fact that you’re in the top half of the top decile for making memes in EA. I wouldn’t be surprised if you’re in the top percentile. It’s not hard. Most effective altruists are just not that good at making memes.
You should have come to me. You could have messaged any major meme-maker in dank EA memes. This wouldn’t be hard. Even with concerns with being too irreverent, the solution is to run the memes by whoever did the work first. We’ve done that in dank EA memes before with Brian Tomasik or David Denkenberger.