(Edit: sorry for the harshness, but I thought it important to convey that I really oppose this.)
This really seems to incentivise deception and secrecy. Take the example of a “reputational risk”—an organisation could take an action that the public would think is bad—and most importantly, people who interact with the organisation in good faith would think is bad—and you’re explicitly encouraging them to do it anyway and just hide it. Why would we want this?
and most importantly, people who interact with the organisation in good faith would think is bad
Those are your words, not the words in the OP.
If I was in the evaluation committee it would be one of my evaluation criteria that people interacting with the organization in good faith would think it was a good deed / good involvement on part of the prize contender (and it would be strange to do it differently, so I don’t expect the evaluation committee to think differently).
Okay, I think you have a good point. The post “PR” is corrosive, “reputation” is not, which I really like and agree with, argues that “reputation” is the thing that actually matters. A good way to describe reputation is indeed “how you come across to people who interact with you in good faith.” Based on this definition, I agree with your point!
That said, I interpreted the OP charitably in that I assumed they’re talking about what Anna Salomon (author of the linked post) would call “PR risks.” Anna’s recommendation there is to basically not care about PR risk at all. By contrast, I think it’s sometimes okay (but kind of a necessary evil) to care about PR risks. For instance, you have more to lose if you’re running for a seat in politics than if you’re a niche organization that anyway doesn’t do a ton of public-facing communications. (But it’s annoying and I would often recommend that orgs don’t worry about them much and focus on the things that uphold their reputation, more narrowly construed, i.e., “among people whose opinions are worth caring about.”)
Anyway, I reversed my downvote of your comment because I like a definition of “reputational risk” where it’s basically generally bad not to care about it. I didn’t change it into an upvote because you seem to disagree with the secrecy/censorship elements of the post in general (you gave “reputational risks” as an example, but worded your post in a way that implies you also have qualms with a bunch of other aspects – so far, I don’t share this aversion; I think secrecy/censorship are sometimes appropriate).
Organizations or people that did the type of thing you’re suggesting wouldn’t get an award. Obviously. The award is for doing good things, not hiding bad ones.
And if someone misunderstood this, and for whatever reason nominated such behavior, I would expect that anyone on the prize committee would, if anything, highlight the misbehavior within the EA community, and the organization or person in question would have much more difficulty getting funded, hired, or supported in the future.
A political figure lies about Sam’s accomplishment to manipulate people into accepting it.
Greg hides his involvement with a controversial field from the public or the elected officials and avoids scrutiny.
An organisation hides the involvement of an unwanted person from the public (who are potential donors) and from partners. Max claims he is reformed, but how do the prize judges know? Is it really their job to decide? (This is actually relevant to ongoing EA-adjacent research.)
Again it is quite unclear why disclosing Steve’s involvement would undermine the project—but if it does, why does this justify hiding it? Maybe it’s really bad to accept Steve’s contributions—again, is it for you to judge?
Edit: there are lots of downvotes. Would someone care to explain why this is a “bad comment” or what you disagree with?
I think that you’re assuming the judges will give awards to bad / damaging actions. Obviously, the context will matter, and given who the judges are, I expect that they will be first, not interested in giving out a prize for bad things, and second, cognizant of the potential reputational and other issues which might be involved in giving out a prize.
And regarding “is it for you to judge?” I think the answer is yes—community leaders, including those who are judges for the prizes, are absolutely the people who would be making decisions about the types of things that the community should recognize and honor, in consultation with others who might be needed in order to investigate or determine what is reasonable. Hence the structure of the prize.
I think that you’re assuming the judges will give awards to bad / damaging actions.
I’m assuming the judges will give prizes to actions that fit the outline of the examples in the post. If 80% of them seem bad/damaging, how should I trust that the judges will only issue prizes based on the singular better example?
You’re still stridently assuming that the judges will fail to use their best judgement, or that you think they are too dumb to realize that obvious failure modes are bad...
(Edit: sorry for the harshness, but I thought it important to convey that I really oppose this.)
This really seems to incentivise deception and secrecy. Take the example of a “reputational risk”—an organisation could take an action that the public would think is bad—and most importantly, people who interact with the organisation in good faith would think is bad—and you’re explicitly encouraging them to do it anyway and just hide it. Why would we want this?
Those are your words, not the words in the OP.
If I was in the evaluation committee it would be one of my evaluation criteria that people interacting with the organization in good faith would think it was a good deed / good involvement on part of the prize contender (and it would be strange to do it differently, so I don’t expect the evaluation committee to think differently).
What do you take a reputational risk to be? If it’s something that would be OK with people interacting with the org, how is it a risk?
Okay, I think you have a good point. The post “PR” is corrosive, “reputation” is not, which I really like and agree with, argues that “reputation” is the thing that actually matters. A good way to describe reputation is indeed “how you come across to people who interact with you in good faith.” Based on this definition, I agree with your point!
That said, I interpreted the OP charitably in that I assumed they’re talking about what Anna Salomon (author of the linked post) would call “PR risks.” Anna’s recommendation there is to basically not care about PR risk at all. By contrast, I think it’s sometimes okay (but kind of a necessary evil) to care about PR risks. For instance, you have more to lose if you’re running for a seat in politics than if you’re a niche organization that anyway doesn’t do a ton of public-facing communications. (But it’s annoying and I would often recommend that orgs don’t worry about them much and focus on the things that uphold their reputation, more narrowly construed, i.e., “among people whose opinions are worth caring about.”)
Anyway, I reversed my downvote of your comment because I like a definition of “reputational risk” where it’s basically generally bad not to care about it. I didn’t change it into an upvote because you seem to disagree with the secrecy/censorship elements of the post in general (you gave “reputational risks” as an example, but worded your post in a way that implies you also have qualms with a bunch of other aspects – so far, I don’t share this aversion; I think secrecy/censorship are sometimes appropriate).
Organizations or people that did the type of thing you’re suggesting wouldn’t get an award. Obviously. The award is for doing good things, not hiding bad ones.
And if someone misunderstood this, and for whatever reason nominated such behavior, I would expect that anyone on the prize committee would, if anything, highlight the misbehavior within the EA community, and the organization or person in question would have much more difficulty getting funded, hired, or supported in the future.
Most of the examples you gave seem bad:
A political figure lies about Sam’s accomplishment to manipulate people into accepting it.
Greg hides his involvement with a controversial field from the public or the elected officials and avoids scrutiny.
An organisation hides the involvement of an unwanted person from the public (who are potential donors) and from partners. Max claims he is reformed, but how do the prize judges know? Is it really their job to decide? (This is actually relevant to ongoing EA-adjacent research.)
Again it is quite unclear why disclosing Steve’s involvement would undermine the project—but if it does, why does this justify hiding it? Maybe it’s really bad to accept Steve’s contributions—again, is it for you to judge?
Edit: there are lots of downvotes. Would someone care to explain why this is a “bad comment” or what you disagree with?
I think that you’re assuming the judges will give awards to bad / damaging actions. Obviously, the context will matter, and given who the judges are, I expect that they will be first, not interested in giving out a prize for bad things, and second, cognizant of the potential reputational and other issues which might be involved in giving out a prize.
And regarding “is it for you to judge?” I think the answer is yes—community leaders, including those who are judges for the prizes, are absolutely the people who would be making decisions about the types of things that the community should recognize and honor, in consultation with others who might be needed in order to investigate or determine what is reasonable. Hence the structure of the prize.
I’m assuming the judges will give prizes to actions that fit the outline of the examples in the post. If 80% of them seem bad/damaging, how should I trust that the judges will only issue prizes based on the singular better example?
You’re still stridently assuming that the judges will fail to use their best judgement, or that you think they are too dumb to realize that obvious failure modes are bad...