“Living expenses while doing some of my early research” is one of the main purposes of the LTFF; to me Atlas feels like a roundabout way of getting that. LTFF asks you to have a specific high-impact project or educational opportunity for you to pursue, but as far as I know that wasn’t true of Atlas.
I think The Century Fellowship would make a better comparison to the Thiel Fellowship than Atlas would. It seems aimed at similar types to the Thiel Fellowship (college age people who are prepared to start projects and need to be financially independent to do so), while Atlas targets a slightly younger demographic and gives scholarships.
Atlas is posed as a talent search and development program, so I think any evaluation of Atlas should focus on how well it is searching for and developing talent that would not otherwise exist. I personally don’t know anything about how that has been turning out, or what the graduates have done/are doing with the money, so I don’t feel very qualified to evaluate it myself.
“Living expenses while doing some of my early research” is one of the main purposes of the LTFF
I eventually did get a grant from the LTFF, but it was once I had a more or less clear research direction. Idk, it’s possible that I could now write a good grant application for exploratory and independent thinking, but at the time I would probably have produced a very awkward ask.
“Living expenses while doing some of my early research” is one of the main purposes of the LTFF; to me Atlas feels like a roundabout way of getting that. LTFF asks you to have a specific high-impact project or educational opportunity for you to pursue, but as far as I know that wasn’t true of Atlas.
I think The Century Fellowship would make a better comparison to the Thiel Fellowship than Atlas would. It seems aimed at similar types to the Thiel Fellowship (college age people who are prepared to start projects and need to be financially independent to do so), while Atlas targets a slightly younger demographic and gives scholarships.
Atlas is posed as a talent search and development program, so I think any evaluation of Atlas should focus on how well it is searching for and developing talent that would not otherwise exist. I personally don’t know anything about how that has been turning out, or what the graduates have done/are doing with the money, so I don’t feel very qualified to evaluate it myself.
I eventually did get a grant from the LTFF, but it was once I had a more or less clear research direction. Idk, it’s possible that I could now write a good grant application for exploratory and independent thinking, but at the time I would probably have produced a very awkward ask.