I agree with your assessment that Vasco’s comment is not really on topic.
I also feel like there is a lack of substantive discussion and just overall engagement on the forum (this post and comment section being an exception).
I’m not exactly sure why this is (maybe there just aren’t enough EA’s) but it seems related to users being worried that their comments might not add value combined with the lack of anonymity and in-group dynamics. In general I find hacker news and subreddits like r/neoliberal to be significantly more thought provoking and engaging even though I think the commenters of those subs are often engaging more hedonistically and less to add value. On the margin the EA forum should be more serious and have stricter norms than those communities, but I’m worried that forum users optimizing individual posts and comments for usefulness is lowering the overall usefulness of the forum.
I agree with your assessment that Vasco’s comment is not really on topic.
I also feel like there is a lack of substantive discussion and just overall engagement on the forum (this post and comment section being an exception).
I’m not exactly sure why this is (maybe there just aren’t enough EA’s) but it seems related to users being worried that their comments might not add value combined with the lack of anonymity and in-group dynamics. In general I find hacker news and subreddits like r/neoliberal to be significantly more thought provoking and engaging even though I think the commenters of those subs are often engaging more hedonistically and less to add value. On the margin the EA forum should be more serious and have stricter norms than those communities, but I’m worried that forum users optimizing individual posts and comments for usefulness is lowering the overall usefulness of the forum.