I’d be curious how the team decided on the $100,000 prize amount
Yes, this is a serious amount of money. That said, writing a good blog takes a lot of time, and note that the expected value for any particular blogger will be relatively low. If 100 bloggers apply (which we expect to be a lower bound given the traction), it’s $5k for the work of a part-time job over a year. Obviously, Cowen using the same number makes it a bit of a Shelling Point and the number has some viral appeal as well.
But we also want to convey how valuable we think writing like this really is: we think the very best entrants really will deserve this. For instance, we have in mind that the breakout successes from the competition might begin writing full-time, or even become public intellectuals within EA. We think the $100,000 amount is the right amount to encourage that kind of ambition. But note that we’re not committing to giving any particular number of these prizes (“up to five”)— we’re planning to use an appropriately high bar in judging the blogs.
Bloggers could have a (conscious or subconscious) bias towards things that are ultimately positive towards EA and longtermism.
Thanks for sharing this concern, it’s an important one to address. To clarify: we are not planning on rewarding entrants for cheering for EA or longtermism; we’re planning on rewarding entrants for effectively engaging with ideas relating to EA, longtermism, and issues we are interested in.
And that includes criticism. If entrants have novel, good-faith, and action-relevant criticisms or ‘redteams’ of any aspect of EA, we’re very excited to hear them!
We’re signaling that we are serious about this with our grant recipients: We’ve made grants to people with major criticisms of longtermism and EA and people who are interested in the topics but lukewarm about standard approaches. We’re also funding people who are diametic to the for-against axis, like a forthcoming series from thinkers in different religious traditions on how they think about the long term. For additional inspiration, here are someof ourfavoritecritiquessofar from the forum.
That said, writing a good blog takes a lot of time, and note that the expected value for any particular blogger will be relatively low. If 100 bloggers apply (which we expect to be a lower bound given the traction), it’s $5k for the work of a part-time job over a year.
I worry that this creates a weird dynamic. Only people who are financially well-off already can afford to invest a lot of time for a small probability to win a lot of money. These are normally not the people who need money the most. And if these people started blogging because of the money, they might not be very motivated to continue once they get this $100,000. At the same time, some talented writer who can’t afford to spend a lot of time on blogging will continue to not be able to do that. Also, I hope that you will give feedback to applicants to prevent someone from putting a lot of time into this hoping that they get the money and then never getting any money. I guess I’m surprised about this $100,000 or nothing granting approach, it doesn’t seem optimal to me.
Just to illustrate, my thought process after reading this post was that maybe I should reduce my hours at work and start a blog. But then I thought that I’m really privileged to be able to do that and that this format further rewards privileged people. And that if I got $100,000, I might take some time off from EA work and blogging which I wouldn’t do otherwise.
But maybe I’m misunderstanding some things. It’s also unclear to me how developed a blog should be before you apply.
for an example of a different model, drew devault, who’s fairly well-known in the free software community, offered $20 to anyone who started a blog, with another $20 if there was an additional 3 posts in the next half year. it seems to have resulted in a number of new blogs, including several that are still active now, 2.5 years later.
I just want to pipe in to say that I think this is a cool example; the structure of “extremely small prize for doing the thing at all” seems like a nice way to build up the funnel of new blogs in a more even-handed way.
I think even “technically flawed” critiques could actually be very useful, because developing arguments against that which are more easily accessible will probably be helpful in the future. (disclaimer I’m currently on a sleeping med making me feel slightly loopy, so apologies if the above doesn’t make sense)
Thanks for sharing this Vaidehi.
Yes, this is a serious amount of money. That said, writing a good blog takes a lot of time, and note that the expected value for any particular blogger will be relatively low. If 100 bloggers apply (which we expect to be a lower bound given the traction), it’s $5k for the work of a part-time job over a year. Obviously, Cowen using the same number makes it a bit of a Shelling Point and the number has some viral appeal as well.
But we also want to convey how valuable we think writing like this really is: we think the very best entrants really will deserve this. For instance, we have in mind that the breakout successes from the competition might begin writing full-time, or even become public intellectuals within EA. We think the $100,000 amount is the right amount to encourage that kind of ambition. But note that we’re not committing to giving any particular number of these prizes (“up to five”)— we’re planning to use an appropriately high bar in judging the blogs.
Thanks for sharing this concern, it’s an important one to address. To clarify: we are not planning on rewarding entrants for cheering for EA or longtermism; we’re planning on rewarding entrants for effectively engaging with ideas relating to EA, longtermism, and issues we are interested in.
And that includes criticism. If entrants have novel, good-faith, and action-relevant criticisms or ‘red teams’ of any aspect of EA, we’re very excited to hear them!
We’re signaling that we are serious about this with our grant recipients: We’ve made grants to people with major criticisms of longtermism and EA and people who are interested in the topics but lukewarm about standard approaches. We’re also funding people who are diametic to the for-against axis, like a forthcoming series from thinkers in different religious traditions on how they think about the long term. For additional inspiration, here are some of our favorite critiques so far from the forum.
I worry that this creates a weird dynamic. Only people who are financially well-off already can afford to invest a lot of time for a small probability to win a lot of money. These are normally not the people who need money the most. And if these people started blogging because of the money, they might not be very motivated to continue once they get this $100,000. At the same time, some talented writer who can’t afford to spend a lot of time on blogging will continue to not be able to do that. Also, I hope that you will give feedback to applicants to prevent someone from putting a lot of time into this hoping that they get the money and then never getting any money. I guess I’m surprised about this $100,000 or nothing granting approach, it doesn’t seem optimal to me.
Just to illustrate, my thought process after reading this post was that maybe I should reduce my hours at work and start a blog. But then I thought that I’m really privileged to be able to do that and that this format further rewards privileged people. And that if I got $100,000, I might take some time off from EA work and blogging which I wouldn’t do otherwise.
But maybe I’m misunderstanding some things. It’s also unclear to me how developed a blog should be before you apply.
for an example of a different model, drew devault, who’s fairly well-known in the free software community, offered $20 to anyone who started a blog, with another $20 if there was an additional 3 posts in the next half year. it seems to have resulted in a number of new blogs, including several that are still active now, 2.5 years later.
Very interesting structure. Will investigate incorporating it into our plans in the future.
I just want to pipe in to say that I think this is a cool example; the structure of “extremely small prize for doing the thing at all” seems like a nice way to build up the funnel of new blogs in a more even-handed way.
I think even “technically flawed” critiques could actually be very useful, because developing arguments against that which are more easily accessible will probably be helpful in the future. (disclaimer I’m currently on a sleeping med making me feel slightly loopy, so apologies if the above doesn’t make sense)