FWIW … in my opinion, retaining the property might have been a more beneficial decision.
Also, I think some people working in the space should not make an update against plans like “have a permanent venue”, but plausibly should make some updates about the “major donors”. My guess this almost certainly means Open Philanthropy, and also likely they had most of the actual power in this decision.
Before delving further, it’s important to outline some potential conflicts of interest and biases: - I did co-organize or participated at multiple events at Wytham. For example, in 2023, ACS organized a private research retreat aimed at increasing the surface area between Active Inference and AI Alignment communities. The event succeeded to attracts some of the best people from both sides and was pretty valuable for the direction of alignment research I do care about, and the Oxford location was very useful for that. I regret running events like that in future will be more difficult. - I have friends in all orgs or sides involved—Wytham project, Open Phil, EV, EAs who disapproved the purchase,... - I lead an org funded by Open Philanthropy— I also lead an org which was fiscally sponsoring a different project of venue purchase, which was funded by FTX regrant (won’t comment on that for legal reasons)
Also, without more details published, my current opinion is personal speculation, partially based on my reading of the vibes.
My impression-from-a-distance is part of the decision is driven by a factor which I think should not be given undue weight, and a factor where I likely disagree
Factor where I possibly disagree is aesthetics. As far as I can tell, the current preferred EA aesthetics is something more similar to how recent EAG Bay looked like. At EAG Bay, my impression of the vibes of venue was… quite dystopian—the main space is a giant hall with unpleasant artificial lights, no natural light, no colours, endless rows of identical black tables utilized by people having endless rows of 1:1s. In some vague aesthetic space, nearby vibes vectors are faceless bureaucracies, borgs and the scifi portrayals of heart-less technocratic baddies. Also something about naive utilitarianism and army.
Wytham seemed to stand in stark contrast to this aesthetics: the building was old and full of quirks. The vibes were more like an old Oxford college.
Factor which I would guess was part of the decision and I suspect had weight was PR concerns. Wytham definitely got some negative media coverage both in traditional media, social media, and on this forum.
What I dislike about this, these concerns often seemed to be mostly on the Simulacra levels 3 and 4, detached from the reality of running events in Oxford, or actual concern about costs. (Why I do think so? Because of approximately zero amount of negative PR, forum criticisms etc. anyone and anything in the ecosystem is getting for renting properties, even if they are more expensive per day or per person.)
To be clear— I don’t think these were the only or main(?) factors. - * I would expect somewhere also exists some spreadsheet with some estimates of “value” of events at Wytham. If this is the case, I probably also disagree about some of the generative opinions about what’s valuable.
Still, given the amount of speculative criticism the purchase of Wytham generated on the forum, it seems good for transparency to also express critical view about the sale.
FWIW, I thought that the choice of venue for EAG Bay Area 2024 was quite good. It was largely open plan—so lots of chance encounters. A nice mixture of privacy and openness for the 1-on-1s, which (rightly, to my mind) the event focusses on. Comfortable, but not flashy. I just got normal, professional vibes from it—it felt like a solid, appropriate choice.
FWIW … in my opinion, retaining the property might have been a more beneficial decision.
Also, I think some people working in the space should not make an update against plans like “have a permanent venue”, but plausibly should make some updates about the “major donors”. My guess this almost certainly means Open Philanthropy, and also likely they had most of the actual power in this decision.
Before delving further, it’s important to outline some potential conflicts of interest and biases:
- I did co-organize or participated at multiple events at Wytham. For example, in 2023, ACS organized a private research retreat aimed at increasing the surface area between Active Inference and AI Alignment communities. The event succeeded to attracts some of the best people from both sides and was pretty valuable for the direction of alignment research I do care about, and the Oxford location was very useful for that. I regret running events like that in future will be more difficult.
- I have friends in all orgs or sides involved—Wytham project, Open Phil, EV, EAs who disapproved the purchase,...
- I lead an org funded by Open Philanthropy—
I also lead an org which was fiscally sponsoring a different project of venue purchase, which was funded by FTX regrant (won’t comment on that for legal reasons)
Also, without more details published, my current opinion is personal speculation, partially based on my reading of the vibes.
My impression-from-a-distance is part of the decision is driven by a factor which I think should not be given undue weight, and a factor where I likely disagree
Factor where I possibly disagree is aesthetics. As far as I can tell, the current preferred EA aesthetics is something more similar to how recent EAG Bay looked like. At EAG Bay, my impression of the vibes of venue was… quite dystopian—the main space is a giant hall with unpleasant artificial lights, no natural light, no colours, endless rows of identical black tables utilized by people having endless rows of 1:1s. In some vague aesthetic space, nearby vibes vectors are faceless bureaucracies, borgs and the scifi portrayals of heart-less technocratic baddies. Also something about naive utilitarianism and army.
Wytham seemed to stand in stark contrast to this aesthetics: the building was old and full of quirks. The vibes were more like an old Oxford college.
Factor which I would guess was part of the decision and I suspect had weight was PR concerns. Wytham definitely got some negative media coverage both in traditional media, social media, and on this forum.
What I dislike about this, these concerns often seemed to be mostly on the Simulacra levels 3 and 4, detached from the reality of running events in Oxford, or actual concern about costs. (Why I do think so? Because of approximately zero amount of negative PR, forum criticisms etc. anyone and anything in the ecosystem is getting for renting properties, even if they are more expensive per day or per person.)
To be clear—
I don’t think these were the only or main(?) factors.
- * I would expect somewhere also exists some spreadsheet with some estimates of “value” of events at Wytham. If this is the case, I probably also disagree about some of the generative opinions about what’s valuable.
Still, given the amount of speculative criticism the purchase of Wytham generated on the forum, it seems good for transparency to also express critical view about the sale.
FWIW, I thought that the choice of venue for EAG Bay Area 2024 was quite good. It was largely open plan—so lots of chance encounters. A nice mixture of privacy and openness for the 1-on-1s, which (rightly, to my mind) the event focusses on. Comfortable, but not flashy. I just got normal, professional vibes from it—it felt like a solid, appropriate choice.
I also thought the Oakland venue was a very good choice, and was glad the events team chose it again in 2024.