Hey. Iām Jordan (jojo) Pieters. Iām currently the EA Global Content Coordinator at CEA, meaning I arrange all the talks, workshop and meetups at EAG conferences.
Previously, I was involved in a variety of EA community-building projects, including running EA Oxford for the 23ā24 academic year. I also have some experience in operations management.
Feel free to reach out if you want to share feedback on EAG, or have ideas for content!
I often use charity and thrift shops. The other day I was thinking about how it would be cool to have one that donates to GiveWell or something.
Good job on trying this!
Iām optimistic about this test. Even as a community builder, I find all the community discussion overwhelming. The Forum has become a place Iām less likely to visit because something like half of the discussions donāt feel productive for me to engage in.
Flagging that I may be interested in helping run both EA Infrastructure and AI safety versions of this
This seems great. This org has ties to pretty influential people. A couple of things Iām curious about:
What influenced this direction? (they mentioned the doomsday clock, but I imagine lots of other sources of influence)
Could we piggyback off of this to increase buy-in for x-risk reduction from people in their network? Maybe getting some of their high net-worth supporters to start moving money towards these causes?
There are some EAs hanging out in CDMX until the end of Jan (and maybe some after)
Agree that having a nomad friendly community near the US would be great
I think this is a nice simple breakdown of the concept.
A nitpickāI think having digital graphs rather than these photos would be a big improvement
[Epistemic status: Iāve never done recruiting, I donāt run or have a position at an āEA orgā - feel free to ignore anything I say]
But, a couple of thoughts:
Your branding and copywriting could use a lot of work. Itās not immediately clear to me that this organisation is legitimate.
Iām highly unlikely to apply for a job if I donāt know who the hiring organisation is. The organisation and their mission is one of the primary reasons Iāll apply anywhere. If youāre doing āblindā hiring rounds, youāll need to accrue a lot more trust amongst top talent.
These roles all seem fairly junior? I donāt see much need for a recruiting agency working on junior roles. Main bottleneck seems to be finding a good fit for senior/āmanagement roles, and professional recruiters should rather spend their time on this
I think the series Next did a pretty good job of making me scared. Itās not an amazing production in itself, but worth watching.
Related thought: should we be trying harder to do outreach to early stage startup founders? Could potentially be very high-EV from a funding perspective
Itās a rough estimate. I think itās difficult to quantify the value of a conference for one individual
The idea of there being increased financial barriers to attending conferences concerns me a lot.
Iād hate to end up in a situation where lower income people or students are discouraged from even applying because they know they wonāt be able to afford it. I know it would be soul crushing for many people to receive an email saying theyāve been accepted, but be unable to consider attending due to financial barriers.
Iād have a preference for smaller events where people are guaranteed funding if they need. I think that looking after a smaller group of people very well can be better than a large group of people having a worse experience.
Thereās a chance that these increased financial barriers could negatively affect the geographic and socioeconomic diversity in EA that some people have been working hard to improve.
Iād be excited about CEA hosting or supporting more virtual conferences. These are far cheaper than in-person events, are more accessible in many ways, and Iād estimate they capture about 60% of the value for an individual attendee that an in-person event does.
I could imagine 2-3 of these happening in 2023, perhaps including some for more specific audiences like the previous student summit. These would have the advantage of being able to have a much lower bar for entry (since costs donāt increase as linearly as in-person conferences). They could therefore be a place to absorb all those who wonāt be accepted to conferences or wonāt be able to travel.
[I was on the organising team for EAGxVirtual 2022]
I definitely agree with these points! The delay is entirely a failure on my part . This is definitely not the only event of its kind that will be run though and I anticipate another one will happen very soon after.
As an organiser, I am constantly amazed at how helpful everyone has been. Thank you to all the volunteers, speakers and attendees who have been so willing to contribute! I love this community <3
Iād also be very interested in the reverse of this. Is there anyone who has thought very hard about AI risk and decided to de-prioritise it?
Thanks for writing this Sam. I think thereās a lot of value in hearing peopleās stories in this way
I share this concern, deeply. I think the EA community could be necessary for a lot of future impact. Risks to the community are therefore very bad.
Iām curious about the term ācommunity healthā though. Maybe there are actually two distinct categories of things to track here? One is internalāhow people feel and interact within EAāand the other is externalāhow the general public perceives EA.
Thank you for being open about this Max. Iām sorry to hear that itās been tough. I think this post in itself is really valuable. I imagine myself using it as a good example in the future to encourage people to prioritize their mental health.
I appreciate the work youāve done to make CEA into an organisation that I really admire. Iām sure youāll do great things in the future. Best wishes!