Who are these EA leaders? What are their names and what do they do? Who directs what? How sure are you that you aren’t just imagining that there must be some adults in charge somewhere?
EA is anarchy. No one is even a little in charge. Some people get asked for advice more than others. Some people have ideas that are more influential than others. No one knows what they are doing, but all the constructive EAs are trying to do things and while also asking around to shore up their epistemics as they do so. EA is a workshop where everyone has their own projects but is free to ask the old hands for tips or to spy on the cool new up-and-coming projects and to try to emulate them.
EA forum, Twitter, EAG talks, etc are not real life. Will is a mascot. At best an “influencer.” If you want to shape the future (of the world, EA, the British government) you have to ground yourself in what is actually going on, not just the chattering in places like the EA forum. Be constructive, be nice, support others, and start building some stuff of your own.
NeoMohist
Your contention: Too much planning and building, not enough blurting out “deeply honest” (and very negative!) opinions.
My contention: Stop burning each other online, EA is not Mean Girls. Shut up, play nice, go into the real world, build, and get shit done.
This actually matters!
Ollie has a very high false positive rate. I can’t imagine a person or project he wouldn’t get off on kicking the legs out from under (https://getyarn.io/yarn-clip/1767181b-4b9d-4f7f-95fa-be4cae266511). If I join in on this “re-drawing lines around the community” exercise he can stand with Kerry Vaugn, Emile Torres, and Robin Hanson on the other side of my big chalk circle.
No one in the Alameda exodus expected fraud. They just thought Sam was terrible on other dimensions, they’ve said as much. Heck, Lantern lost money they were holding on FTX because they trusted it there.
In all seriousness, I hope he is on some sort of suicide watch. If anyone in his orbit is reading this, you need to keep an eye on him or have his dad or whoever keep an eye on him.
The monarchy wields influence. That is not the same thing as control.
I will go back and edit this. I’ve clearly crossed the line by more than I realized. Like a lot of people, I’m fraying with this one. It feels like all of the worst folks in EA publicly (and permanently!) shaming all of the best. Break ups don’t hurt this much.