EA Funds rejected my grant application for a small exploratory community building grant, and did not leave any actual feedback beyond a generic rejection. On top of that, in the same email they leave a link asking for feedback "How did we do? We would really appreciate your feedback on your experience applying for a grant. It takes just a minute and helps us improve." Lol. I wish they could have taken a minute and given me feedback. It sure would help me improve!
After having done community building for almost a year as a volunteer this feels really frustrating and extremely demotivating.
Incredibly frustrating and I feel for you. I for one think the grant makers underestimate the risks of playing a god role where you just dish out cash without a clear rubric(not saying they don't have a consistent process, just from the outside there isn't much legibility). If you read the infrastructure info page (assuming you applied there), there is some substance but not so much that you would truly have any idea why they rejected you.
Stuff like this is one reason why I think our social financing should head in the direction of impact markets and away from grantmaking.
It's sort of implicitly saying "I think your that your time, and your development, is worth much less than mine". I wish we were the kind of community where people would say that to my face, then we could have a conversation and find out whether that's really true.
Damn. I don't think you're literally doing the single most important thing in the world, but I think you're well worth funding for what you're doing, and wish CEA would see that. I do, however, think it's sort of hard to understand what you're doing for people who can't see it, so references might be key. I don't really know, though.
Note: This post was crossposted from Planned Obsolescence by the Forum team, with the author's permission. The author may not see or respond to comments on this post.
Subtitle: If acceleration compounds, the naive extrapolation implies superintelligence within a year
This post discusses a public METR report on AI R&D acceler...
TL;DR:
* When we started Rethink Priorities (RP) in 2018, our mission was, simply put, to close the knowledge gaps that stopped people from improving the world as much as they could. That hasn’t changed much, but the landscape we’re doing it in is shifting.
* In 2027, we plan to grow our core GHD, Animal Welfare, and Worldview Investigations teams to take on emerging priorities across causes, including those that the forthcoming transformative AI is creating.
...
This was cross-posted from the Animal Charity Evaluators blog.
We update our list of recommendations annually. This year, we announced our recommendations on November 10.
Most people who care about animals arrive at the same impas...
EA Funds rejected my grant application for a small exploratory community building grant, and did not leave any actual feedback beyond a generic rejection. On top of that, in the same email they leave a link asking for feedback "How did we do? We would really appreciate your feedback on your experience applying for a grant. It takes just a minute and helps us improve." Lol. I wish they could have taken a minute and given me feedback. It sure would help me improve!
After having done community building for almost a year as a volunteer this feels really frustrating and extremely demotivating.
I'm sorry to hear the experience feels really frustrating and demotivating.
I wrote some notes on grantmaking in the past which might be relevant here, particularly this section on why grantmakers don't usually give feedback.
(I work part-time for EA Funds. I did not review your application)
Incredibly frustrating and I feel for you. I for one think the grant makers underestimate the risks of playing a god role where you just dish out cash without a clear rubric(not saying they don't have a consistent process, just from the outside there isn't much legibility). If you read the infrastructure info page (assuming you applied there), there is some substance but not so much that you would truly have any idea why they rejected you.
Stuff like this is one reason why I think our social financing should head in the direction of impact markets and away from grantmaking.
It's sort of implicitly saying "I think your that your time, and your development, is worth much less than mine". I wish we were the kind of community where people would say that to my face, then we could have a conversation and find out whether that's really true.
Damn. I don't think you're literally doing the single most important thing in the world, but I think you're well worth funding for what you're doing, and wish CEA would see that. I do, however, think it's sort of hard to understand what you're doing for people who can't see it, so references might be key. I don't really know, though.
Note that EA Funds is not part of CEA.
(I work for EA Funds' Long-term Future Fund. I did not evaluate this grant).
Thanks for correction!