FTX Poll Post - What do you think about the FTX crisis, given some time?

By Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T10:22 (+34)

Tl;dr


Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T10:24 (+43)

I think EA institutional processes need to change to significantly to make things like the FTX crisis less likely in future

Chris Leong @ 2023-03-09T14:56 (+12)

Hmm… part of me worries that this might be a bit too contentless/applause-lightly to provide useful information?

Michael_PJ @ 2023-03-09T17:36 (+10)

Yeah, I think this would be much better as a poll on a specific course of action. "Something needs to change... nothing in particular, but something" is an easy feeling to fall into.

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-09T17:46 (+2)

Feel free to add some. Also when noone has said their thinking, I think it's reasonable to be like "we should consider whether something should change"

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T19:15 (+11)

I would like a place to report concerns to anonymously, like the community health team but for misbehaviour/fraud/etc. 

ChanaMessinger @ 2023-03-08T19:46 (+10)

I think EA institutional processes need to change to make things like the FTX crisis less likely in future


[Taking out "significantly", in case that's significant for the karma, idea stolen from OllieBase below]


 

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T19:14 (+6)

I would like to see a red team focused on investigating funders reputationally assocaited with EA.

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T11:54 (+30)

I am concerned that if I criticise CEA/OpenPhil under my own name I might miss out on jobs/funding opportunities.

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T10:23 (+23)

I think EA culture needs to change significantly to make things like the FTX crisis less likely in future

OllieBase @ 2023-03-08T18:31 (+15)

I think EA culture needs to change to make things like the FTX crisis less likely in future

[Taking out "significantly", in case that's significant for the karma]

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T10:25 (+21)

I have heard enough from core EAs about their thoughts regarding the FTX crisis

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T11:25 (+3)

I would like to hear their thoughts because I want to know they take it seriously. If they don't, I don't want to keep being a member of this community.

Dustin Moskovitz @ 2023-03-08T16:23 (+12)

Will's version https://twitter.com/willmacaskill/status/1591218014707671040

People debate if I'm core I guess, but I left some taking it seriously thoughts here https://twitter.com/moskov/status/1591592375553781760

 

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T11:37 (+20)

I want to be able to push for answers from community leaders [1]if those same people will speak publicly for the EA community in other circumstances.

  1. ^

    ie as opposed to organisational leaders

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T11:28 (+19)

The FTX crisis has reduced my commitment to the EA movement

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T21:41 (+11)

To just the movement, not the ideals.

Sanjay @ 2023-03-08T14:19 (+17)

I'm fed up of hearing about / thinking about FTX and SBF. I just want to move on now.

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T10:25 (+9)

My friends are less receptive to EA since the crisis

Dustin Moskovitz @ 2023-03-08T16:25 (+14)

My friends are less receptive to EA since the crisis, but it seems like it's because of multiple scandals/storylines from recent months, rather than FTX itself.

Dawn Drescher @ 2023-03-08T19:08 (+6)

My friends are less interested in the EA community since the crisis but equally interested in EA values and goals.

Dawn Drescher @ 2023-03-08T19:19 (+5)

(I don’t agree or disagree with that statement. For my actual friends all the harassment scandals were a much bigger deal.)

Dustin Moskovitz @ 2023-03-08T16:24 (+6)

My friends are less receptive to EA since the crisis primarily due to FTX

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T10:26 (+6)

Community issues (FTX, Time, Bostrom) should not take more than 5% of our collective time (as opposed to object level work)

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T10:22 (+6)

SBF and perhaps others behaved immorally

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T10:23 (+5)

I think about FTX hardly at all

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T10:22 (+5)

I think about FTX a lot

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T10:22 (+5)

SBF and perhaps others behaved stupidly

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T17:53 (+7)

A marginal defence of this being worth upvoting. 

I care about sober behaviour while managing billions of dollars that one intends to donate. I think it will turn out that SBF's decisions were bad ex ante, even if they hadn't been fraudulent and even if they hadn't been been risk neutral. I think it will turn out they were just bad trades. And I think that's pretty notable given the quantities of money we are resources with here. 

Again, i'm not saying that makes it okay, but I think this would have gone badly even with no fraud and I think that's bad.

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T19:17 (+4)

I would like a 5 min google survey done on this topic.

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T14:26 (+4)

I would like to move on from discussion of FTX, but for whatever reason, I don't currently feel I have closure.

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T10:25 (+4)

The FTX crisis has made it harder for me to do work

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T17:27 (+2)

Anon submission

Will MacAskill should resign from the board of EVF - until and unless the regulatory investigation by the UK charities commission clears him of wrongdoing

Habryka @ 2023-03-08T17:47 (+22)

Will MacAskill should resign from the board of EVF independently of the investigation by the UK charities commission (I don't expect the rules of the charity commission to line up very much with the rules of who I want to be an EA leader)

Nathan Young @ 2023-03-08T10:23 (+1)

The FTX crisis has caused me to not take actions I would have otherwise.

edit: I don't have great theories of what actions people mean. Could anyone give examples?

Dawn Drescher @ 2023-03-08T19:15 (+6)

Possible examples:

  1. You lost a lot of money, so you can’t go down a risky career path anymore.
  2. You were about to found a charity funded by FTX.
  3. You were about to do a degree funded by FTX.
Ivy Mazzola @ 2023-03-08T23:09 (+3)

[I feel like] the crisis has (at least) 2 sides for EA paths:

  1. Before the crisis exploded, it changed people's behavior. Falsely believing that there was more money than there was made a difference. Like if I had known much sooner that FTX was basically in debt, (eg they hadn't covered it up) I would have started my own company, but I did not because I thought there was no need to E2G.

  2. After the crisis exploded and we came to realize that there wasnt as much money. This one is isn't as relevant to me personally because I haven't ruled anything out yet.

But I agreevoted for #1. I guess I'd count the relevant critical behavior as having started before November, back when I was making other decisions, and I definitely messed up because of misinformed belief

Robi Rahman @ 2023-03-08T19:12 (+3)

Applying for grant funding, for example.

Jason @ 2023-03-09T22:55 (+2)

Possibly broader alternative wording: The existence of the FTX Future Fund caused me to take actions that were to my detriment in retrospect, AND that I would not have taken those actions had the FTXFF never existed, had I known FTX was a fraud, and/or had I known the FTXFF would collapse.