It will be a while before we run an experiment, and when I’d like to start one, I’ll make another post and consult with you again.
When/if we do one, it’ll probably look like what @the gears to ascension proposed in their comment here: a pretty technical video that will likely get a smaller number of views than usual and filters for the kind of people we want on LessWrong. How I would advertise it could resemble the description of the market on Manifold linked in the post, but I’m going to run the details to you first.
LessWrong currently has about 2,000 logged-in users per day. And to 20-100 new users each day (comparing the wide range including peaks recently).
This provides important context. 20-100 new accounts per day is a lot. At the moment, Manifold predicts that as a result of a strong call to action and 1M views, Rational Animations would be able to bring 679 new expected users. That would probably look like getting 300-400 more users in the first couple weeks the video is out and an additional 300-400 in the following few months. That’s not a lot!
As a simplification, suppose the video gets 200k views during the first day. That would correspond to about 679⁄5 = 136 new expected users. Suppose on the second day we get 100k more views. That would be about 70 more users. Then suppose, simplifying, that the remaining 200k views are equally distributed over the remaining 12 days. That would correspond to merely 11 additional users per day.
Should LessWrong be providing intro material and answers? [...] So maybe. Maybe we should leaning into this as an opportunity even though it’ll take work of both not letting it affect the site in bad ways (moderation, etc). and also possibly preparing better material for a broader audience.
I would be happy to link such things if you produce them. For now, linking the AI Safety Fundamentals courses should achieve ~ the same results. Some of the readings can be found on LessWrong too so people may discover LW as a result too. That said, having something produced by LW probably improves the funnel.
To provide some insight: on the margin, more new users means more work for us. We process all first time posters/commenters manually, so there’s a linear factor there, and of new users, some require follow-up and then moderation action. So currently, there’s human cost in adding more people.
Duly noted. Another interesting datum would be to know the fraction of new users that become active posters and how long they take to do that.
It will be a while before we run an experiment, and when I’d like to start one, I’ll make another post and consult with you again.
When/if we do one, it’ll probably look like what @the gears to ascension proposed in their comment here: a pretty technical video that will likely get a smaller number of views than usual and filters for the kind of people we want on LessWrong. How I would advertise it could resemble the description of the market on Manifold linked in the post, but I’m going to run the details to you first.
This provides important context. 20-100 new accounts per day is a lot. At the moment, Manifold predicts that as a result of a strong call to action and 1M views, Rational Animations would be able to bring 679 new expected users. That would probably look like getting 300-400 more users in the first couple weeks the video is out and an additional 300-400 in the following few months. That’s not a lot!
As a simplification, suppose the video gets 200k views during the first day. That would correspond to about 679⁄5 = 136 new expected users. Suppose on the second day we get 100k more views. That would be about 70 more users. Then suppose, simplifying, that the remaining 200k views are equally distributed over the remaining 12 days. That would correspond to merely 11 additional users per day.
I would be happy to link such things if you produce them. For now, linking the AI Safety Fundamentals courses should achieve ~ the same results. Some of the readings can be found on LessWrong too so people may discover LW as a result too. That said, having something produced by LW probably improves the funnel.
Duly noted. Another interesting datum would be to know the fraction of new users that become active posters and how long they take to do that.