I don’t think that there was no change in framing. Last year:
Every Petrov Day, we practice not destroying the world. One particular way to do this is to practice the virtue of not taking unilateralist action.
It’s difficult to know who can be trusted, but today I have selected a group of LessWrong users who I think I can rely on in this way. You’ve all been given the opportunity to show yourselves capable and trustworthy.
This Petrov Day, between midnight and midnight PST, if you, ChristianKl, enter the launch codes below on LessWrong, the Frontpage will go down for 24 hours.
Personalised launch code: …
I hope to see you on the other side of this, with our honor intact.
Yours, Ben Pace & the LessWrong 2.0 Team
This year:
On Petrov Day, we celebrate and practice not destroying the world.
It’s difficult to know who can be trusted, but today I have selected a group of 270 LessWrong users who I think I can rely on in this way. You’ve all been given the opportunity to not destroy LessWrong.
This Petrov Day, if you, ChristianKl, enter the launch codes below on LessWrong, the Frontpage will go down for 24 hours, removing a resource thousands of people view every day. Each entrusted user has personalised launch codes, so that it will be clear who nuked the site.
Your personalised codes are: …
I hope to see you in the dawn of tomorrow, with our honor still intact.
–Ben Pace & the LessWrong Team
The last year was more explict about both the goal of the exercise and what it means for an individual to not use the code.
Using the phrase destroy LessWrong this year was a tell that this isn’t a serious exercise because people ususally don’t exaggerate when they are serious. Especially rationalists can usually be trusted to use clear words when they are serious.
Reading the message this time, I had the impression that it would be more likely for the website to go down then last year.
I don’t think that there was no change in framing. Last year:
This year:
The last year was more explict about both the goal of the exercise and what it means for an individual to not use the code.
Using the phrase destroy LessWrong this year was a tell that this isn’t a serious exercise because people ususally don’t exaggerate when they are serious. Especially rationalists can usually be trusted to use clear words when they are serious.
Reading the message this time, I had the impression that it would be more likely for the website to go down then last year.