Here’s the thing: Consider the circumstances of a potential applicant who makes $X and live in Texas. If applying to this job is going to be worth their time, they need to know that it’s worth at least f$X where f (greater than unity) is a conversion factor for the cost of living in Texas vs. the Bay Area. If the only job pays, say 0.5 $X or less, then it’s probably not even worth the applicant’s time to update their resume. Additionally, if the applicant is already employed, then they’d need to have some confidence that the application process would be handled confidentially lest they be exposed to their current employer and put in a difficult situation.
Nothing in EY’s post gives any confidence for either of these factors. He’s made no effort to signal that this is on the up and up. There’s no way to know whether there’s positive utility to be gained by applying. It’s a complete and utter crapshoot. The ad says no experience required, but is that their preference? It reads partly as though they’re looking for a visionary but partly as though they’re looking for a newbie. How is anyone supposed to make out what’s wanted from the ad?
Additionally, as best I can tell, most people on this forum don’t know EY personally. Saying trust him, he’s a good guy is like asking you to trust me. I haven’t given you any reason to do so, and (especially to a person new to the site) the thread of comments here about whether or not to promote this story might make one think that EY is a bit of a loose cannon.
It’s clearly within EY’s power to update the job posting with a better description of the job and a salary range. He should also state some anonymous facts about the company in question (order of magnitude number of employees, industry, public or private, order of magnitude market capitalization, etc.). Finally, he could also state that he is personally in control of yaunshotfirst@gmail.com so that folks know that they’re giving their info over to him and not some random entity on the net.
Edited to remove asterisks which apparently put the font into italics....
It’s not necessarily in Eliezer’s interest to make the job ad as useful to those who don’t know him as those who do.
If only Eliezer’s friends apply, great, that means someone more likely to also be a supporter/funder of SIAI ends up getting this well-paying job.
(I for one have never met Eliezer in person, but I’ve observed him and his associates over the net for about 10 years now, which allows me to read quite a lot between the lines of this job ad.)
I’ll also explicitly note that I don’t consider it to be unfair of EY that only some readers get the full benefit of this job ad. It’s a free extra service, throwing this info out here; he’s under no obligation to spend more time making the use of this information easier.
That’s awfully parochial of you. Also, that puts me firmly in the “this shouldn’t have been promoted camp.”
If the rationality community is going to grow, it would behoove it to be more open not less. It’s a bit surprising that you would advocate for insular and incestuous hiring practices given the hurdles that this community has to overcome if it wants attract more members.
This isn’t a matter of being non-open (except on the part of the employer, which is their valid choice). It’s just a matter of not putting in the effort to make it obvious at the very first glance to newcomers whether the job ad is trustworthy or not.
To be honest, I don’t consider it a particularly demanding task even for newcomers to determine that they won’t exceptionally probably be screwed if they send their info. But if you’re worried about it, no-one is stopping you from sending an anonymised application, saying that you’d give your more personal details if the potential employer first communicates more about itself to you.
God, the people here go on and on about such a trivial issue! Sorry if I offend anyone, but really. Petty microanalysis of the type seen nowhere else on the Internet. If you don’t like the ad, don’t apply. If you don’t want to promote it, don’t. Is it really worth having a debate about whether it is worth promoting?
A brief note on terminology: When people complain about it being “promoted”, they mean moved to the front page. Only some mods (or just Eliezer?) has that power. We have no choice whether it is “promoted” or not in this sense.
No, since I’m not pushing you towards applying. Not applying is a perfectly valid choice, and I too don’t mind if only EY’s friends end up sending their resumes ;)
I guess you’d need to trust EY’s judgement a bit if you’re gonna apply. Don’t apply if you think he’d do this with a fishy employer/”employer”.
Here’s the thing: Consider the circumstances of a potential applicant who makes $X and live in Texas. If applying to this job is going to be worth their time, they need to know that it’s worth at least f$X where f (greater than unity) is a conversion factor for the cost of living in Texas vs. the Bay Area. If the only job pays, say 0.5 $X or less, then it’s probably not even worth the applicant’s time to update their resume. Additionally, if the applicant is already employed, then they’d need to have some confidence that the application process would be handled confidentially lest they be exposed to their current employer and put in a difficult situation.
Nothing in EY’s post gives any confidence for either of these factors. He’s made no effort to signal that this is on the up and up. There’s no way to know whether there’s positive utility to be gained by applying. It’s a complete and utter crapshoot. The ad says no experience required, but is that their preference? It reads partly as though they’re looking for a visionary but partly as though they’re looking for a newbie. How is anyone supposed to make out what’s wanted from the ad?
Additionally, as best I can tell, most people on this forum don’t know EY personally. Saying trust him, he’s a good guy is like asking you to trust me. I haven’t given you any reason to do so, and (especially to a person new to the site) the thread of comments here about whether or not to promote this story might make one think that EY is a bit of a loose cannon.
It’s clearly within EY’s power to update the job posting with a better description of the job and a salary range. He should also state some anonymous facts about the company in question (order of magnitude number of employees, industry, public or private, order of magnitude market capitalization, etc.). Finally, he could also state that he is personally in control of yaunshotfirst@gmail.com so that folks know that they’re giving their info over to him and not some random entity on the net.
Edited to remove asterisks which apparently put the font into italics....
It’s not necessarily in Eliezer’s interest to make the job ad as useful to those who don’t know him as those who do.
If only Eliezer’s friends apply, great, that means someone more likely to also be a supporter/funder of SIAI ends up getting this well-paying job.
(I for one have never met Eliezer in person, but I’ve observed him and his associates over the net for about 10 years now, which allows me to read quite a lot between the lines of this job ad.)
I’ll also explicitly note that I don’t consider it to be unfair of EY that only some readers get the full benefit of this job ad. It’s a free extra service, throwing this info out here; he’s under no obligation to spend more time making the use of this information easier.
That’s awfully parochial of you. Also, that puts me firmly in the “this shouldn’t have been promoted camp.”
If the rationality community is going to grow, it would behoove it to be more open not less. It’s a bit surprising that you would advocate for insular and incestuous hiring practices given the hurdles that this community has to overcome if it wants attract more members.
This isn’t a matter of being non-open (except on the part of the employer, which is their valid choice). It’s just a matter of not putting in the effort to make it obvious at the very first glance to newcomers whether the job ad is trustworthy or not.
To be honest, I don’t consider it a particularly demanding task even for newcomers to determine that they won’t exceptionally probably be screwed if they send their info. But if you’re worried about it, no-one is stopping you from sending an anonymised application, saying that you’d give your more personal details if the potential employer first communicates more about itself to you.
God, the people here go on and on about such a trivial issue! Sorry if I offend anyone, but really. Petty microanalysis of the type seen nowhere else on the Internet. If you don’t like the ad, don’t apply. If you don’t want to promote it, don’t. Is it really worth having a debate about whether it is worth promoting?
Your Internet sounds like a nice place to visit, nothing like the one in our world.
A brief note on terminology: When people complain about it being “promoted”, they mean moved to the front page. Only some mods (or just Eliezer?) has that power. We have no choice whether it is “promoted” or not in this sense.
I’m not fussed myself.
Also, did a rationalist just ask me to take something on faith? ;)
No, since I’m not pushing you towards applying. Not applying is a perfectly valid choice, and I too don’t mind if only EY’s friends end up sending their resumes ;)