One of the reasons Yvain posts there instead of here is because the standards are different; a post on LW talking about the problems with internet feminism would get a “hey, politics is the mind-killer,” but on Slate Star Codex it’s his blog and he gets to talk about whatever he wants to talk about. Besides content, there are presentation differences; Yvain has a jokey style that irritates some of the pedant crowd on LW, but engages more typical readers.
gwern also thinks the different branding has something to do with it; instead of being ‘just another’ LW poster, and LW having a scattered focus with many components that won’t appeal to any particular reader, it’s a clearly distinct site with a narrow focus. The average post quality on SSC is far higher than the average post quality of LW (note that Yvain has the second highest karma of any poster here), which makes it easier to recommend, because you’re recommending Yvain specifically.
I think the comments on SSC are terrible relative to LW- the system is bad (without an inbox, upvoting, downvoting, etc.) which makes bad incentives (I’m nowhere near as careful commenting there, and have noticed that I’m much more likely to be snarky and negative) but also the commenters just seem dumber and less worth reading (but this may have to do with the increased focus on politics and decreased focus on self-improvement). But you don’t share a site on social media / email it to others because of the comments, you do it because of the posts.
Sure, but LessWrong is a forum for a set of very specific topics, specifically instrumental and epistemic rationality, not just a place for whoever is on LessWrong to post about whatever they want to.
Many of us have our personal blogs and they fill a different niche than LessWrong does.
lesswrong.com: global rank − 40,877, rank in the US − 19,570,
57.81% of total traffic come from the US.
slatestarcodex.com: global rank − 69,386, rank in the US -
31,060,
61.97% of total traffic come from the US.
Therefore, LessWrong seems to have a little bit more visitors (especially from outside the US) than SlateStarCodex. SSC seems to have a lot of comments, but you should note that LW requires having an account for posting comments, whereas SSC allows you to post comments anonymously, it doesn’t even ask your email address.
Curiously, overcomingbias.com has 6k readers in feedly.com and 778 in inoreader.com, which is comparable to LessWrong itself, but it has fewer visitors than LW or SSC. Perhaps most people use their RSS readers to read it and don’t visit the blog itself.
I think there is a difference between LW and SSC. On LW, we have 2-4 new discussion threads every day, a lot of threads are active at the same time. Whereas SSC usually has 2-4 thread a week, only perhaps a couple threads are active at any given point in time. In addition to that, almost all SSC posts are written by the same person who builds upon his previous posts. Therefore everyone is on the same page both literally and figuratively. Therefore it is quite easy to tell what ideas float on SSC now. Whereas LessWrong has many individual posters who tend to be interested in various things. Few of them build upon the ideas of each other, few explore the possibilities suggested by other LW posts. Therefore it is much harder for a reader to get a big picture. A question “what X has been up to recently?” is much harder to answer if X=LW than if X=SSC.
As of now, LessWrong does not have posters whose new ideas would move opinions of the majority of the readers forward. People seem to form ideas on their own, whereas SSC offers its readers a “journey”. Therefore comments are relatively much more important on LessWrong than they are on SlateStarCodex. However, if one is supposed to read the comments, it becomes much harder to use the site casually. On SSC, while comments sometimes do add to the post themselves, you can simply read Scott’s essays if you do not have time for anything more. The question how to optimize your LessWrong reading, which is relevant for casual readers, is harder to answer. The question “how has X consensus changed in the last 3 months” is much harder to answer if X=LW than if X=SSC, because in order to answer the latter question, reading Scott’s essays seems to be enough.
To sum up. LW probably has more readers (especially from the outside the US), SSC probably has more comments due to the possibility to post comments anonymously. SSC posts, all being written by the same person, build upon each other and thus offer their readers a “journey” and are able to move consensus opinions more quickly than individual LW posts.
Reading SSC brings back the feeling I got when I first discovered Less Wrong (right after the split with Overcoming Bias, when there were still sequences being posted). Here’s this extremely intelligent and articulate guy, posting very insightful things on topics I didn’t even know I was interested in—and he’s doing it pretty regularly!
I like what Less Wrong has evolved into in the post-Sequences era, but reading Less Wrong today produces a very different feeling from when it did early on.
How the hell did slate star codex get to be so much more popular than lesswrong? It’s an offshoot of this site right?
Yes, but.
One of the reasons Yvain posts there instead of here is because the standards are different; a post on LW talking about the problems with internet feminism would get a “hey, politics is the mind-killer,” but on Slate Star Codex it’s his blog and he gets to talk about whatever he wants to talk about. Besides content, there are presentation differences; Yvain has a jokey style that irritates some of the pedant crowd on LW, but engages more typical readers.
gwern also thinks the different branding has something to do with it; instead of being ‘just another’ LW poster, and LW having a scattered focus with many components that won’t appeal to any particular reader, it’s a clearly distinct site with a narrow focus. The average post quality on SSC is far higher than the average post quality of LW (note that Yvain has the second highest karma of any poster here), which makes it easier to recommend, because you’re recommending Yvain specifically.
I think the comments on SSC are terrible relative to LW- the system is bad (without an inbox, upvoting, downvoting, etc.) which makes bad incentives (I’m nowhere near as careful commenting there, and have noticed that I’m much more likely to be snarky and negative) but also the commenters just seem dumber and less worth reading (but this may have to do with the increased focus on politics and decreased focus on self-improvement). But you don’t share a site on social media / email it to others because of the comments, you do it because of the posts.
Also, consider how frequently a new post shows up in the main vs. how frequently there’s a new post on Star Slate Codex.
If Yvain was posting all his SSC stuff to Discussion/Main, wouldn’t there be even more frequently a new post in Main than there is on SSC?
Sure, but LessWrong is a forum for a set of very specific topics, specifically instrumental and epistemic rationality, not just a place for whoever is on LessWrong to post about whatever they want to.
Many of us have our personal blogs and they fill a different niche than LessWrong does.
You should note a few things. According to alexa.com:
lesswrong.com: global rank − 51,809, rank in the United States − 18,847, 46.3% of visitors come from the US.
slatestarcodex.com: global rank − 87,006, rank in the United States − 16,366, 71.7% of visitors come from the US.
According to similarweb.com:
lesswrong.com: global rank − 40,877, rank in the US − 19,570, 57.81% of total traffic come from the US.
slatestarcodex.com: global rank − 69,386, rank in the US - 31,060, 61.97% of total traffic come from the US.
Therefore, LessWrong seems to have a little bit more visitors (especially from outside the US) than SlateStarCodex. SSC seems to have a lot of comments, but you should note that LW requires having an account for posting comments, whereas SSC allows you to post comments anonymously, it doesn’t even ask your email address.
RSS readers:
feedly.com shows lesswrong.com (i.e. http://lesswrong.com/.rss, which is the same as http://lesswrong.com/promoted/.rss) as having 7k readers and slatestarcodex.com as having 2k readers. It is interesting to note that http://lesswrong.com/new/.rss and http://lesswrong.com/r/discussion/new/.rss have few subscribers. This is probably because if new people visit LessWrong, they can see only one RSS Feed icon on the front page so naturally it is the one they subscribe to. I think this is a very bad thing and it should be corrected as soon as possible. If someone tells a person to check out LessWrong, they are likely to end up reading promoted posts only.
inoreader.com has similar stats: lesswrong.com has 378 subscribers, slatestarcodex.com has 137 subscribers. Few people to subscribe to lesswrong.com/new and Discussion.
Curiously, overcomingbias.com has 6k readers in feedly.com and 778 in inoreader.com, which is comparable to LessWrong itself, but it has fewer visitors than LW or SSC. Perhaps most people use their RSS readers to read it and don’t visit the blog itself.
I think there is a difference between LW and SSC. On LW, we have 2-4 new discussion threads every day, a lot of threads are active at the same time. Whereas SSC usually has 2-4 thread a week, only perhaps a couple threads are active at any given point in time. In addition to that, almost all SSC posts are written by the same person who builds upon his previous posts. Therefore everyone is on the same page both literally and figuratively. Therefore it is quite easy to tell what ideas float on SSC now. Whereas LessWrong has many individual posters who tend to be interested in various things. Few of them build upon the ideas of each other, few explore the possibilities suggested by other LW posts. Therefore it is much harder for a reader to get a big picture. A question “what X has been up to recently?” is much harder to answer if X=LW than if X=SSC.
As of now, LessWrong does not have posters whose new ideas would move opinions of the majority of the readers forward. People seem to form ideas on their own, whereas SSC offers its readers a “journey”. Therefore comments are relatively much more important on LessWrong than they are on SlateStarCodex. However, if one is supposed to read the comments, it becomes much harder to use the site casually. On SSC, while comments sometimes do add to the post themselves, you can simply read Scott’s essays if you do not have time for anything more. The question how to optimize your LessWrong reading, which is relevant for casual readers, is harder to answer. The question “how has X consensus changed in the last 3 months” is much harder to answer if X=LW than if X=SSC, because in order to answer the latter question, reading Scott’s essays seems to be enough.
To sum up. LW probably has more readers (especially from the outside the US), SSC probably has more comments due to the possibility to post comments anonymously. SSC posts, all being written by the same person, build upon each other and thus offer their readers a “journey” and are able to move consensus opinions more quickly than individual LW posts.
Reading SSC brings back the feeling I got when I first discovered Less Wrong (right after the split with Overcoming Bias, when there were still sequences being posted). Here’s this extremely intelligent and articulate guy, posting very insightful things on topics I didn’t even know I was interested in—and he’s doing it pretty regularly!
I like what Less Wrong has evolved into in the post-Sequences era, but reading Less Wrong today produces a very different feeling from when it did early on.
I do have a feeling that LW is passed it’s heyday.