I work at CBAI, and we might push to get fellows to publish results on LW or X. I'd like to give more than just my own anecdotes.
So please comment your experience here (or in this google form if you don't want a public comment).
Arxiv papers take a while to write and aren't optimized for clarity. Blog posts though can be. Once I've done the hard work of writing a clear explanation of my research, then:
Doing this a lot, I've also become a better technical communicator (though this is also accompanied by 30+ min chats where I'm communicating to 1 person at a time. Much easier to get feedback on clarity this way.)
From LW posts, I've been reached out to for 3 different interp start-ups (bio-interp this, bio-interp that), which isn't my cup of tea. I have reached out to 10+ folks based off their LW posts ("Hey cool post, I think my work on X could work? Wanna chat; here's my calendly"). On two different occasions:
I honestly don't think I've recieved great feedback on my research through my LW posts (definitely interesting ideas, but nothing game-changing). Most of the good ideas come from discussing it with folks in 30+ min calls or in person chats.
I do think I've left good advice on other's post (only possibly gamechanging lol), and benefited personally from engaging with their work.
I'm very interested in hearing other's experiences though; especially:
[And again, the overall purpose is for advice to mentees through a research fellowship program]
I did know Lee Sharkey a bit from AI safety camp, virtually, with most of our talking over 1 catch-up call from after the program. I think Lee would've responded anyways though; he's a nice guy.