Link to original article

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: EA Infrastructure Fund: May–August 2021 grant recommendations, published by Max Daniel on December 24, 2021 on The Effective Altruism Forum. Introduction Between May and August 2021, the EA Infrastructure Fund has recommended the following grants. These include both grants from our Q2 grant cycle and from the rolling applications process we’ve adopted since. (Earlier grants are covered in the report on our Q1 grant cycle.) This post covers grant applications received before August 3rd (with the exception of one such grant that was decided later and will be included in the next report), and in three cases follow-up grants for grants that were awarded before the end of August. Total grants: $1,700,346 Number of grants: 42 Acceptance rate (excluding desk rejections and withdrawn applications): 71% (We think this acceptance rate seems high at first glance, but after a quick review we tentatively think our decisions were broadly correct. We also asked EA Funds ED Jonas Vollmer for a quick spot check, and he agreed that there were only very few grants that seemed perhaps below the bar to him. That being said, we might increase our funding threshold if we learn that few grants have been large successes, or if more funders are entering the space.) Decision period: May–August 2021 Report authors: Max Daniel (chair), Buck Shlegeris, Michelle Hutchinson, Chi Nguyen (guest manager), Michael Aird (guest manager) Note that we’re providing less detailed payout reports than last round. This is because we’re constrained by fund manager time, and so more detailed payout reports trade off directly with our grantmaking ability. We feel that it is valuable for donors and applicants to understand the fund managers’ thinking, but that after the detailed payout reports from last round and our AMA earlier this year, there are diminishing returns from continuing to publish in-depth payout reports. (Note that us being constrained by fund manager time does not mean that ‘EA is primarily vetting constrained.’ We think that receiving a larger number of applications proposing highly valuable projects could increase the overall impact of the EAIF’s grants much more than fund managers spending more time on evaluating current applications. In fact, we suspect marginal fund manager time would be best spend on active grantmaking, i.e., soliciting more such applications. In this sense, the bigger constraint seems to be the supply of high-impact project ideas, project founders, and/or matching projects to founders.) Strategic updates include: Since May, the EAIF has taken on evaluating grants to local, national, and university groups outside of the select locations covered by CEA’s Community Building Grants program. Buck Shlegeris led the assessment of such applications covered in this report. Since September, assistant fund manager Emma Williamson usually has taken the lead on evaluating such applications, with supervision from Buck and using a process that Buck and Emma developed. This refers to funding for group organizers. All groups remain eligible to apply to CEA’s Groups Support Funding for operating costs such as room booking, advertising costs, and food at events, and to allow EA groups to run specific projects (such as retreats or fellowships). After having consulted with the other EA Funds, we are planning for the EAIF to evaluate all grants for local groups going forward, no matter the group’s scope. For instance, the EAIF is going to evaluate applications for animal-focused groups, rationality groups, and groups focused on existential risk. We think that this is how we can best leverage the EAIF’s experience in evaluating community building activities, since much of what we’ve learned will be useful irrespective of a group’s focus. We will consult with managers of the other funds and cause a...