5 ms·

Jokes aside, writing this fanfic is certainly a curious use of time for someone charged with the task of saving the world from an apocalypse.

listic 16y ago
I suspect that this fanfic is hoping at its best to bring some of Harry Potter fans, of which there are many, to the understanding of rationality and participation in site lesswrong.com A smart move to raise the sanity waterline, as Elieser puts it: http://lesswrong.com/lw/1e/raising_the_sanity_waterline/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/1e/raising_the_sanity_waterline/
AngryParsley 16y ago
From the author's notes: I started writing this story in part because I'd bogged down on a book I was working on (now debogged), and that means my top priority was to have fun writing again. It might have helped in other ways, too. Release of this fanfic correlates with increased traffic on LW: http://siteanalytics.compete.com/lesswrong.com http://siteanalytics.compete.com/lesswrong.com Apparently if you want to get more people to visit your site, write Harry Potter fanfic.
- gjm11 16y ago
  Apparently if you want to get more people to visit your site, write Harry Potter fanfic. ... If you happen to be as good at it as Eliezer Yudkowsky is. Which you probably aren't.
  - gjm11 16y ago
    If whoever downvoted this would like to explain why, I'd be interested. (General consensus seems to be that HPATMOR is in fact an exceptionally good instance of Harry Potter fan-fiction. It therefore seems likely that most people are not as good at writing Harry Potter fan-fiction as Eliezer is. Ergo, his success in getting more visitors to his site by writing Harry Potter fan-fiction is not likely representative of what other people would achieve.)
- gwern 16y ago
  Wow. From 20k to 100k visitors? That's pretty impressive, although I didn't notice any major uptick in # of comments or new posts.
  - adamta 16y ago
    Hopefully that means people are taking time to read through the important sequences before commenting much.

listic 16y ago

I suspect that this fanfic is hoping at its best to bring some of Harry Potter fans, of which there are many, to the understanding of rationality and participation in site lesswrong.com A smart move to raise the sanity waterline, as Elieser puts it: http://lesswrong.com/lw/1e/raising_the_sanity_waterline/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/1e/raising_the_sanity_waterline/

AngryParsley 16y ago

From the author's notes: I started writing this story in part because I'd bogged down on a book I was working on (now debogged), and that means my top priority was to have fun writing again. It might have helped in other ways, too. Release of this fanfic correlates with increased traffic on LW: http://siteanalytics.compete.com/lesswrong.com http://siteanalytics.compete.com/lesswrong.com Apparently if you want to get more people to visit your site, write Harry Potter fanfic.

gjm11 16y ago
Apparently if you want to get more people to visit your site, write Harry Potter fanfic. ... If you happen to be as good at it as Eliezer Yudkowsky is. Which you probably aren't.
- gjm11 16y ago
  If whoever downvoted this would like to explain why, I'd be interested. (General consensus seems to be that HPATMOR is in fact an exceptionally good instance of Harry Potter fan-fiction. It therefore seems likely that most people are not as good at writing Harry Potter fan-fiction as Eliezer is. Ergo, his success in getting more visitors to his site by writing Harry Potter fan-fiction is not likely representative of what other people would achieve.)
gwern 16y ago
Wow. From 20k to 100k visitors? That's pretty impressive, although I didn't notice any major uptick in # of comments or new posts.
- adamta 16y ago
  Hopefully that means people are taking time to read through the important sequences before commenting much.