5 ms·

A friend of mine attended last year. He described it as "the most socially awkward people you've ever met telling you how to be less socially awkward".

vitno 15y ago
that doesn't sound like the description at all...
- Eliezer 15y ago
  It's possible that somebody is confusing this with an LW meetup, or possibly the Megacamp (that didn't work nearly as well as the one-week Minicamp which is why we aren't repeating it), or something else. Attendees of the previous Minicamp were nearly unanimous about how awesome it was, and they weren't socially awkward.
  - SilasX 15y ago
    Well, those who publicly spoke about it were unanimous in its being awesome. SIAI isn't very open about stats for the remainder. Also, I don't think a regular LW meetup would be described as involving "teaching people to be less socially awkward". I've followed LessWrong, and I hadn't heard anything, until the GP, about it giving off such an aura of "the blind leading the blind".
    - rms 15y ago
      I expect that Scott's friend generally had a great experience at the camp and made a somewhat flippant and self-deprecating comment that was appropriate in a social context, but wasn't Scott's friend's most important takeaway from the experience. You can see all of the feedback to the survey question asking what about the camp could be improved here: http://lesswrong.com/lw/b98/minicamps_on_rationality_and_awesomeness_may_1113/678g http://lesswrong.com/lw/b98/minicamps_on_rationality_and_awe...
      - SilasX 15y ago
        Who's Scott?
        rms 15y ago
        fuelfive
    - Eliezer 15y ago
      No, we took surveys and everyone except one person rated in the 9-10 range, I believe.
      - SilasX 15y ago
        And then in a few months everyone promptly returned to their status quo ante minicamp ... or at least, the available results are observationally equivalent thereto.
        Eliezer 14y ago
        Your statement is false as a matter of fact. We have a one-year life-outcomes followup study planned, but the preliminary indications don't fit with 'status quo', and there are plenty of participant comments on the LW thread which explicitly say otherwise. Stop making stuff up.
grandalf 15y ago
I think your friend should go back to watching sports and eating wings.

vitno 15y ago

that doesn't sound like the description at all...

Eliezer 15y ago
It's possible that somebody is confusing this with an LW meetup, or possibly the Megacamp (that didn't work nearly as well as the one-week Minicamp which is why we aren't repeating it), or something else. Attendees of the previous Minicamp were nearly unanimous about how awesome it was, and they weren't socially awkward.
- SilasX 15y ago
  Well, those who publicly spoke about it were unanimous in its being awesome. SIAI isn't very open about stats for the remainder. Also, I don't think a regular LW meetup would be described as involving "teaching people to be less socially awkward". I've followed LessWrong, and I hadn't heard anything, until the GP, about it giving off such an aura of "the blind leading the blind".
  - rms 15y ago
    I expect that Scott's friend generally had a great experience at the camp and made a somewhat flippant and self-deprecating comment that was appropriate in a social context, but wasn't Scott's friend's most important takeaway from the experience. You can see all of the feedback to the survey question asking what about the camp could be improved here: http://lesswrong.com/lw/b98/minicamps_on_rationality_and_awesomeness_may_1113/678g http://lesswrong.com/lw/b98/minicamps_on_rationality_and_awe...
    - SilasX 15y ago
      Who's Scott?
      - rms 15y ago
        fuelfive
  - Eliezer 15y ago
    No, we took surveys and everyone except one person rated in the 9-10 range, I believe.
    - SilasX 15y ago
      And then in a few months everyone promptly returned to their status quo ante minicamp ... or at least, the available results are observationally equivalent thereto.
      - Eliezer 14y ago
        Your statement is false as a matter of fact. We have a one-year life-outcomes followup study planned, but the preliminary indications don't fit with 'status quo', and there are plenty of participant comments on the LW thread which explicitly say otherwise. Stop making stuff up.

grandalf 15y ago

I think your friend should go back to watching sports and eating wings.