Doing vs Talking at EA Events

My main question for you: How would you discuss the point from a friend new to EA: “Nothing was practically accomplished at the meeting. Ideas were discussed.”

I would encourage the friend to take a longer-term view to see the value in discussing ideas.

I would also encourage the friend to try out doing the direct-work meetup concept. I suspect there are good reasons why that style meetup is not popular, but would be delighted to see them pioneer it successfully.

The following EA Forum post may be relevant to you. I'm not sure how Madison vs Harvard differ, though I suspect they are both more similar to each other than they are to the contract-work-and-donate model of an EA meetup you are conceptualizing: http://effective-altruism.com/ea/1nh/heuristics_from_running_harvard_and_oxford_ea/

Some value I see in the social discussion style EA meetups I am familiar with (I co-organize EA Austin and have been to Chicago a couple times):

• Prevent value drift through facilitating the development of friendships and closer ties between community members

• Inform EA community members about new ideas which they can then go home and read further about online (high fidelity learning)

• Have more personalized discussions about career planning than is easy/typical in online EA discussions

It seems like the new idea you're adding to the forum is that local EA groups should earn money together.

My gut reaction is that freelancing with a rotating group that's open to anyone would be an inefficient way of making money. Normally, the process of applying for jobs takes a while, so you'd really have to know in advance who's going to be attending the meet-up and what skills they have.

You might solve this by always taking the same type of jobs--maybe you always work in HTML because it's easy. But easy jobs won't pay well. You'll be competing with developers in very poor countries.

Another way to solve it could be to create a small business with a few talented EA friends and plan to donate the profits (cf Founder's Pledge). That way you could expect commitment, know skillsets in advance, and don't have a revolving door of people to teach. You'll be able to take on more challenging, specialized jobs that will pay you more. I'm not sure Upwork is the best place to find those jobs, but if you have technically talented and altruistic friends, maybe freelancing or starting a business is a good idea.

For most of us, I think a better way to have impact is to improve our performance at our day job. Getting a raise/bonus/promotion will almost definitely be worth more than freelancing. For some people, improving their performance at their day job means learning something new; those people might want to start a reading or study group together (EA London has a few). For other people, improving their work performance comes down to putting in the hours at work, and what they need from EA events is a place to socialize and be reminded why they do what they do.

I don't think the idea of freelancing together is a bad one, I just think it's not the optimal use of groups' time. Let me know if you disagree with anything I've said. - Kirsten

EDIT: Improving their performance at their day jobs will often also be a way for people doing direct work to have impact, even if they don't get paid extra.

“Nothing was practically accomplished at the meeting. Ideas were discussed.”

• Mention something about how it's a social event. In Engineers Without Borders, every other off-week, we have a meeting that's focused on community building. It's the same sort of deal.

• To that other electrical engineering major (who tagged along to the EA Madison event), I would now say, "It's like going to a technical conference. People going to an Altium (industry standard for PCB design software) conference are going to discuss and learn Altium. Specialized language is occationally used. Certain parameters are more commonly known by these professionals (and sometimes students). Altium by itself is to do a specific job, such as designing the board in a cell phone. The purpose of the conference is not to make cell phone PCBs."

• Conclude with something about the GWWC pledge.

vegan friends who eat beef—because beef cattle suffer the least

While I'm all for inclusive veganism this seems to be going a bit far! :') it seems like it's on the good side of the Omni spectrum, though. The argument is pretty sound (though bivalves would be better and also have less environmental impact).

Regarding your main question... I'm going to give it some thought and come back later if I come up with anything worthwhile ;)

I feel your desire for doing at a meet up, because I ran a student group in college where I worried there was a lot of talk and too little action. I think there could be versions of "talking" that are closer to "doing," though—for example, presenting on recent projects or donation decisions, thereby giving members a chance to feel good about good they've done recently and creating a norm of action. This would probably avoid some of the problems with short-term freelancing laid out in other comments. Hope this idea helps!