Personally, I like the recorded GiveWell meetings and see the virtues of transparency in being more credible to observers, and in providing external incentives. However, I would also worry that signalling issues with a diverse external audience can hinder accurate discussion of important topics, e.g. frank discussions of the strengths and weaknesses of potential Summit speakers, partners, and potential hires that could cause hurt feelings and damage valuable relationships. Because of this problem I would be more wholehearted in supporting other forms of transparency, e.g. more frequent and detailed reporting on activities, financial transparency, the strategic plan, things like Luke's Q&A, etc. But I wouldn't be surprised if this happens too.
I'll take this opportunity to mention that I'm against publishing SIAI's board meeting minutes. First, for the reasons Carl gave above. Second, because then we'd have to invest a lot of time explaining the logic behind each decision, or else face waves of criticism for decisions that appear arbitrary when one merely publishes the decision and not the argument.
However, I'm definitely making big effort to improve SIAI transparency. Our new website (under development) has a page devoted to transparency, where you'll be able to find our strategic plan, our 990s, and probably other links. I'm also publishing the monthly progress reports, and recently co-wrote 'Intelligence Explosion: Evidence and Import', which for the first time (excepting Chalmers) summarizes many of our key pieces of reasoning with the clarity of mainstream academic form. We're also developing an annual report, and I'm working toward developing some other documents that will make SIAI strategy more transparent. But all this takes time, especially when starting from pretty close to 0 on transparency, and having lots of other problems to fix, too.
Second, because then we'd have to invest a lot of time explaining the logic behind each decision, or else face waves of criticism for decisions that appear arbitrary when one merely publishes the decision and not the argument.
Are the arguments not made during the board meetings? Or do you guys talk ahead of time and just formalize the decisions during the board meetings?
In any case, I think you should invest more time explaining the logic behind your decisions, and not just make the decisions themselves more transparent. If publishing board meeting minu...
Today I was appointed the new Executive Director of Singularity Institute.
Because I care about transparency, one of my first projects as an intern was to begin work on the organization's first Strategic Plan. I researched how to write a strategic plan, tracked down the strategic plans of similar organizations, and met with each staff member, progressively iterating the document until it was something everyone could get behind.
I quickly learned why there isn't more of this kind of thing: transparency is a lot of work! 100+ hours of work later, plus dozens of hours from others, and the strategic plan was finally finished and ratified by the board. It doesn't accomplish much by itself, but it's one important stepping stone in building an organization that is more productive, more trusted, and more likely to help solve the world's biggest problems.
I spent two months as a researcher, and was then appointed Executive Director.
In further pursuit of transparency, I'd like to answer (on video) submitted questions from the Less Wrong community just as Eliezer did two years ago.
The Rules
1) One question per comment (to allow voting to carry more information about people's preferences).
2) Try to be as clear and concise as possible. If your question can't be condensed into one paragraph, you should probably ask in a separate post. Make sure you have an actual question somewhere in there (you can bold it to make it easier to scan).
3) I will generally answer the top-voted questions, but will skip some of them. I will tend to select questions about Singularity Institute as an organization, not about the technical details of some bit of research. You can read some of the details of the Friendly AI research program in my interview with Michael Anissimov.
4) If you reference certain things that are online in your question, provide a link.
5) This thread will be open to questions and votes for 7 days, at which time I will decide which questions to begin recording video responses for.
I might respond to certain questions within the comments thread and not on video; for example, when there is a one-word answer.