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Singularity Summit - some videos

1 Post author: Dr_Manhattan 26 October 2011 02:57PM

Someone posted what looks like unofficial videos from the Summit. http://www.youtube.com/user/thesingularitycom

Comments (11)

Comment author: shminux 26 October 2011 05:22:04PM *  27 points [-]

I had been looking forward to watching the EY's presentation, and was bitterly disappointed.

On stage he looks like a novice speaker, committing a slew of rookie mistakes: most of the jokes fall flat, the slides are uninformative for anyone who is not already an expert in the area (and useless for anyone who is), he constantly complains about time constraints (did they shorten his time unexpectedly at the last moment?), he does not leave time for a conclusion, he talks at a level likely inappropriate for the audience, he flashes a score of slides toward the end to show that he's done more work than he was able to present...

Now contrast this with the presentation that immediately follows, by a seasoned pro, Max Tegmark, who knows how to be engaging and hold the audience's attention and how to get his point across, whose slides are well thought out and whose jokes elicit the intended reaction.

I am loath to give advice to a person who is orders of magnitude smarter than I am, but, were it anyone else, I would recommend a basic presentation-giving training, such as the one I took ages ago.

EDIT: That course is also where I first learned how to structure oral and written presentations.

Comment author: Wei_Dai 03 November 2011 12:52:27PM 5 points [-]

It seems to me that Eliezer's goal was to use the talk as a lure for any potential FAI researchers who might be in the audience, and simultaneously to signal that SIAI is doing real technical work and not focused purely on PR or "spend all our time pondering morality". For these purposes, a really smooth practiced presentation would not be particularly helpful.

Comment author: pedanterrific 27 October 2011 04:38:10AM 3 points [-]

I had been looking forward to watching the EY's presentation, and was bitterly disappointed.

Bitterly? Just what were you expecting?

Comment author: shminux 27 October 2011 04:41:24AM 10 points [-]

Having never met him or seen him on stage, I was expecting to have my mind blown, MoR style.

Comment author: Vladimir_Nesov 26 October 2011 10:51:22PM *  7 points [-]

The talks for SS06 and SS07 were presented much better, so it seems like a matter of investing less effort in preparing for the talk (perhaps with less-time-than-expected making the challenge of happening to be prepared anyway harder), rather than of not being able to present well.

Comment author: wedrifid 26 October 2011 11:25:31PM *  8 points [-]

That being the case it may have been a time to consider the heuristic "if this is worth doing it is worth doing well" and apply modus tollens.

Comment author: dlthomas 26 October 2011 11:38:09PM 0 points [-]

It's a catchy saying. It may or may not be a good heuristic.

It certainly doesn't hold in every case.

It might have in this case.

Comment author: wedrifid 26 October 2011 11:45:11PM *  6 points [-]

It certainly doesn't hold in every case.

Which is why I explicitly went out of my way to modify the saying to 'this', sacrificing catchiness so it was clear to readers that I was not asserting “If a job is worth doing, it's worth doing well” as a general claim. Without success, it would seem.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 26 October 2011 03:24:06PM 8 points [-]

The official SingInst channel, which I found at Marginal Revolution. I don't think I've seen the videos there mentioned at LW.

Comment author: wallowinmaya 26 October 2011 04:12:04PM *  2 points [-]

This is great! You should write a post in the Discussion-section. ( I would write it myself, but I don't want to steal the karma;) )

Comment author: jimrandomh 26 October 2011 04:09:36PM 2 points [-]

The official videos are much better. (The unofficial ones look like they came from a cell phone camera.)