If one thinks of LW not as the final destination to which intellectual elites should be attracted, but a useful and productive entry point for LW-associated organisations (whether formally affiliated or loosely linked) also including LW itself, it seems to me that things are largely on the right track. Judging from the welcome threads there seems to have been a great deal of success in recruiting young members especially, but not only, through HPMoR. And often there is a youthful feel to discussions here, quite appropriately as many young members are discovering a like-minded community for the first time and learning how one can move beyond Spock-rationality to something deeper -- and establishing a reputation in the community at the same time.
But at the same time others seem to be slowly becoming more engaged in LW, or at least aware of it, thanks to the greater engagement of LW and LW-associated organisations with the more "mainstream". From a different perspective the question might be, what does it gain an academic researcher with an existing reputation in the "mainstream" to participate here? And, is this something most LW members would want? After all LW has long had a strongly-defended reputation as an outsider organisation -- would more involvement by "mainstream elite" take away those aspects of LW that make it what it is? As a "mainstream" academic myself I think this would be highly likely.
There also seems to be some kind of tension here - LW would like to attract more intellectual elites while at the same time MIRI is reducing efforts in the same direction MIRI 2013 strategy due to developments in the academic mainstream. Does this indirectly speak to the same issue?
And, is this something most LW members would want? After all LW has long had a strongly-defended reputation as an outsider organisation -- would more involvement by "mainstream elite" take away those aspects of LW that make it what it is?
I don't see much downside in being seen as becoming more mainstream. LW isn't itself a mainstream academic organization, but it's not like we're all fundamentalist hipsters.
...There also seems to be some kind of tension here - LW would like to attract more intellectual elites while at the same time MIRI is redu
Is Less Wrong, despite its flaws, the highest-quality relatively-general-interest forum on the web? It seems to me that, to find reliably higher-quality discussion, I must turn to more narrowly focused sites, e.g. MathOverflow and the GiveWell blog.
Many people smarter than myself have reported the same impression. But if you know of any comparably high-quality relatively-general-interest forums, please link me to them!
In the meantime: suppose it's true that Less Wrong is the highest-quality relatively-general-interest forum on the web. In that case, we're sitting on a big opportunity to grow Less Wrong into the "standard" general-interest discussion hub for people with high intelligence and high metacognition (shorthand: "intellectual elites").
Earlier, Jonah Sinick lamented the scarcity of elites on the web. How can we get more intellectual elites to engage on the web, and in particular at Less Wrong?
Some projects to improve the situation are extremely costly:
Code changes, however, could be significantly less costly. New features or site structure elements could increase engagement by intellectual elites. (To avoid priming and contamination, I'll hold back from naming specific examples here.)
To help us figure out which code changes are most likely to increase engagement on Less Wrong by intellectual elites, specific MIRI volunteers will be interviewing intellectual elites who (1) are familiar enough with Less Wrong to be able to simulate which code changes might cause them to engage more, but who (2) mostly just lurk, currently.
In the meantime, I figured I'd throw these ideas to the community for feedback and suggestions.