# Should Rational Animations invite viewers to read content on LessWrong?

When I [introduced](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/yekoZcQQfuZYqk3Bj/introducing-rational-animations) Rational Animations, I wrote:

> What I* won't *do is aggressively advertise LessWrong and the EA Forum. If the channel succeeds, I will organize fundraisers for EA charities. If I adapt an article for YT, I will link it in the description or just credit the author. If I use quotes from an author on LW or the EA Forum, I will probably credit them on-screen. But I will never say: "Come on LW! Plenty of cool people there!" especially if the channel becomes big. Otherwise, "plenty of cool people" becomes Reddit pretty fast.
> 
> If the channel becomes *big, *I will also refrain from posting direct links to LW and the EA Forum. Remind me if I ever forget. And let me know if these rules are not conservative enough.

In my most recent communications with Open Phil, we discussed the fact that a YouTube video aimed at educating on a particular topic would be more effective if viewers had an easy way to fall into an "intellectual rabbit hole" to learn more. So a potential way to increase Rational Animations' impact is to increase the number of calls to action to read the sources of our videos. LessWrong and the EA Forum are good candidates for people to go learn more. Suppose we adapt an article from the sequences. One option is to link to [readthesequences.com](https://www.readthesequences.com/), another is to link to the version of the article hosted on LessWrong. It seems to me that linking to the version hosted on LessWrong would dramatically increase the chance of people falling into an "intellectual rabbit hole" and learning a lot more and eventually starting to contribute.  
  
Here are what I think are the main cons and pros of explicitly inviting people to read stuff on LessWrong:

Cons:

1.  If lots of people join at once we may get a brief period of lower-quality posts and comments until moderation catches up.
2.  If we can't onboard people fast enough, the quality of what's in the site will become a lot lower over time, and people producing excellent content will be driven away.

Pro:

1.  If people read LessWrong, they will engage with important topics such as reducing existential risk from AI. Eventually, some of them might be able to contribute in important ways, such as by doing alignment research. 

I'm more optimistic now about trying to invite people than I was in 2021, mainly thanks to recent adjustments in [moderation policy](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/kyDsgQGHoLkXz6vKL/lw-team-is-adjusting-moderation-policy) and solutions such as the [Rejected Content Section](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/PKGTKdRDneLA7bY54/new-rejected-content-section), which, in my understanding, are meant at least in part for dealing with the large influx of new users resulting from the increased publicity around AGI x-risk. I think it likely (~ 70%) that such moderation norms are strong enough filters that they would select for good contributions and for users that can contribute in positive ways. 

Among the cons, I think number 2 is worse and more likely to happen without a strong and deliberate moderation effort. That said, it's probably relatively easy and safe to run experiments.

I don't think many people would make a new account as a result of an isolated call to action to read an article hosted on LessWrong. I have high confidence that the number of new accounts would be between 100 and 1000 per million views, given the three conditions in [this market](https://manifold.markets/Writer/if-rational-animations-invites-view). You should treat the market as providing a per-video upper bound, since the conditions describe some very aggressive publicity.

Market conditions:

> 1.  In a video, Rational Animations invites viewers to read a LessWrong article or sequence. It's an explicit invitation made in the narration of the video rather than, e.g., only as in-video text.
> 2.  The article/sequence is linked in three places: at the end of the video (e.g., in place or near the Patreon link), at the top of the video description, and in the pinned comment.
> 3.  The video accrues 1 million views.

So, what should I do? I'm asking moderators and users too. How liberal should I be with inviting people here? Can/should I do some experiments? If I don't get a clear and united "go ahead" from the community and moderators I won't take any strong unilateral action. I feel like there needs to be a strong majority for me to proceed. 

I will weigh particularly highly the opinions of moderators and long-time users. 

I'm particularly interested in initially discussing the idea of starting small-scale and experimenting with tools such as links tracking new accounts.