EA - Why we’re getting the Fidelity Model wrong by Alishaandomeda

Link to original articleWelcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Why we’re getting the Fidelity Model wrong, published by Alishaandomeda on December 17, 2022 on The Effective Altruism Forum.This is a Draft Amnesty Day draft. That means it’s not polished, it’s probably not up to my standards, the ideas are not thought out, and I haven’t checked everything. I was explicitly encouraged to post something unfinished! Commenting and feedback guidelines: I’m going with the default — please be nice. But constructive feedback is appreciated; please let me know what you think is wrong. Feedback on the structure of the argument is also appreciated.This is a response to The fidelity model of spreading ideas - EA Forum (effectivealtruism.org), the associated CEA blog post, plus those who have referenced it in good-spirited debate about how EA comms ought to develop in the coming years.Epistemic status: As confident as anyone experienced enough in manipulating the whims of social media algorithms for social change can ever be, given that they change semi-regularly. 6+ years of experience using social media to effect social change, including advising politicians on their use of social media, conducting experimental social media for social change projects that have informed national political party strategies, and training upwards of 500+ activists.OverviewThis post is an exploration of the Fidelity Model, an approach to the spreading of ideas that is widely referenced within EA spaces.While I am broadly supportive of the fidelity model and agree with its central premises, I disagree with one influential interpretation of it: that we shouldn't use social media to communicate key EA ideas.This interpretation of the argument is claimed to be central to CEA's social media scepticism, which I argue is misplaced. I am more sympathetic to the mass media scepticism this argument also brings about.I explain why having an "official presence" on social media is important using the Fidelity Model. Social media is an important communications model, even if social media itself is low-fidelity.The Fidelity ModelI am taking this from the original post, so as to keep our arguments clear and consistent.DefinitionFidelity The key term in this model is "fidelity." Therefore it will be useful to define this term. By fidelity [the original author has] in mind nothing more than the classic dictionary definition of "adherence to fact or detail" or "accuracy; exactness."As an example, imagine I am shooting a movie on an old camera. If the image captured by the camera causes it to seem as though I am wearing a blue shirt when actually my shirt is red, then the image captured by the camera is low fidelity.The problemWith reference to The Telephone Game, the author of the original argument accepts that "EA" ideas and arguments are nuanced and worries that some methods of communication require that the nuance be stripped back in order to be easily communicable.When the context gets stripped away, those who receive the ideas leave with something that's similar to effective altruism, but different. Thus, when we hear the EA message repeated back to us, we get sentences like "EA is about earning all the money you can and donating it to GiveWell charities" or "EAs only care about interventions that are supported by randomized controlled trials." To a certain extent we can influence the sentences we get back by being more clever about how we frame our ideas, but it seems unlikely that framing can do all the work.How we get to social media scepticismVery few people who use social media believe it to be a high-fidelity information exchange space. Platforms like Twitter, with low character counts and a norm towards fast-paced argument threads, are particularly bad at fostering nuanced debate.EA ideas are nuanced, and when they aren't covered with that nuance in m...