I am looking after EA Kolkata in India.
Feel free to message me via forum or
Book a 1:1 - https://cal.com/nayanika
Help me grow EA Kolkata.
Share my experience of transitioning from a prestige-driven career to impact-driven and building an EA Group in an LMIC.
Thank you Sanu for asking this! This donation happened by chance and led to breaking my first donation analysis-paralysis situation. Considering how large often EA donations are, I didn't quite think if it should be EA optimised since my donation was only enough to cover a pre X-mass event for these kids and their families. I felt somewhere that since the org which donated my fee to them was EA-aligned it was kinda an EA-ish support that way, definitely not downright EA way. As you rightly said, not every donation need to optimise and the fact that the donation was possible due to my work on an EA project is also what makes it relevant for me to post this here :)
I'd recommend Amplify as a much needed initiative given, as EAs, we mostly don't get it right or are inadequate when it comes to marketing our services and overall whatever we can offer the world at large. Impact can be maximised when we (especially the EA groups/communities and its services like Effective Thesis, etc) are visible and surfacing the mainstream avenues/channels.
Hi Dion! Just read this and since you're exploring other cities, I'm willing to coordinate future events in Kolkata, India. As per our group mentor's (CEA fall OSP'25) suggestion we're also looking forward to filing to host an EA Summit in Kolkata next year. I'm unable to attend this year.
Thank you Arnold for your question! tbh cost-effectiveness was never a matter of concern here since I was not funding anything significantly tractable or neglected.
I also believe you are right that emotionally salient donations can increase long-term giving capacity because they help people form a durability around giving rather than a purely instrumental motivation everytime.