2026-06-10
I need clear risk opt-ins, for people around me
Disclaimer
- personal
- target audience - strictly myself
- Flagging this because it has repeatedly come up in multiple contexts. This is not a note about any specific person.
- Mind sims - I do have mind sims of specific people in mind though, so this is not pure theory detached from reality.
Main
- I need a clearer process for other people to opt in or opt out to the risk of interacting with me. I need a process for offline and a process for online. Also they're interconnected because you often meet someone first in one context and transition to the other.
- Issue I notice
- Multiple times it has happened that when people opt-out of the risk, I am unclear whether it is because they don't want the risk, or because they actually disagree with the plan.
- This is a big problem because I need to know whether they're type-1 (agree, but wanna stay private) or type-2 (disagree but accept) or type-3 (do not accept).
- Why can't I leave this question unanswered? Why do I need to know?
- One simple answer is just mental resources. I have limited mental bandwidth to devote to navigating social reality, I also have object-level work to do. I wish people would just give me their goddamn answer and get it over with. Then I can go do other important stuff.
- Another answer is yes, this is useful information. If lot of people disagree with me, maybe I want to understand the disagreement? But ofcourse, such people might also decline to have such a conversation with me.
- How to solve this?
- Easy answer - just go cold DM a bunch of people and ask if they're type-1 or type-2 or type-3 lol.
- Deeper issue 1
- Some people might want a guarantee their answer stays private. But like, I cannot actually offer that guarantee. I can be like sure, I am not immediately posting your answer online. But also, if I am investigated, ofcourse the answer comes out. If I get hacked, the answer could come out. If I am threatened, the answer could come out. Or I might just have some mental health issue one day as a result of which I myself end up revealing the answer. I cannot actually promise a high degree of privacy to a lot of people.
- See also: Habryka on why keeping secrets is costly
- Deeper issue 2
- Some people might themselves not know what their answer is.
- Most people haven't thought through topics like this, and even if you ask, some of them will just give a surface-level answer they haven't thought through. And if you're like, "no you should actually think this through, this is important", they will still be like, no, lol
- Some people might want to think it through properly but want this thinking to be private. And again, see above, if they discuss their thinking with me, I again can't promise a lot of privacy to them.
- Answer to deeper issues
- I don't know, I think being even more explicit about stuff is the only way. And if they still need to think about it, maybe the actually correct move on their part is to distance from me, think it through, and then later decide if they wanna talk to me again or not.
Conclusion
- I need to have more empathy for the fact that multiple people around me (online and in-person) cannot actually honestly communicate with me whether their answer is "agree, but wanna stay private" or "disagree but accept" or "do not accept" or "don't know, wanna think, wanna stay private" or "don't know, don't wanna think, wanna stay private."
- I am actually putting them in a difficult spot. I do still think putting them in this spot is the least worst option. But I should be aware that this is what I'm doing, and why I'm doing it.
- Especially after you've had a first conversation with people that is non-work-related, bring up the topic of what you're actually working on, bring up how much privacy you can actually realistically offer, ask them what they think and don't press them for an immediate answer if they don't wanna immediately offer one. The last part is important.
- Another possible solution - Maybe I should try to get more feedback from strangers in-person? This is a large time investment but like, in-person is way better than online, and meeting strangers is less risky to said stranger, than sustained repeated interaction. I don't know, this doesn't sound like an ideal solution but it can work sometimes.
- prolific.com surveys seem higher ROI on my time tbh. Maybe I should do those too.
- Motherfucker you wanted to do the surveys months ago, why haven't you done them yet? Note to self - do the surveys by the end of the month (2026-06-30) ideally.
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