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• [1]Writing
• [2]Science
• [3]About
Things you're allowed to do
December 13, 2020, updated&nbspJanuary 9, 2023
This is a list of things you’re allowed to do that you thought you weren’t, or
didn’t even know you could.
I haven’t tried everything on this list, mainly due to cost. But you’d be
surprised how cheap most of the things on this list are (especially the free
ones).
Note that you can replace “hire” or “buy” with “barter for” or “find a DIY
guide to” nearly everywhere below. E.g. you can clean the bathroom in exchange
for your housemate doing a couple hours’ research for you.
Learning and decision making
• Hire a researcher or expert consultant
□ I hired a researcher ([4]Elizabeth Van Nostrand, whom you can and
should [5]hire too) to help write this very post, which is largely
about how to hire people to do things!
□ They can:
☆ Help validate whether a crazy idea is possible
☆ Do [6]epistemic spot checks of your work
☆ Map the landscape of opinions on a topic
☆ Write literature surveys
☆ Find people worth talking to about a potential topic and writing
briefs about them
☆ Opposition or market research
☆ Find options for big purchases like houses or insurance
☆ Compile datasets
☆ Find un-Googleable things
□ To find one:
☆ Look for books or scholarly articles on the topic, and email the
author
○ Graduate students are especially good, and often know more than
the “experts”
○ If you find someone genuinely interested in what you’re working
on, you might be able to collaborate and not pay
☆ Look for interested individuals in the long tail of blogs
○ E.g. by Google searching with "site: medium.com" and finding
the authors
☆ Use a matchmaking service (see [7]Appendix)
☆ Search through professional organizations directories (e.g. Bar
Association, American Academy of Pediatrics)
☆ Google the topic +
○ “blog”
○ “podcast”
○ “expert witness”
○ “book”
○ “consultant”
○ “reddit”
□ What do I pay them?
☆ Some post their prices online
☆ If you’re hiring a grad student you can pay them at or above their
school’s graduate student stipend, which you can Google.
☆ [8]Make sure they get something out of the project (and other tips)
• [9]Ask obvious questions
• Ask questions online
□ You know those answers you enjoy reading on Stack Exchange, Reddit,
Quora, etc.? Someone had to ask those questions. It can be you.
□ If you’re embarrassed by the question, it’s easy to be anonymous
• Run surveys
□ Twitter
☆ Or ask someone with a larger following to do it
□ Google Surveys
□ Amazon Mechanical Turk
• Buy advertisements, [10]especially in legacy media
• Run [11]genuine randomized control trials on yourself
• Buy research or data
□ See [12]Appendix, [13]here, or [14]here
□ Or find it on [15]SciHub or [16]Libgen
• Hire someone to pentest/doxx you
□ Or put out a bounty for it, like [17]Gwern used to
• Hire a graphic designer to turn your appalling sketches into beautiful
diagrams or slides
• Host small gatherings or conferences on topics you care about
□ These are much easier to set up than you’d think, especially in the age
of Zoom
• Hire a tutor
□ [18]Language tutors are surprisingly cheap and better than any app
□ [19]Wyzant and many other sites exist for general tutoring
□ For niche tutoring you can try general freelance sites like [20]Fiverr
or [21]Upwork
□ Services like [22]Sharpest Minds exist for professional training
• [23]Dissect a cadaver (even as a non-medical student)
• Pick a spot on the map that simply seems strange and just go there. (HT
Michael Nielsen)
• Hire someone just as an excuse to make yourself complete a project
□ Sure you could proofread your own document. But if you hire a
proofreader, you have to actually deliver them something at some point.
Interpersonal
• Say “I don’t know” or “I don’t have an opinion” when you don’t
• Not tell white lies
□ You can be nice and tell the truth at the same time.
□ Especially to kids when they annoy you.
• Don’t drink (alcohol), even when you’re expected to
• Buy goods/services from your friends
□ It’s not weird unless you make it weird
□ Everyone knows some starving artists and needs to buy holiday gifts
□ Doesn’t apply to every service obviously: don’t take out loans from
your friends
• Travel to friends just to visit them
• Move close to friends
• Live in multiple places with multiple people
□ Rent spare rooms or couches part-time in multiple homes
□ Arrange your own timeshare system with friends
☆ E.g. a group of nine friends can rent three three-bedroom
apartments in three cities
☆ This also gives you flexibility over which jurisdiction you’re
taxed in
• Be a nomad
• Ask your acquaintances, “Hey, I want to leave my house more, are there any
cool events you’re going to soon?” (HT Sasha Chapin)
• Actively try to make yourself a better conversation partner
□ Via [24]Sasha Chapin
□ Via [25]Chana Messinger
□ Via [26]Adam Mastroianni
• Start a blog or substack so you can say “I’m a writer” without lying. Then
start conversations with strangers by saying “Hi, I’m a writer doing a
piece about <location/circumstance you’re in>. Can I ask you a few
questions?”
□ This is especially handy when traveling or at a restaurant.
• Romance
□ Ask people out on dates
□ Ask your friends to set you up
□ Hire a matchmaker
□ Buy premium versions of dating apps
□ Get couples therapy
• Give to charity
□ You can, to the best of our knowledge, [27]save someone’s (statistical)
life with not that much money. This is a big deal.
Support and accountability
• Hire a coach
□ For your professional area
☆ [28]An Atul Gawande article on the subject
☆ [29]On clicker training
□ Personal trainer
□ Nutritionist
□ Meditation guide
• Visit a physical therapist
• Buy task-specific devices that prevent multitasking
□ Kindle
□ Freewrite Traveller
□ Dedicated music players
□ Dedicated notebooks for specific purposes (day planner, exercise log,
etc.)
• Engage a human productivity monitor
□ I know two people who have hired people to sit next to them or
frequently contact them to keep them on-task
□ Examples: [30]focusmate.com and [31]coding-pal.com
Making the most of your resources
• First, figure out [32]how much your time is really worth to you, and then
act/spend accordingly
• Modify your stuff
□ Tape over annoying LED lights
□ Remove logos ([33]example)
□ Write in books
□ Rip off tags
□ Rotate your monitor to portrait
• Repair your stuff, or get it repaired
□ Shoes
□ Clothes
□ Luggage and [34]outdoor gear
□ Furniture
□ Car
☆ You can buy at-home car care
• Grocery delivery
• Cleaning services
□ Can be regular or just when you need a big spring clean
□ Don’t forget carpet cleaning, vent cleaning, and air filter replacement
• Laundry service
• Nannies over daycare
• Write on a post-it note affixed to a greeting card rather than on the
greeting card itself, so the recipient can throw away the post-it and reuse
your card
□ Employ similar logic for any disposable/consumable item
• Ask for free upgrades or coupons
□ At checkout you can just ask “Do you have any coupons I can apply to
this?”
• Treat fines like payments
□ E.g. park illegally and let yourself think of the (expected value of
the) fine as a parking fee
□ Obviously don’t break rules that matter like blocking a fire exit
• [35]Contest unjust fines
□ [36]DoNotPay offers lots of services like this, like unsubscribing you
from services or sending faxes digitally
• Don’t pay, or renegotiate, bills
□ [37]Example with hospital bills
• Let the credit cards on recurring bills expire
• Call/email executives at company to complain about things
□ E.g. using [38]RocketReach
• Telemedicine
• Surgery for appearance or comfort
• At-home vet care
• Enroll [39]yourself (or [40]your pet) in a clinical trial or research study
• Generate your own audiobooks
• Generate your own ebooks
□ [41]1dollarscan.com
• Get verbal things written down
□ [42]transcribeme.com
□ [43]otter.ai
• Personal assistant services (or a real PA if you can afford it)
□ [44]Magic, [45]TaskRabbit, [46]Fancy Hands, and similar services can
approximate many of these. There are also more serious services like
[47]Double.
□ Manage email
□ Helping you move
□ Getting visas and arranging travel
□ Stand in line for you
□ Errands
□ Filing paperwork
• Hire a personal stylist
• And if you grew up in a thrifty family, like me:
□ Paying for parking in convenient location
□ Hotels where you can sleep comfortably
□ Non-public transportation, especially when traveling
□ Buying comfortable mattress, shoes, etc.
□ Buying clothes for appearance or comfort instead of just the lowest
price
□ Bottled water when you’re thirsty
☆ And in general fulfilling any bodily need for < $5 (restrooms,
buying a hat when you forgot yours, etc.)
□ Buy your way out of advertising on e.g. Spotify or YouTube
□ Actually turn the heat/AC on
☆ And in general, [48]being willing to spend a few minutes to fix
small annoyances
○ You could even get someone to observe you to help figure this
out
☆ Seriously, just put 3-IN-ONE oil on that squeaky hinge already
Professional
• Ignore what’s on the jobs page and directly pitch someone at a company on
hiring you
□ The jobs page is always out-of-date anyway
□ Figure out what their needs are before you make your pitch
• Negotiate for better terms in your job offer
□ Easier than asking for a raise - you have more leverage
□ You can ask for a signing bonus equal to the cost of exercising all
your options, which shows commitment to the company
□ Propose a longer vesting schedule to demonstrate commitment
• Ask for a raise
• Ask to waive admission or graduation requirements
• Drop out/quit your job
□ Or go on leave from your job/school until they kick you out. They often
won’t.
• Live off your savings while trying something new
• If you can’t live off your savings, get a grant
□ [49]Emergent Ventures
□ [50]ACX Grants
□ Kickstarter
□ These days there are always new microgrant programs starting, [51]
here’s one list
• Work for yourself
□ Coaching, contracting, etc.
• [52]Cold contact people
□ Yes, even famous people. Or anyone who wrote something you like. Just
make sure you have something to say or a good question.
• [53]Write forwardable emails
• [54]Follow up many times
□ You won’t make people mad if you’re polite.
• Approach a person or group you admire and ask whether they want to cofound
something with you
□ “Here’s my story, my goal is to build a company/nonprofit/whatever in
this space, maybe I can help you with X role.”
• Propose that a person, group, or company contract-to-hire you
□ Even if you want a cofounder role, this can be done well
• Learn how professionals email by [55]reading leaked emails.
• Use contract-to-hire
□ Even for CEO-level roles, this can be done well
• As mentioned above, buy [56]research or data, e.g. for compensation
• Market-test a mere idea by (1) setting up a landing page with an interest
form and (2) buying a cheap social media ad campaign. (HT [57]@daytimeskye)
• Merge with your competitors, a la PayPal
• Work in public
□ Or mostly in public, a la SpaceX who livestreams everything
• Sell to unusual markets
□ ZetrOZ was building a medical device, but started by selling to olympic
horse teams, then olympic human athletes
□ Some biotech companies start in pets
• Charge more
• Write interviews with yourself and send them to journalists (HT Tom Kalil)
• Fly to people for in-person meetings/visits to demonstrate seriousness
• In general, just ask for things, even if you’ve never heard someone ask for
them
□ It’s okay if the things are crazy. You can always mollify afterward by
saying “I know that’s a crazy thing to ask for, but I have a rule that
I always ask.”
Related, Probably Better Lists
• Dwarkesh Patel’s [58]list of “barbell strategies”
• Katja Grace’s [59]How to trade money and time
• Sam Bowman’s [60]Things I Recommend You Buy and Use
• Rob Wiblin [61]channeling Sam
• Arden Koehler [62]channeling Rob
• Arden Koehler [63]channeling herself
• Sam Bowman [64]channeling himself
• [65]Estimated hourly costs of buying free time (see comments)
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Thanks to [66]Gwern, [67]Stephen Malina, [68]Alexey Guzey, [69]Elliot Jin, [70]
iandanforth, [71]Joshua M. Clulow, [72]Kay, [73]zoba, [74]ryandrake, a guy I
can’t name who offers “personal assistant concierge services for high-net-worth
families,” and [75]Elizabeth Van Nostrand for some of the ideas above.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Appendix: Sources of experts
Name Type Comments Target URL
Audience
Expertise Academics to comment on many Journalists [76]
Finder subjects link
Women’s Media Women only, focuses on [77]
Center current events and politics Journalists link
SheSource
National
Association of Seems like a low [78]
Personal Financial only bar to entry Journalists link
Financial
Advisors
Owned by PR firm,
ProfNet Wide range of experts presumably works Journalists [79]
for experts more link
than you
Presumably biased
Coursera Academics from top schools towards people who Journalists [80]
Expert Network only have made Coursera link
courses
Curated experts from
ExpertFile universities, institutions, Journalists [81]
think tanks, associations, link
companies and other sources
Aimed mostly at professional [82]
GURU expertise (Sales, Marketing, Businesses link
Eng, etc.)
Amber Biology Biologists only Science [83]
projects? link
Help a Requires
Reporter Out affiliation with a Journalists [84]
(HARO) highly ranked link
website
Self
Improvement Individuals [85]
Experts link
Directory
JurisPro Expert witnesses Lawyers [86]
link
ForensisGroup Expert witnesses Lawyers [87]
link
Expert Expert witnesses Lawyers [88]
Institute link
Appendix: Sources of research and data
• Top choices:
□ [89]IBIS
□ [90]Profound
□ [91]Research Monitor
□ [92]EuroMonitor
• [93]Inside View
• [94]US Census Data
• [95]SBA’s Office of Entrepreneurship Education Resources
• [96]Pew Research Center
• [97]Statista
• [98]marketresearch.com
• [99]Plunkett Research
• [100]The Market Intelligence Co.
• [101]Jinfo
• [102]IDC
• [103]Gartner
• [104]Pitchbook
• [105]Crunchbase
• [106]Option Impact salary information
• [107]The Venture Capital Executive Compensation Survey
References:
[1] https://milan.cvitkovic.net/writing/
[2] https://milan.cvitkovic.net/science/
[3] https://milan.cvitkovic.net/about/
[4] https://acesounderglass.com/
[5] https://acesounderglass.com/hire-me/
[6] https://acesounderglass.com/tag/epistemicspotcheck/
[7] https://milan.cvitkovic.net/writing/things_youre_allowed_to_do/#appendix-sources-of-experts
[8] https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/evyBmPw9ZnzmoFmP6/experiment-a-good-researcher-is-hard-to-find
[9] http://mindingourway.com/obvious-advice/
[10] https://www.news10.com/news/national/90-year-old-man-spends-10k-on-ads-to-tell-att-ceo-about-his-slow-internet-service/
[11] https://www.gwern.net/Nootropics#blinding-yourself
[12] https://milan.cvitkovic.net/writing/things_youre_allowed_to_do/#appendix-sources-of-research
[13] https://blog.alexa.com/sites-for-market-research/
[14] https://web.jinfo.com/go/blog/73431
[15] https://twitter.com/Sci_Hub
[16] https://twitter.com/libgen_project
[17] https://www.gwern.net/Blackmail#pseudonymity-bounty
[18] https://www.italki.com/
[19] https://www.wyzant.com/
[20] https://www.fiverr.com/
[21] https://www.upwork.com/
[22] https://www.sharpestminds.com/
[23] https://alok.github.io/2022/11/09/dissection/
[24] https://sashachapin.substack.com/p/making-normal-conversations-better
[25] https://twitter.com/ChanaMessinger/status/1463160594941554696
[26] https://experimentalhistory.substack.com/p/good-conversations-have-lots-of-doorknobs
[27] https://www.givewell.org/giving101/Your-dollar-goes-further-overseas
[28] https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/10/03/personal-best
[29] https://www.npr.org/2020/02/03/802422904/when-things-click-the-power-of-judgment-free-learning
[30] https://www.focusmate.com/
[31] https://coding-pal.com/
[32] https://programs.clearerthinking.org/what_is_your_time_really_worth_to_you.html
[33] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVeGDitPqKo
[34] https://rainypass.com/
[35] https://donotpay.com/
[36] https://donotpay.com/
[37] https://twitter.com/SievaKozinsky/status/1343664550617305088
[38] https://rocketreach.co/
[39] https://www.dummies.com/health/how-to-enroll-in-a-clinical-trial/
[40] https://loyalfordogs.com/
[41] https://1dollarscan.com/
[42] https://transcribeme.com/
[43] https://otter.ai/
[44] https://getmagic.com/
[45] https://www.taskrabbit.com/
[46] https://www.fancyhands.com/
[47] https://withdouble.com/
[48] https://radimentary.wordpress.com/2018/01/29/hammertime-day-1-bug-hunt/
[49] https://www.mercatus.org/emergent-ventures
[50] https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/apply-for-an-acx-grant
[51] https://github.com/nayafia/microgrants
[52] https://guzey.com/personal/what-should-you-do-with-your-life/#cold-emails-and-twitter
[53] https://www.startuphacks.vc/blog/2015/06/24/how-to-write-a-forwardable-introduction-email
[54] https://guzey.com/follow-up/
[55] https://twitter.com/TechEmails
[56] https://milan.cvitkovic.net/writing/things_youre_allowed_to_do/#appendix-sources-of-research
[57] https://twitter.com/daytimeskye/status/1608107407678349317
[58] https://web.archive.org/web/20220309155302/https://dwarkeshpatel.com/barbell-strategies/
[59] https://meteuphoric.com/2014/03/25/how-to-trade-money-and-time/
[60] https://medium.com/@s8mb/things-i-recommend-you-buy-and-use-second-edition-457a8e7163f6
[61] https://medium.com/@robertwiblin/things-i-recommend-you-buy-and-use-rob-edition-1d7b2ce27d68
[62] https://www.facebook.com/ardenlk/posts/10156553178262333
[63] https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ZrSzGLuwIEWeQJ_2zL5vpYDyV-LmC-8SBy-Q4WPF318/edit
[64] https://sambowman.substack.com/p/things-i-recommend-you-buy-2020-sam-bowman
[65] https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/KuFSkLwhSkEZJYALE/collating-widely-available-time-money-trades
[66] https://www.gwern.net/
[67] https://twitter.com/an1lam
[68] https://twitter.com/alexeyguzey
[69] https://twitter.com/robot__dreams
[70] https://twitter.com/iandanforth
[71] https://twitter.com/jmclulow
[72] https://twitter.com/K4y1s
[73] https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=zoba
[74] https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=ryandrake
[75] https://acesounderglass.com/
[76] https://expertisefinder.com/
[77] https://www.womensmediacenter.com/shesource/
[78] https://www.napfa.org/newsroom
[79] https://profnet.prnewswire.com/ProfNetHome/What-is-Profnet.aspx
[80] https://experts.coursera.org/
[81] https://expertfile.com/
[82] https://www.guru.com/
[83] https://www.amberbiology.com/
[84] https://www.helpareporter.com/
[85] https://www.selfgrowth.com/experts.html
[86] https://www.jurispro.com/
[87] https://www.forensisgroup.com/
[88] https://www.expertinstitute.com/
[89] https://www.ibisworld.com/
[90] https://profound.com/
[91] https://www.eifl.net/e-resources/research-monitor
[92] https://www.euromonitor.com/store
[93] https://www.insideview.com/
[94] https://www.census.gov/
[95] https://www.sba.gov/offices/headquarters/oee/resources/2836
[96] http://www.pewresearch.org/
[97] https://www.statista.com/
[98] https://www.marketresearch.com/
[99] https://www.plunkettresearch.com/how-to-buy/
[100] https://market-intelligence.com.au/
[101] https://www.jinfo.com/
[102] https://www.idc.com/
[103] https://www.gartner.com/en
[104] https://pitchbook.com/
[105] https://www.crunchbase.com/
[106] https://www.optionimpact.com/
[107] https://www.advanced-hr.com/VCECS