Podcast appearances and mentions of ben todd

What's the best way to think about building an impactful career? Should everyone try to work in fields related to existential risks? Should people find work in a problem area even if they can't work on the very "best" solution within that area? What does it mean for a particular job or career path to be a "good fit" for someone? What is "career capital"? To what extent should people focus on developing transferable skills? What are some of the most useful cross-domain skills? To what extent should people allow their passions and interests to influence how they think about potential career paths? Are there formulas that can be used to estimate how impactful a career will be for someone? And if there are, then how might people misuse them? Should everyone aim to build a high-leverage career? When do people update too much on new evidence?Benjamin Hilton is a research analyst at 80,000 Hours, where he's written on a range of topics from career strategy to nuclear war and the risks from artificial intelligence. He recently helped re-write the 80,000 Hours career guide alongside its author and 80,000 Hours co-founder, Ben Todd. Before joining 80,000 Hours, he was a civil servant, working as a policy adviser across the UK government in the Cabinet Office, Treasury, and Department for International Trade. He has master's degrees in economics and theoretical physics, and has published in the fields of physics, history, and complexity science. Learn more about him on the 80,000 Hours website, or email him at benjamin.hilton@80000hours.org.Further reading:80,000 Hours: Career GuideStaffSpencer Greenberg — Host / DirectorJosh Castle — ProducerRyan Kessler — Audio EngineerUri Bram — FactotumWeAmplify — TranscriptionistsAlexandria D. — Research and Special Projects AssistantMusicBroke for FreeJosh WoodwardLee RosevereQuiet Music for Tiny Robotswowamusiczapsplat.comAffiliatesClearer ThinkingGuidedTrackMind EasePositlyUpLift [Read more]

ECS families and student Discipleship groups will gather at the Shelby Farms campus on Saturday, March 2, for a Day of Service. ECS PTF's Katelin Walker and Student Development director Ben Todd share about how this opportunity encourages students to be the hands and feet of Christ as they partner with local relief organizations and ministries.

There's no Hanging Around as we've got One Of A Kind for you on The Fantastival Podcast #124 as joining Steve this week is the frontman of the fabulous Moonlight Parade, is Ben Todd… Ben talks to us about all things music including how he started playing the guitar, which bands he was into when he was younger, a chance meeting with Alex in his time in White Elephant, how Moonlight Parade started, their catalogue, upcoming single ‘So Clear' plus their U.S CD release, exciting gigs with The Heavy North, My Life Story and playing The Cavern Club, their famous fan in Robert Carlyle, the new music community on twitter and lots more whilst also getting to collate his Fantasy Festival lineup in this awesome episode - who will be Ben's Talk Of The Town? After you've listened to this episode go and check out this Ben's Spotify Playlist from featuring his Fantasy Festival Acts: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7A1ABEzSeawKsBsNZBlkJs?si=xDeTvhLSQsylMgb7mWDBDQ For all things Moonlight Parade give their website a visit: https://www.moonlightparade.com/ And if you don't already make sure you give Moonlight Parade a follow on all social platforms: Twitter: https://twitter.com/band_parade?s=21&t=eqrCq7Vm65YWWbA4Nfrj7A Instagram: https://instagram.com/moonlight_parade_band?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y= Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/moonlightparadeband If you've enjoyed the Fantastival Podcast please give us a follow on Twitter @FantastivalP, subscribe on whatever platform you are listening to and give us a star rating on iTunes or rate the show and comment on the episode on Spotify and remember to check for our new episodes which are released every Sunday at 9am. Spread the word... and the word is Fantastival! --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/the-fantastival-podcast/message

Welcome 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: 80,000 Hours two-year review: 2021–2022, published by 80000 Hours on March 8, 2023 on The Effective Altruism Forum. 80,000 Hours has released a review of our programmes for the years 2021 and 2022. The full document is available for the public, and we're sharing the summary below. You can find our previous evaluations here. We have also updated our mistakes page. 80,000 Hours delivers four programmes: website, job board, podcast, and one-on-one. We also have a marketing team that attracts users to these programmes, primarily by getting them to visit the website. Over the past two years, three of four programmes grew their engagement 2-3x: Podcast listening time in 2022 was 2x higher than in 2020 Job board vacancy clicks in 2022 were 3x higher than in 2020 The number of one-on-one team calls in 2022 was 3x higher than in 2020 Web engagement hours fell by 20% in 2021, then grew by 38% in 2022 after we increased investment in our marketing. From December 2020 to December 2022, the core team grew by 78% from 14 FTEs to 25 FTEs. Ben Todd stepped down as CEO in May 2022 and was replaced by Howie Lempel. The collapse of FTX in November 2022 caused significant disruption. As a result, Howie went on leave from 80,000 Hours to be Interim CEO of Effective Ventures Foundation (UK). Brenton Mayer took over as Interim CEO of 80,000 Hours. We are also spending substantially more time liaising with management across the Effective Ventures group, as we are a project of the group. We had previously held up Sam Bankman-Fried as a positive example of one of our highly rated career paths, a decision we now regret and feel humbled by. We are updating some aspects of our advice in light of our reflections on the FTX collapse and the lessons the wider community is learning from these events. In 2023, we will make improving our advice a key focus of our work. As part of this, we're aiming to hire for a senior research role. We plan to continue growing our main four programmes and will experiment with additional projects, such as relaunching our headhunting service and creating a new, scripted podcast with a different host. We plan to grow the team by ~45% in 2023, adding an additional 11 people. Our provisional expansion budgets for 2023 and 2024 (excluding marketing) are $12m and $17m. We're keen to fundraise for both years and are also interested in extending our runway — though we expect that the amount we raise in practice will be heavily affected by the funding landscape. The Effective Ventures group is an umbrella term for Effective Ventures Foundation (England and Wales registered charity number 1149828 and registered company number 07962181) and Effective Ventures Foundation USA, Inc. (a section 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organisation in the USA, EIN 47-1988398), two separate legal entities which work together. Thanks for listening. To help us out with The Nonlinear Library or to learn more, please visit nonlinear.org.

Welcome 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: Selective truth-telling: concerns about EA leadership communication., published by tcelferact on November 15, 2022 on The Effective Altruism Forum. Intro I have had concerns about EA leadership communication as long as I've known about EA, and the FTX meltdown has persuaded me I should have taken them more seriously. (By leadership I mean well-known public-facing EAs and organizations.) This post attempts to explain why I'm concerned by listing some of the experiences that have made me uncomfortable. tl;dr: EA leadership has a history of being selective in the information they share in a way that increases their appeal, and this raises doubts for me over what was and wasn't known about FTX. I do not think I'm sharing any major transgressions here, and I suspect some readers will find all these points pretty minor. I'm sharing them anyway because I'm increasingly involved in EA (two EAGs and exploring funding for an EA non-profit) and I've lost confidence in leadership of the movement. A reflection on why I've lost confidence and what would help me regain it seems like useful feedback, and it may also resonate with others. i.e. This is intended to be a personal account of why I'm lacking confidence, not an argument for why you, the reader, should also lack confidence. 2014: 80K promotional event in Oxford. I really wish I could find/remember more concrete information on this event, and if anyone recognizes what I'm talking about and has access to the original promotional material then please share it. In 2014 I was an undergraduate at Oxford and had a vague awareness of EA and 80,000 hours as orgs that cared about highly data-driven charitable interventions. At the time this was not something that interested me, I was really focussed on art! I saw a flyer for an event with a title something like 'How to be an artist and help improve the world!' I don't remember any mention of 80K or EA, and the impression it left on me was 'this is an event on how to be a less pretentious version of Bono from U2'. (I'm happy to walk all of this back if someone from 80K still has the flyer somewhere and can share it, but this is at least the impression it left on me.) So I went to the event, and it was an 80K event with Ben Todd and Will MacAskill. The keynote speaker was an art dealer (I cannot remember his name) who talked about his own career, donating large chunks of his income, and encouraging others to do the same. He also did a stump speech for 80K and announced ~£180K of donations he was making to the org. This was a great event with a great speaker! It was also not remotely the event I had signed up for. Talking to Ben after the event didn't help: his answers to my questions felt similar to the marketing for the event itself, i.e. say what you need to say to get me in the door. (Two rough questions I remember: Q: Is your approach utilitarian? A: It's utilitarian flavoured. Q: What would you say to someone who e.g. really cares about art and doesn't want to earn to give? A: Will is actually a great example of someone I think shouldn't earn to give (he intended to at the time) as we need him doing philosophical analysis of the best ways to donate instead.) This all left me highly suspicious of EA, and as a result I didn't pay much attention to them after that for years. I started engaging again in 2017, and more deeply in 2021, when I figured everyone involved had been young, they had only been minorly dishonest (if I was even remembering things correctly), and I should just give them a pass. Philosophy, but also not Philosophy?: Underemphasizing risk on the 80K website My undergraduate degree was in philosophy, and when I started thinking about EA involvement more seriously I took a look at global priorities research. It was one of five top-recommended career paths on 80K's web...

Welcome 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: Announcing a new introduction to effective altruism, published by Clifford on August 23, 2022 on The Effective Altruism Forum. We've released "a new intro essay for a general audience: "What is effective altruism?" An earlier post shared the essay and mentioned that there were still some changes to make. The essay is now finished and we'd be excited for people to share it on social media and with friends. The goal of the essay is to accurately get across what effective altruism is, rather than to be as inspiring as possible to new people who might get involved. Our hope is that this is the go-to explanation of what effective altruism is for someone who has already heard about the idea, and wants to better understand what it involves (e.g. someone actively searching “effective altruism” on google). We also imagine it being useful to people outside of the community such as journalists or university professors, and wanted to present EA in a way that's clear and puts our best foot forward to those kinds of audiences. In order to serve these aims, we decided to lead with a clear description of what EA is, followed by concrete examples of EA work, then the values that define EA, and then an FAQ responding to common misunderstandings or objections. In contrast, a more inspirational article might have started with a striking example or story. But we think this is better left to a wide range of articles with strong but narrow appeal, rather than the central explanation of what EA is. (Though we also think a relatively direct explanation can be inspiring to at least some readers, especially those with the most affinity for the ideas.) The article also doesn't aim to give people a ‘full' understanding of EA. Instead, we imagine people clicking through to materials in the resources pages, like Doing Good Better, the 80k intro to EA podcast series, or the handbook / introductory course This project took several months; we've spent time figuring out appropriate aims for the essay, drafting the key messages we wanted to get across, and working through several iterations of drafts from a number of authors. Some of the things we especially struggled with included: striking a balance between being engaging & concise, but also clear & defensible; figuring out which canonical examples to use and how to illustrate them visually; deciding how to frame the four values & several sentence description of EA. I'm really grateful to everyone who helped with this project, and to Ben Todd for writing the final version of the essay. Feedback is welcome, especially from people who didn't know much about EA prior to reading the essay. We might not work on significant changes in the near future, but expect to make iterations in the coming year or two, so we're collecting all the feedback we receive for then. Read the essay. Thanks for listening. To help us out with The Nonlinear Library or to learn more, please visit nonlinear.org.

Welcome 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: What are the key claims of EA?, published by RobertHarling on April 25, 2022 on The Effective Altruism Forum. [This is rough write-up mainly based on my experiences in EA and previous reading (I didn't do specific reading/research for this post)- I think it's possible there are important points I'm missing or explaining poorly. I'm posting this still in the spirit of trying to overcome perfectionism, and because I mentioned it to a couple of people who were interested in it] I think that EA as a worldview contains many different claims and views, and sometimes we may not realise all these distinct claims are combined in our normal view of “an EA” and instead might think EA is just “maximise positive impact”. I initially brainstormed a list of various claims I think could be important parts of the EA worldview and then tried to categorise them into themes. What I present below is the arrangement that feels most intuitive to me, although I list multiple complexities/issues with it below. I tried to use an overall typology of claims on morality, claims about empirical facts about the world, and claims about how to reason. Again this is just based on some short intuitions I have, and is not a well defined typology. I think this is an interesting exercise for a couple of reasons: It helps us consider what are the most core ideas of EA, which inform how we pitch it and how we define the community. E.g. which claims do we focus on when first explaining EA? It demonstrates the wide variety of reasons people might disagree with the common “EA worldview” It demonstrates how there are some empirical claims EAs tend to believe that most people outside the community don't, and that aren't direct implications of the moral claims (e.g. AI poses a large threat, there's a large variation in the impact of different charities). We might expect EA to be defined by a single key insight, not several unrelated ones (it's one thing to notice the world is getting something wrong in one way, but feels more unlikely that we'd be the only ones to notice several independent flaws). However I do think these independent empirical claims can be explained through how EA values draw the community's attention to specific areas, and gives it incentive to try to reason accurately about them. (I've bolded the specific claims, and the other bullet points are my thoughts on these) I'd be interested if there are important claims I've missed, if some of the claims below could be separated out, or if there's a clearer path through the different claims. A lot my thinking on this was informed by Will MacAskill's paper and Ben Todd's podcast. Moral Claims Claims about what is good and what we ought to do. Defining good People in EA often have very similar definitions of what good means: The impact of our actions are an important factor in what makes them good or not. We should define good in a roughly impartial, welfarist view. I roughly understand this as the defintion of good is not too dependent on who you are, and roughly depends on the impact of your actions on the net value of relevant lives in the world. This definition of good then helps lead us to thinking in a scope sensitive way. When considering the relevant lives, this includes all humans, animals and future people. We generally do not discount the lives of future people intrinsically at all. This longtermist claim is common but not absolute in EA, and I'm brushing over mutliple population ethics questions here. (e.g. severals EA might hold person-affecting views) Moral obligations We should devote a large amount of our resources to trying to do good in the world I think this is often missed and is not really included in common definitions of EA, which instead focus on maximising impartial impact with whatever resources you choose to do good with. B...

Welcome 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: FTX Future Fund and Longtermism, published by rhys lindmark on March 17, 2022 on The Effective Altruism Forum. This is a linkpost for/. Warning: Lots of napkin math below. Lending y'all an Idea That Is Not Yet Fully Formed™. But wanted to share so you get a rough map of longtermist funding. My org is writing a grant application for FTX Future Fund's first grant round. (You should too! Apply by March 21.) As part of that, I wanted to research how important FTX Future Fund is for the longtermist ecosystem more generally. In summary: It's quite important! Let's learn why. I. EA Funding Right Now First, let's look at EA funding over time. Of all Effective Altruist (EA) funding, 20% comes from GiveWell and 60% comes from Open Philanthropy (Open Phil). In 2019, here's how much each org processed: What about GiveWell's giving over time? Their graph is below. They processed only $2M per year in the 2000s, then started to grow from $10M to $100M per year throughout the 2010s. / (this doesn't include Open Phil) And here's Open Phil's estimate of how much they've given per year: So, taking GiveWell and Open Phil together, here's how much EA money has been given per year throughout the 2020s: $400M, not bad. But this is actually going to ramp up a bunch in the coming few years. Open Phil only regranted $100M to GiveWell in 2020, but they plan to grant GiveWell $300M in 2021, $500M in 2022, and $500M again in 2023. So how much will Open Phil be granting total? Based on 2021 data, GiveWell granting is roughly 50% of Open Phil's budget: So by increasing their 2022/2023 GiveWell giving to $500M, we'd roughly expect Open Phil to give $1B by that time: GiveWell itself wants to direct $1B by 2025. If we take all of these together: $$ from Open Phil to GiveWell $$ from Open Phil to not GiveWell $$ to GiveWell from not Open Phil Other Grantmaking The growth of EA giving into 2025 looks like this: In other words, we're just at the start of EA funders giving a lot more money. Still, most of EA granting lies with Open Phil and GiveWell. And much of that is still in Global Health. ...Until now! II. FTX Future Fund and Longtermism Meanwhile, Sam Bankman-Fried has been making magic internet money. He's starting to give it back, mostly towards longtermism. How much of an impact is it having? We can start by looking at how much money is in longtermism now. Let's start with Ben Todd's excellent overview of 2019 EA granting categories, which I've slightly modified. As you can see, longtermism (in red) is roughly 30% of all EA giving. In 2021, it was roughly 15% of Open Phil giving. So, assuming roughly 20% of Open Phil's giving is longtermist, and assuming other longtermist donors are roughly 20% of Open Phil's longtermist giving, here's what longtermist giving looks like until now: This is good! It's a reflection of the EA ecosystem accounting for the idea that ~future lives matter. But FTX Future Fund is about to drastically increase it even more. They're trying to give $100M in 2022 alone. Here's what the graph will look like going forward: That's a big yellow jump! It makes longtermist giving look like this for 2022: But even this assumes that Open Phil is going to 2x their longtermist grantmaking in a similar fashion as they're pumping money into GiveWell. If they keep their longtermist grantmaking at current levels, around $100M, the 2022 pie chart looks like this: So, yes, the FTX Future Fund is a big deal for the longtermist funding ecosystem. The EA funding ecosystem has had a shift. Dustin Moskovitz was a Web2 Facebook Money. SBF is Web3 FTX Money. This means we should add a new player, FTX, (in green!) to our overall EA giving graph below. Hope this helps give context to FTX's longtermist grantmaking. Thanks for reading and don't forget to apply for that sweet sweet cash from FTX Future...

Welcome 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: EA needs a hiring agency and Nonlinear will fund you to start one, published by Kat Woods on January 17, 2022 on The Effective Altruism Forum. If your dream job is to work in longtermism, be your own boss, and talk to EAs all day, then you might be the perfect fit for starting an EA recruitment agency through Nonlinear's incubation program. To find out more about the idea itself and why it's high impact, read below. For more details about how to tell if you're a good fit, what support we provide, and how to apply, see the second half of the article. If you think this is an important charity to have in the EA space, please like and share this Request for Founders so that the right people see it. Deadline: February 1st, 11:59pm EST Fill out this form to apply Why it's high impact to start an EA headhunting agency The idea is for you to start an organization that helps hire employees for longtermist orgs. This will help the world in a few ways: Save orgs' time. Hiring takes a lot of time. It often takes over 200 hours to hire a new employee. Fortunately, a lot of this can be outsourced. A typical approach would be for you to talk to the org about what they're looking for. You'd then write the job ad, advertise it, do the first couple rounds of interviews and test tasks, then send the client the top ones for the final evaluation. This can shorten the amount of time they spend on hiring from multiple full-time weeks to an afternoon, freeing up their time for direct work only they can do. Hire better candidates. Since you'll be a specialist in hiring, you'll have a bigger EA network and know all the best practices for recruiting, so you'll be able to get better candidates for the positions. This is huge. Team quality is one of the largest sources of differences in an organization's effectiveness. This increases the impact of the organization until they hire a new person, which is often years later. Furthermore, having better colleagues has positive externalities on the rest of the team by decreasing conflict, creating a culture of excellence, and generally helping the team work more smoothly. This is an example of passive impact, where you make an upfront investment, then it continues having an impact without ongoing effort. Save applicants' time. Instead of separately having to apply to each new job, people can apply to multiple jobs at once, even expressing general interest in certain sorts of jobs. This also increases their odds of getting an EA job per time invested, which can help with feelings of rejection in the movement. Make jobs. Lowering the barrier to hiring will increase the number of jobs orgs hire for. This will be especially true for hiring personal assistants (PAs) since a large barrier to hiring them is the process being so difficult. What roles will the startup hire for? Nonlinear's research team has identified hiring PAs as one of the best use cases of a hiring agency in EA. This is for a few reasons. Firstly, as 80,000 Hours describes in their career guide, PAs can be a high-impact role. Ben Todd says it better than me here: “Consider: if you can save that researcher one hour spent on activities besides research, then that researcher can spend one more hour researching. So, by saving that researcher time, you can convert your time into their time. Suddenly, one of your hours becomes one more hour spent by the best researcher, working in the best field!” Put another way, imagine you could add another Paul Christiano, Eliezer Yudkowsky, or Chris Olah to the alignment community. With a PA hiring agency, you could essentially do that by getting the top researchers PAs. To use an extremely oversimplified example, say a PA increases the output of a researcher by 10% on average. That means if you hire ten PAs for the top ten researchers, that's the equivalent...

Merry Christmas to all of my BAND IT ABOUT - Podcast Series listener's and guests. Having released an episode every week for over a year, and being busy working throughout the past month as Mrs Claus, I have decided to take a few weeks off from interviewing. I am using this break as an opportunity to allow new listeners to catch up on the many episodes that are available, and will be releasing mini episodes by repurposing the 20 Questions in 2 minutes segment from my earlier interviews. I realise that due to the length of some of the interviews that not everyone listens to this segment, so by compiling 5 guests interviews at a time, it makes it a short, fun episode for you to enjoy. This week is episodes 11 to 15 and the guest drummers are: Lachie Durrans, Joe Turtur, John Reynolds, Bradley Polain, and Ben Todd. Thank you to all of my guests, my listener's, those who have taken the time to rate and review this independent podcast series, and to those who have kindly used the PayPal link to donate towards the many hours that it takes me to be able to release a new episode, I truly appreciate you all! If you would like to support this podcast please use the PayPal link which you can find in my Linktree: https://linktr.ee/banditaboutpodcastseries The Linktree also has links for anyone who would like to leave a review which is handy for those who listen on a platform that doesn't offer this feature. Spotify has recently added a rating feature, you can do this by either tapping on the rating directly or the three-dot menu below the podcast cover art in the Spotify app (iOS and Android), simply tap to rate the show as long as you have listened to at least 30 seconds of an episode. Please remember to Follow this podcast series on your preferred podcast listening platform. Music: "Band It About" theme song was written and recorded by Catherine Lambert and Michael Bryant for the BAND IT ABOUT - Podcast Series. *This may be of interest to the musicians who listen to this podcast series: BeatStars is a digital music marketplace where musicians can buy and sell beats, sound kits, album covers, and music more. BeatStars connects artists, labels, and music industry execs virtually, allowing for your music to be heard and bought by creators around the world. Songs like Lil Nas X's “Old Town Road,” CJ's “Whoopty,” and Soulja Boy's “She Make It Clap” were all created using beats found on BeatStars. Code “BANDITABOUT” at checkout gets listeners a free one month (30 day) trial of BeatStars. You can open your own professional digital music store at beatstars.com/sell-beats New episodes of the BAND IT ABOUT - Podcast Series will be available early in the new year, until then I wish you all a Very Merry Christmas and a Safe and Prosperous New Year. Thanks for listening, Di Spillane Band It About, Proudly Supporting Live Music. #musicinterviews #musicpodcasts #musiccommentary #southaustralia #independentpodcastseries #australianpodcasts #drummers #realpeople #realstories #lachiedurrans #joeturtur #johnreynolds #bradleypolain #bentodd #banditabout #banditaboutpodcastseries #adelaidedrummers #20questions #podcast #podcasts --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/dianne-spillane/message

Adelaide Drummer/Percussionist PAUL BUTLER joins me in The Engine Room this week to discuss his musical journey which began at an early age due to being born into a musical family. Paul's parents had been performing for many years and through their involvement in the industry, it was a given that he too would follow this path. As a child, Paul was fascinated with drums, and he first began to play them when Steve Staben offered to teach him. He was 10 years old when he first began playing at church services, and in year 6 he began taking drum lessons with Don Crook, his teacher at Sunrise Primary School and Temple Christian College, through to year 11. Paul joined his first band (away from the church) 'Spank n Funk' when he was in high school, he also began teaching after having done work experience with Don. In year 12 he began to study percussion with acclaimed teacher Jim Bailey, helping him to prepare for auditioning for The Adelaide Elder Conservatorium of Music. Jim Bailey was the Head of Percussion at the Elder Conservatorium, where Paul successfully gained the David Galliver Memorial scholarship and won a number of prizes at national percussion eisteddfods. Paul was percussion section leader of The Elder Conservatorium Wind Ensemble, and member of The Symphony Orchestra and Percussion Ensemble. Paul completed his study achieving his Bachelor of Music and Honors in Percussion Performance. Jim mentioned that the Band of the South Australia Police were looking for someone for an upcoming event and asked Paul if he would be interested which of course he was. Paul enjoying playing with them and when he heard that they had an opening he successfully auditioned. Paul worked with the band for 7 years and during this time he gave workshops to schools, performed at numerous state events and official government ceremonies in a variety of groups, Parade Band, Wind Orchestra, Dixie Band, Big Band, Rock Patrol, School Beat Band and Percussion Ensemble. Highlights include the Sensational Adelaide Police Tattoo 2006, the Commonwealth Bank Police Tattoo 2008, Musikschau der Nationen 2008 in Bremen, Germany, and the Basel Tattoo 2010 in Switzerland. Paul has also played the corporate and club scene of Adelaide; he was resident percussionist at Savvy Bar and Vodka Bar. He has also performed with: The Baker Boys, The Revue, Bloky's Boys, The Attack, Wasabi, The Shizzle, Triple Score, Astronaut 7 Mammoth Logic, Squeaker, Porkie Pies, Matt Winter Band, and The Rules. As a freelance artist he has worked with the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, Adelaide Arts Orchestra and played numerous shows throughout the Adelaide Fringe Festival, WOMADelaide, Cabaret Festival, and Feast Festival, alongside such names as Jon English, Todd McKenney, Cameron Daddo, and Julie Anthony. Paul's introduction to 'Cirque du Soleil' was through Ben Todd who had been performing with the company and suggested he audition. Paul auditioned but wasn't successful, a few months later he was invited to audition again, this time he was, so he gave the military band his notice, packed up and went overseas to join his first Cirque show 'Corteo'. Paul was with that show for 5 years touring through Europe, South America, Central America, and Mexico. He then auditioned for KOOZA, and was on that show for 3 years touring Australia, Asia, Singapore, China, Korea, and Europe. Paul joined KURIOS after another audition and was excited to be touring with this show as they were bringing the show to his hometown Adelaide in 2020. They performed in Sydney and Brisbane before remaining dates were postponed due to the Covid-19 Pandemic. Paul will be re-joining Cirque overseas early in the new year. Music intro "Band It About" written & recorded by Catherine Lambert & Michael Bryant, outro Paul Butler's final 'KOOZA' drum solo. BAND IT ABOUT Links: https://linktr.ee/banditaboutpodcastseries --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/dianne-spillane/message

welcome 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: Canva CEO commits at least $6 billion “to do the most good”, published by 22tom on the effective altruism forum. Melanie Perkins, the CEO of Canva, recently announced that they intend to donate the “vast majority of their equity to do good in the world”. This comes out to at least $6 billion. I think this is awesome news and a potentially exciting opportunity for the EA community. As reported in several media outlets, Canva has recently been valued at $40 billion USD. Following this, Melanie Perkins (Canva's CEO) outlined in a blog post their vision, through a simple Two-Step plan: With a $40 billion valuation, Canva has made a lot of progress on step 1. To achieve step 2, Melanie and her husband and co-founder, Cliff, have “committed the vast majority of their equity (30% of Canva) to do good in the world”, through the Canva Foundation.[1] This works out to be the equivalent of at least $6 billion USD, and potentially more.[2] To put this into perspective, that would be more than 10 times that of all Giving What We Can pledges (using Ben Todd's estimates). Canva have already taken the 1% pledge,[3] but are now looking to expand their philanthropy further. Excitingly for EAs, this starts with a $10 million pilot program with GiveDirectly in South Africa. They then “hope to rapidly scale this more broadly and to contribute to the lives of as many people across the globe as we can.” [emphasis added] This strikes me as both awesome news and an exciting opportunity. What could/should EAs do about this? I have some very tentative suggestions: Find out more. I heard about this today, and have only spent ~1 hour Googling. Investigating more about this news and the Canva Foundation seems potentially worthwhile, to get a better grip on what this could mean for EAs. Maybe nothing. There are potential backfire risks when doing outreach, the CEO may have their own priorities, or perhaps the money is already committed to EA causes, so action is less valuable. Something else? I have spent very little time looking into this, but would be interested in other people's thoughts. Disclaimer: I have no associations or affiliations with Canva. From some Googling, it seems that the Canva Foundation was registered with the Australian government in May 2020. Their stated objective is “providing benevolent relief to people and communities in need in Australia and around the world, by and without limitation: (a) improving access to quality education for disadvantaged youth; (b) providing benevolent support to people in need when a crisis strikes; (c) establishing collaborative partnerships with other benevolent institutions to promote, support and amplify their activities; (d) doing such other things or activities which are necessary, incidental or conducive to the attainment of these objects.” ↩︎ $40 billion x 30% x 50%. However, “vast majority” could mean much more than 50%, potentially reaching double-digit billions. ↩︎ Pledge 1% encourages firms to give 1% of their equity, profits, time or product away. However, they don't seem to focus on that money being spent effectively (as far as I can tell). ↩︎ thanks for listening. to help us out with the nonlinear library or to learn more, please visit nonlinear.org.

welcome 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: Everyday Longtermism, published by Owen_Cotton-Barratt on the effective altruism forum. This post is about a question: What does longtermism recommend doing in all sorts of everyday situations? I've been thinking (on and off) about versions of this question over the last year or two. Properly I don't want sharp answers which try to give the absolute best actions in various situations (which are likely to be extremely context dependent and perhaps also weird or hard to find), but good blueprints for longtermist decision-making in everyday situations: pragmatic guidance which will tend to produce good outcomes if followed. The first part of the post explains why I think this is an important question to look into. The second part talks about my current thinking and some guess answers: that everyday longtermism might involve seeking to improve decision-making all around us (skewing to more important decision-making processes), while abiding by commonsense morality. A lot of people provided some helpful thoughts in conversation or on old drafts; interactions that I remember as particularly helpful came from: Nick Beckstead, Anna Salamon, Rose Hadshar, Ben Todd, Eliana Lorch, Will MacAskill, Toby Ord. They may not endorse my conclusions, and in any case all errors, large and small, remain my own. Motivations for the question There are several different reasons for wanting an answer to this. The most central two are: Strong longtermism says that the morally right thing to do is to make all decisions according to long-term effects. But for many many decisions it's very unclear what that means. At first glance the strong longtermist stance seems like it might recommend throwing away all of our regular moral intuitions (since they're not grounded in long-term effects). This could leave some dangerous gaps; we should look into whether they get rederived from different foundations, or if something else should replace them. More generally it just seems like if longtermism is important we should seek a deep understanding of it, and for that it's good to look at it from many angles (and everyday decisions are a natural and somewhat important class). Having good answers to the question of everyday longtermism might be very important for the memetics / social dynamics of longtermism. People encountering and evaluating an idea that seems like it's claiming broad scope of applicability will naturally examine it from lots of angles. Two obvious angles are "what does this mean for my day-to-day life?" and "what would it look like if everyone was on board with this?". Having good and compelling answers to these could be helpful for getting buy-in to the ideas. I think an action-guiding philosophy is at an advantage in spreading if there are lots of opportunities for people to practice it, to observe when others are/aren't following it, and to habituate themselves to a self-conception as someone who adheres to it. For longtermism to get this advantage, it needs an everyday version. That shouldn't just provide a fake/token activity, but meaningful practice that is substantively continuous with the type of longtermist decision-making which might have particularly large/important long-term impacts. If longtermism got to millions or tens of millions of supporters -- as seems plausible on timescales of a decade or three -- it could be importantly bottlenecked on what kind of action-guiding advice to give people. A third more speculative motivation is that the highest-leverage opportunities may be available only at the scale of individual decisions, so having better heuristics to help identify them might be important. The logic is outlined in the diagram below. Suppose opportunities naturally arise at many different levels of leverage (value out per unit of effort in) and scales (how much effort...

welcome 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: Patient vs urgent longtermism has little direct bearing on giving now vs later, published by Owen_Cotton-Barratt on the effective altruism forum. This post is a response to having heard multiple people express something like "I'm persuaded by the case for patient longtermism, so I want to save money rather than give now", or otherwise implicitly assuming that patient longtermism is obviously more in favour of saving money than urgent longtermism (e.g. Ben Todd says "Even the people who are most into patient longtermism still think we should spend some on object-level things today. It's just maybe they would only give half a percent of the portfolio as opposed to 4%." in his podcast episode on varieties of longtermism). This view is understandable to me, especially given: Trammell's paper arguing that "patient philanthropists" should invest rather than spend down their capital (note that I tentatively agree with this in the context of global poverty, to which he applies the framework in the paper); The commonsense meanings of "urgent" and "patient", and of "spend" and "invest". Nonetheless, I think it is mistaken and there is no direct implication that "patient longtermists" should be less willing to spend money now than "urgent longtermists". Rather I think it's an open question which will depend on a lot of messy empirics (about giving opportunities) which position should be more in favour of saving money now. My current guess is to recommend spending rather than saving money at current margins to both patient and urgent longtermists. Neither recommendation feels robust; however, I'm actually a little more pro-saving for "urgent" longtermists than for "patient" ones. Note that I do think that considering which timescales we want to exert influence over is an extremely fruitful lens (although I'd usually think of a natural timescale as attaching to an activity rather than an overall view), and it has a great deal of relevance for deciding what to fund and hence indirect bearing on whether to give now or later. [With apologies for a lack of careful scholarship: I suspect these points are largely written up elsewhere, and appreciated in large part already by Trammell and Todd.] So what's going on? Why doesn't the argument for patient philanthropy apply straightforwardly in the longtermist case? The argument is in favour of investing (so that you have more resources available later), rather than spending (so that you have less resources available). You might think that giving money away should naturally be considered as spending; and considered from the perspective of an individual donor it probably is. But from the perspective of the longtermist community, most "spending" of money now is actually investment. It pays for research or career development or book-writing or websites or community-building (etc.); and the hope is that resources invested in these things now will return more resources meaningfully aligned with important parts of the longtermist worldview down the line (whether more money, or more people willing to act on the principles, or more broad sympathy to and influence for the ideas). I think the best of these activities are almost certainly good investments; for instance I think that longtermism (broadly understood) has vastly outperformed the stock market over the last twenty years in terms of the resources it has amassed. I then think that individual decisions about giving now vs later should largely be driven by whether the best identifiable marginal opportunities are still good investments. There's a lot of nuance that can (and should!) modulate that statement, for instance: If an individual is still increasing their understanding of what good opportunities look like fast enough, they could be better waiting But deferring to more-informed others or ...

welcome 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: EA Global Tips: Networking with others in mind, published by kuhanj on the effective altruism forum. Summary/Context: EAs tend to be pretty good at thinking about people other than themselves. One situation in which I don't see this as much is when networking, where I've seen people largely focus on their careers/questions+uncertainties/projects/funding opportunities/etc. EA Global London 2021 is a day away, and many attendees are searching for attendees to schedule meetings with (which I, and many others, usually strongly recommend over attending recorded sessions, and most other sessions too). I thought now (or more accurately a few days ago, oops) might be a good time to write down some thoughts on: the importance and benefits of coordination in communities with shared goals like the EA community. the implications of this for networking in EA and specifically at EA Global (the default time for many members of the community to set aside a weekend to meet with other members of the community). how I've approached networking at EA Global. Some concrete tips I'd encourage for EAs when networking (especially for EA Global): Think about who you can help and how you can help them, along with who can help you when deciding who to reach out to. Default to thinking about your network (EA group, friends, etc) along with yourself when deciding who to network with. In the spirit of the above point, consider how your network can help others along with how others can help your network. When having conversations, get into the habit of regularly thinking about how you can provide value to your conversation partner, and actually following up. I've listed some concrete ways I've applied these principles at previous EA conferences in the post, and how doing so has helped generate impact (and more specifically, Stanford EA and SERI succeed). The Importance of Coordination: My favourite article on the importance of coordination in EA is “Doing good together—how to coordinate effectively, and avoid single-player thinking” by Ben Todd. In it, he writes: The historian, Yuval Harari, claims in his book Sapiens that better coordination has been the key driver of human progress. He highlights innovations like language, religion, human rights, nation states and money as valuable because they improve cooperation among strangers. If we work together, we can do far more good. This is part of why we started the effective altruism community in the first place: we realised that by working with others who want to do good in a similar way — based on evidence and careful reasoning — we could achieve much more. But unfortunately we, like other communities, often don't coordinate as well as we could. Instead, especially in effective altruism, people engage in “single-player” thinking. They work out what would be the best course of action if others weren't responding to what they do. But once you're part of a community that does respond to your actions, this assumption breaks down. We need to develop new rules of thumb for doing good — the strategies and approaches that work well in a single-player situation often don't work once you're collaborating with a community. Tips for Networking with Others in Mind Given the above, here are a few recommendations for networking in EA (which apply in general, but especially for EA Global given its status as the schelling/default networking event for the community): When considering whom to reach out to, think not only about who might be able to provide value, advice, connections, job/internship/research/funding opportunities to yourself, but how you might offer these things to others. If you're a group organizer, or if you know other EAs/people interested in EA (so probably most people reading this post), consider doing the above for all your group members, or all ...

welcome 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: EA Leaders Forum: Survey on EA priorities (data and analysis), published by Aaron Gertler on the effective altruism forum. Thanks to Alexander Gordon-Brown, Amy Labenz, Ben Todd, Jenna Peters, Joan Gass, Julia Wise, Rob Wiblin, Sky Mayhew, and Will MacAskill for assisting in various parts of this project, from finalizing survey questions to providing feedback on the final post. Clarification on pronouns: “We” refers to the group of people who worked on the survey and helped with the writeup. “I” refers to me; I use it to note some specific decisions I made about presenting the data and my observations from attending the event. This post is the second in a series of posts where we aim to share summaries of the feedback we have received about our own work and about the effective altruism community more generally. The first can be found here. Overview Each year, the EA Leaders Forum, organized by CEA, brings together executives, researchers, and other experienced staffers from a variety of EA-aligned organizations. At the event, they share ideas and discuss the present state (and possible futures) of effective altruism. This year (during a date range centered around ~1 July), invitees were asked to complete a “Priorities for Effective Altruism” survey, compiled by CEA and 80,000 Hours, which covered the following broad topics: The resources and talents most needed by the community How EA's resources should be allocated between different cause areas Bottlenecks on the community's progress and impact Problems the community is facing, and mistakes we could be making now This post is a summary of the survey's findings (N = 33; 56 people received the survey). Here's a list of organizations respondents worked for, with the number of respondents from each organization in parentheses. Respondents included both leadership and other staff (an organization appearing on this list doesn't mean that the org's leader responded). 80,000 Hours (3) Animal Charity Evaluators (1) Center for Applied Rationality (1) Centre for Effective Altruism (3) Centre for the Study of Existential Risk (1) DeepMind (1) Effective Altruism Foundation (2) Effective Giving (1) Future of Humanity Institute (4) Global Priorities Institute (2) Good Food Institute (1) Machine Intelligence Research Institute (1) Open Philanthropy Project (6) Three respondents work at organizations small enough that naming the organizations would be likely to de-anonymize the respondents. Three respondents don't work at an EA-aligned organization, but are large donors and/or advisors to one or more such organizations. What this data does and does not represent This is a snapshot of some views held by a small group of people (albeit people with broad networks and a lot of experience with EA) as of July 2019. We're sharing it as a conversation-starter, and because we felt that some people might be interested in seeing the data. These results shouldn't be taken as an authoritative or consensus view of effective altruism as a whole. They don't represent everyone in EA, or even every leader of an EA organization. If you're interested in seeing data that comes closer to this kind of representativeness, consider the 2018 EA Survey Series, which compiles responses from thousands of people. Talent Needs What types of talent do you currently think [your organization // EA as a whole] will need more of over the next 5 years? (Pick up to 6) This question was the same as a question asked to Leaders Forum participants in 2018 (see 80,000 Hours' summary of the 2018 Talent Gaps survey for more). Here's a graph showing how the most common responses from 2019 compare to the same categories in the 2018 talent needs survey from 80,000 Hours, for EA as a whole: And for the respondent's organization: The following table contains data on every category ...

"Ben Todd is a drummer, percussionist, composer and bandleader from Adelaide in South Australia. Over the past 10 years, Ben has been touring the world with the internationally acclaimed "Cirque du Soleil" as a featured drummer, percussionist and now bandleader........ Ben has performed in Japan, Russia, The United States, Spain, Canada, France, Belgium and England and performed over 1500 shows. Prior to joining Cirque, Ben performed with a wide range of artists back in Australia including Kate Cebrano, Paulini, Ben Folds, Doug Parkinson, Rhonda Burchmore, James Morrison, David Campbell, Barry Humphries and Glen Shorrok, as well as playing in the pit orchestras for a variety of musical theatre shows including the Australia/NZ tour of Cats, The Wedding Singer, Miss Saigon and Grease. Ben began playing drums at the age of 3, adding to an already large family of drummers (3 generations to be exact). His first introduction to the instrument was from his father, who was a full-time freelance musician at that time."http://www.bentodd.com.au/Latest Album https://bentodd.bandcamp.com/album/memento"It was a honour to interview Ben Todd for this podcast.  When Ben was talking about his career, first playing drums at 3 years old, coming from a family of 3 generations of drummers (maybe a 4th generation drummer on the way!), the respect he has for his dad drummer, Steve Todd, his determination over 3 years to do what inspired him at the age of 9 to join Cirque du Soleil and travel the world and achieve this.....and so much more, I couldn't help notice how humble, grateful to everyone that has helped him along the way and driven Ben was. His passion and sense of  fun for what he does for a living, playing drums/music and being apart of the industry is truely inspiring. Thank you Ben for sharing your story, so far!"Tania Ingerson Podcaster/Founder TEA The Entrepreneurial Artist PodcastI would like to acknowledge that music played on my Podcast is an original tune by David Innocente, Jazz Musician/Artist - "One Thing Led to Another"https://www.innocente.com.au/

In this extra bonus episode, Andy (Dom) and Ben (Todd) sit down to discuss that latest bombshell, Dom's mysterious origins, what kind of bird Todd actually is, why the hell he owns an antique shop, possible upcoming bonus content, and even let the audience know a bit more about the possible future of WRNL after this season's events come to a close (whenever that is).Follow us on Twitter (@NoLuckPod) and/or email us at withrollsnoluck@gmail.com!Logo by Mark Fionda Jr. (http://www.markfiondajr.com/)"Second Attack At Level 5" composed/performed by Jackson Eppley (http://www.jacksoneppley.com/)   Interested in some art?  Check out the artiste behind the canon portrait of Todd (yes, it exists) at https://www.haleyvaughn.com/!

Read the full transcript here. What is 80,000 Hours, and why is it so important? Does doing the most good in the world require being completely selfless and altruistic? What are the career factors that contribute to impactfulness? How should people choose among the various problem areas on which they could work? What sorts of long-term AI outcomes are possible (besides merely apocalyptic scenarios), and why is it so important to get AI right? How much should we value future generations? How much should we be worried about catastrophic and/or existential risks? Has the 80,000 Hours organizing shifted its emphasis over time to longer-term causes? How many resources should we devote to meta-research into discovering and rating the relative importance of various problems? How important is personal fit in considering a career?Ben Todd is the CEO and cofounder of 80,000 Hours, a non-profit that has reached millions of people and helped 1000+ people find careers tackling the world's most pressing problems. He helped to start the effective altruism movement in Oxford in 2011. He's the author of the 80,000 Hours Career Guide and Key Ideas series. Find out more about Ben at benjamintodd.org. [Read more]

Read the full transcriptWhat is 80,000 Hours, and why is it so important? Does doing the most good in the world require being completely selfless and altruistic? What are the career factors that contribute to impactfulness? How should people choose among the various problem areas on which they could work? What sorts of long-term AI outcomes are possible (besides merely apocalyptic scenarios), and why is it so important to get AI right? How much should we value future generations? How much should we be worried about catastrophic and/or existential risks? Has the 80,000 Hours organizing shifted its emphasis over time to longer-term causes? How many resources should we devote to meta-research into discovering and rating the relative importance of various problems? How important is personal fit in considering a career?Ben Todd is the CEO and cofounder of 80,000 Hours, a non-profit that has reached millions of people and helped 1000+ people find careers tackling the world's most pressing problems. He helped to start the effective altruism movement in Oxford in 2011. He's the author of the 80,000 Hours Career Guide and Key Ideas series. Find out more about Ben at benjamintodd.org.

What is 80,000 Hours, and why is it so important? Does doing the most good in the world require being completely selfless and altruistic? What are the career factors that contribute to impactfulness? How should people choose among the various problem areas on which they could work? What sorts of long-term AI outcomes are possible (besides merely apocalyptic scenarios), and why is it so important to get AI right? How much should we value future generations? How much should we be worried about catastrophic and/or existential risks? Has the 80,000 Hours organizing shifted its emphasis over time to longer-term causes? How many resources should we devote to meta-research into discovering and rating the relative importance of various problems? How important is personal fit in considering a career? Ben Todd is the CEO and cofounder of 80,000 Hours, a non-profit that has reached millions of people and helped 1000+ people find careers tackling the world's most pressing problems. He helped to start the effective altruism movement in Oxford in 2011. He's the author of the 80,000 Hours Career Guide and Key Ideas series. Find out more about Ben at benjamintodd.org.

What is 80,000 Hours, and why is it so important? Does doing the most good in the world require being completely selfless and altruistic? What are the career factors that contribute to impactfulness? How should people choose among the various problem areas on which they could work? What sorts of long-term AI outcomes are possible (besides merely apocalyptic scenarios), and why is it so important to get AI right? How much should we value future generations? How much should we be worried about catastrophic and/or existential risks? Has the 80,000 Hours organizing shifted its emphasis over time to longer-term causes? How many resources should we devote to meta-research into discovering and rating the relative importance of various problems? How important is personal fit in considering a career?Ben Todd is the CEO and cofounder of 80,000 Hours, a non-profit that has reached millions of people and helped 1000+ people find careers tackling the world's most pressing problems. He helped to start the effective altruism movement in Oxford in 2011. He's the author of the 80,000 Hours Career Guide and Key Ideas series. Find out more about Ben at benjamintodd.org.

Ben Todd is the CEO & founder of 80,000 Hours, and helped to start the effective altruism movement. 80,000 Hours is a non-profit that provides free research and support to help people find careers that effectively tackle the world's most pressing problems. In our interview, we discuss: Why your choice of career could be the most important ethical decision you ever get to make; 80K's ‘problem, solution, personal fit' framework for choosing a career; Whether longtermism should be considered a research project or a social movement; The idea of using leverage to multiply the difference you're able to make. Note that if you don't need to hear an introduction to the key ideas of 80,000 Hours, you can skip to about the 34-minute mark. You can read more about the topics we cover this episode's write-up: hearthisidea.com/episodes/ben. Key links mentioned in the interview: The 80,000 Hours website A (free) weekly career planning course for positive impact The 80,000 Hours 'Key Ideas' series The 80,000 Hours job board The 80,000 Hours Podcast with Rob Wiblin If you have any feedback or suggestions for future guests, feel free to get in touch through our website. Consider leaving us a review wherever you're listening to this — it's the best free way to support the show. If you want to support the show more directly, consider leaving a tip. Thanks for listening!

Read and Edited by Sam Nolan, Written by MichaelA This is the second post in the series Improving the EA-Aligned Research Pipeline, What's wrong with the EA-Aligned Research Pipeline. This reading discusses 10 potential issues with the pipeline as it currently stands. Most notably, it finds that although there are a large number of people, research questions and funders, but a bottleneck in vetting potential EA research candidates. The first post in this series was: Improving the EA-Aligned Research Pipeline Further posts in this series will be released soon. Links: Original post A central directory for open research questions EA is vetting-constrained Ben Todd discussing organizational capacity, infrastructure, and management bottlenecks Call to action anonymous form --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/ea-forum-podcast/message

Steve Todd became a professional musician when he was 19, and has worked in the industry ever since. Born in to a family of entertainers Steve's profession was predestined, his father John Todd was a drummer, his mother a founding member of the 'Ethelton Entertainers' theatre group, and his grandfather a vaudevillian, it was a given that both he and his brother Larry would work in the industry. Steve was taught by Reg Bassett who not only taught him how to play, he taught him how to secure ongoing opportunities within the music industry. Steve first began playing while in Primary School, both he and Larry played the snare drum that was used to march the students into class everyday. He joined his first (out of school band) 'Bennie & The Jets' while attending High School, and his first major band was 'Centaur' (Adelaide Australia), this band saw him leave Adelaide for the first time, they toured up and down the East Coast. After leaving this band he returned to Adelaide and studied music to gain the reading skills required that would enable him to work as a freelance musician. In 1985 Steve began working for Banksia Productions, this is where he started to work in television and radio. Adelaide had one of the best music scenes in Australia, every TV Station had a House Band, and Steve had regular work during the day in children's television shows, recording and touring with 'Here's Humphrey', 'The Music Shop', 'The Book Place', and 'The Fairies' to name a few. Steve has recorded and toured with children's entertainer Peter Coombe for the past 30 years. He was the House Drummer for 'Pepper Studios', has worked with both the State Theatre Company and the Australian Dance Theatre, and spent 16 years playing with the 'South Australian Police Band'. Steve performed with various bands including 'Goose', and had a 7 year residency at the Grenfell Tavern with 'Mixed Bag'. In 2017 he was invited to join a group of Adelaide musicians who are collectively known as the 'Hindley Street Country Club' (HSCC), they release a cover of an 80s hit song every week, and have become so popular that they have had over 100 million views on YouTube! Major highlight's of Steve's career include playing percussion with his idols Jon English and Peter Cupples (Stylus), when they toured performing unplugged versions of their hits, and performing "A Little Ray Of Sunshine" with Glenn Shorrock and Brian Cadd. Personal highlight's performing onstage with his dad, brother, son and nephew, and every time that he gets to perform or record with his son Ben, Ben Todd was the (S2 E15) Engine Room Guest. Music: Intro "BAND IT ABOUT" written and recorded by Catherine Lambert and Michael Bryant. Outro "What's Up" written by Ben Todd Please remember to subscribe to this music interview podcast series. Band It About can be heard on all of the major podcast listening platforms including: Apple Podcasts Google Podcasts Anchor and Spotify. Email: banditabout17@gmail.com #banditabout #drummers #Adelaide #SteveTodd #realstories --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/dianne-spillane/message

S2 E29 PAUL JIMMY SHARMAN Part 2. Paul is giving 4 Band It About podcast listeners the chance to WIN a Free Double Entry to the 'SATISFACTION - The Stones Show, at the Arkaba Hotel, Saturday 29th of May. Email your answer to the question given in the episode, along with your name and mobile number to: banditabout17@gmail.com Drawn Thurs 26th, SA only. In part 2, Paul miraculously manages to mention all of the following people: his wife Tracey, Bette Midler, Steve and Ben Todd, Steve Prestwich, Satisfaction band members plus Nigel Bourne, Louise Pearson, Peter Kershaw, Tonkin Family, Mark Meyer, Mario Marino, Bobby Keys, Rolling Stones, Royal Crown Revue, Jeff Algra, ABC's Snowflake podcast, Daniel Glass, Charlie Watts, Mick Jagger, a shout-out to Enrico Morena, and I get to ask the occasional question! Music: "Band It About" I would like to thank Catherine Lambert and Michael "Mitzi" Bryant for their collaboration on the very first Band It About podcast series theme. I think they did an amazing job don't you? Finish with Paul and his Satisfaction band members performing 'The Rolling Stones' hit from 1968, "Sympathy For The Devil", written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. I filmed the band performing this song at The Gov, Satisfaction video YouTube https://youtu.be/cMRnFDPRl8Q Don't forget to leave your voice message for a chance to win a free snare tune up and overhaul, from John Stephens. Subscribe Android phones http://www.subscribeonandroid.com/anchor.fm/s/10a6ecfc/podcast/rss Apple iPhone banditabout Paul Sharman 'Jim Sharman Presents' 0408 877 769 https://www.facebook.com/Voodoo-Lounge-Rehearsal-Room-Adelaide-398078234024217/ https://www.facebook.com/Satisfaction.thestonesshow Listen on Google Podcasts Listen on Apple podcasts Listen on Spotify https://www.podpage.com/band-it-about-podcast-series/ https://www.buymeacoffee.com/BANDIT https://www.facebook.com/allowmetoguideyoutothegig https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLhg0WMgLVQYhLjgcWNQYKrg63Vh5suSfX https://www.instagram.com/banditaboutpodcastseries/ Email: banditabout17@gmail.com #musicinterviews #podcasts #banditabout #jimsharman #zillicymbals --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/dianne-spillane/message

The 80,000 Hours Podcast is about “the world's most pressing problems and how you can use your career to solve them”, and in this episode we tackle that question in the most direct way possible. In 2019 we published a summary of all our key ideas, which links to many of our other articles, and which we are aiming to keep updated as our opinions shift.  All of us added something to it, but the single biggest contributor was our CEO and today's guest, Ben Todd, who founded 80,000 Hours along with Will MacAskill back in 2012. In this conversation from 2020, Ben talks about some common misunderstandings of our advice,  our key moral positions, and a high level overview of what 80,000 Hours generally recommends.   Full transcript, related links, and summary of this interviewThis episode first broadcast on the regular 80,000 Hours Podcast feed on March 3, 2020. Some related episodes include:• #75 – Michelle Hutchinson on what people most often ask 80,000 Hours• Benjamin Todd on varieties of longtermism and things 80,000 Hours might be getting wrong (80k team chat #2)• Benjamin Todd on what the effective altruism community most needs (80k team chat #4)Series produced by Keiran Harris.

80,000 Hours is a non-profit that provides research and support to help people switch into careers that effectively tackle the world’s most pressing problems. Ben discusses the most useful things they’ve learned so far. Ben Todd managed 80,000 Hours while it grew from a lecture, to a student society, to the organisation it is today. … Continue reading 80,000 Hours: Key Ideas with Ben Todd

Adelaide drummer Ben Todd began playing drums at the age of 3, adding to an already large family of drummers (3 generations to be exact!) His first introduction to the instrument was from his father Steve who worked as a freelance musician. After leaving high school, Ben quickly became established in the Adelaide music community and began work in sessions, musicals and corporate bands, as well as conducting drum clinics and workshops both in SA and interstate. Ben sent his first audition tape when he was 15, and continued to send through updates every 6 months or so until finally securing his first contract when he was 19 with the internationally acclaimed "Cirque du Soleil". Ben has toured the world with Cirque as a featured drummer, percussionist and now bandleader with 3 of their shows, "CORTEO", "KOOZA" and most recently "VOLTA". Prior to joining Cirque, Ben performed with a wide range of artists back in Australia including Kate Ceberano, Paulini, Ben Folds, Doug Parkinson, Rhonda Burchmore, James Morrison, David Campbell, Barry Humphries and Glen Shorrock, as well as playing in the pit orchestras for many musical theatre shows including the Australia/NZ tour of Cats, and the Adelaide productions of Miss Saigon, Grease, Metro Street and The Candyman. Music: Intro "Like Kids" artist Cirque du Soleil album VOLTA, Outro "What's Up?" written by Ben Todd, the song was released in 2020 on Ben's album Memento and features Ben Todd - Drums and Percussion, Marty Holoubek - Bass, Mark Lettieri - Guitar, Paul White - Keyboards, Miron Rafajlovic - Trumpet, Ben Harrison - Saxophone, and Steve Todd - Percussion. Links: https://www.cirquedusoleil.com/press/kits/shows/volta Ben Todd Memento Ben Todd Band, Ben Todd Pearl Drumset Artist, Ben Todd Zildjian cymbals, Ben Todd Vic Firth Sticks, Ben Todd Piglet Music Fringe shows; Jackson Vs Jackson https://adelaidefringe.com.au/ Band It About Facebook Email: banditabout17@gmail.com YouTube Band It About - Proudly Supporting Live Music Listen on the following platforms: Vurbl Google Podcasts Pocket Casts Castbox Breaker RadioPublic Overcast Apple podcasts Spotify Anchor #CirqueWay, #CirqueduSoleil, #BenTodd, #drummers, #drum, #drumming, #Adelaide #UNESCO #SouthAustralia #PearlDrums #Zildjian #VicFirth, #AdelaideFringe #VOLTA, #HSCC, #BenToddBand, #Cats #musicaltheatre #freelancemusician, #LPPercussion, #ProLogixPercussion, #Kickport, #BergCases, #HumesCases, #PigletMusic, #BandItAbout --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/dianne-spillane/message

https://youtu.be/oV8EZwLujNg “Adam Page is a multi-instrumentalist, composer, music educator and record producer based in Adelaide, South Australia. Known widely for his critically acclaimed solo multi-instrumental looping performances, Page has carved his path internationally as a composer. He has written major works for the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra Wellington, Zephyr Quartet and co-composed on numerous occasions with celebrated Kiwi composer John Psathas. Page has recently composed and performed with The Grigoryan Brothers, established the boutique record label - Wizard Tone Records, established and performed with his new 12 piece ensemble - The Adam Page Ensemble (TAPE), written and performed with The Adelaide Symphony Orchestra and also conducted the ASO in a concert featuring the music of Ross McHenry and Matthew Sheens.His orchestral music has also been recorded and broadcast twice by ABC Classic FM.Page's other musical collaborations stretch far and wide, working with artists and groups such as The Australian String Quartet, Tim Finn, Slava Grigoryan, Noel Gallagher, Katie Noonan, Riki Gooch, Jamie MacDowell and Tom Thum, Emma Pask, Ross Irwin, Ben Todd, The Shaolin Afronauts, 1.1 Immermann, Ross McHenry, Thomas Oliver, The Adelaide Sax Pack, Darren Percival, Mal Webb, Lisa Tomlins and the late Dr. Chandrakant Sardeshmukh. He has also recorded with artists such as Electric Wire Hustle, Julien Dyne, Mark de Clive-Lowe, Oisima, Spook City, The Shaolin Afronauts and Dave Whitehead (recording various sounds for The Hobbit films). In 2014, Page co-founded Adelaide's 'Wizard Tone Studios' with fellow Adelaide musicians James Brown and Jarrad Payne.”http://www.adampage.com.au/https://www.wizardtonestudios.com/So many topics covered in this interview including The different pathways available for creativesThe power of dreamingSaying YES to things that are super challengingSeriously too many topics to list you just have to listen to the podcastI just loved this interview Adam has so much positive energy and passion for all things creative as a musician he is also interested in other creative spaces as well including the Art Gallery and being inspired by all forms of Art.Adam has an incredible gig really creative and something not seen before here in Adelaide as far I know. Its coming up soon which I can't wait to share a mini podcast all about this gig  and I will be posting this podcast in the next couple of weeks once dates and tickets have been confirmed.Sundays you can see Adam play in The Ben Todd Band at the Gov see link for details.https://www.thegov.com.au/index.php/gig_guide/gig/e120472I think every time I feel like I am unsure of what I am doing as a creative person I am going to listen to Adam's interview and be reenergised.I would like to acknowledge that music played on my Podcast is an original tune by David Innocente, Jazz Musician/Artisthttps://www.innocente.com.au/

In the last '80k team chat' with Ben Todd and Arden Koehler, we discussed what effective altruism is and isn't, and how to argue for it. In this episode we turn now to what the effective altruism community most needs. Links to learn more, summary and full transcript. According to Ben, we can think of the effective altruism movement as having gone through several stages, categorised by what kind of resource has been most able to unlock more progress on important issues (i.e. by what's the 'bottleneck'). Plausibly, these stages are common for other social movements as well. • Needing money: In the first stage, when effective altruism was just getting going, more money (to do things like pay staff and put on events) was the main bottleneck to making progress. • Needing talent: In the second stage, we especially needed more talented people being willing to work on whatever seemed most pressing. • Needing specific skills and capacity: In the third stage, which Ben thinks we're in now, the main bottlenecks are organizational capacity, infrastructure, and management to help train people up, as well as specialist skills that people can put to work now. What's next? Perhaps needing coordination -- the ability to make sure people keep working efficiently and effectively together as the community grows. The 2020 Effective Altruism Survey just opened. If you're involved with the effective altruism community, or sympathetic to its ideas, it's a great thing to fill out. Ben and I also cover the career implications of those stages, as well as the ability to save money and the possibility that someone else would do your job in your absence. If you’d like to learn more about these topics, you should check out a couple of articles on our site: • Think twice before talking about ‘talent gaps’ – clarifying nine misconceptions • How replaceable are the top candidates in large hiring rounds? Why the answer flips depending on the distribution of applicant ability Get this episode by subscribing: type 80,000 Hours into your podcasting app. Or read the linked transcript. Producer: Keiran Harris. Audio mastering: Ben Cordell. Transcriptions: Zakee Ulhaq.

Today’s episode is the latest conversation between Arden Koehler, and our CEO, Ben Todd. Ben’s been thinking a lot about effective altruism recently, including what it really is, how it's framed, and how people misunderstand it. We recently released an article on misconceptions about effective altruism – based on Will MacAskill’s recent paper The Definition of Effective Altruism – and this episode can act as a companion piece. Links to learn more, summary and full transcript. Arden and Ben cover a bunch of topics related to effective altruism: • How it isn’t just about donating money to fight poverty • Whether it includes a moral obligation to give • The rigorous argument for its importance • Objections to that argument • How to talk about effective altruism for people who aren't already familiar with it Given that we’re in the same office, it’s relatively easy to record conversations between two 80k team members — so if you enjoy these types of bonus episodes, let us know at podcast@80000hours.org, and we might make them a more regular feature. Get this episode by subscribing: type 80,000 Hours into your podcasting app. Or read the linked transcript. Producer: Keiran Harris. Audio mastering: Ben Cordell. Transcriptions: Zakee Ulhaq.

Today’s bonus episode is a conversation between Arden Koehler, and our CEO, Ben Todd. Ben’s been doing a bunch of research recently, and we thought it’d be interesting to hear about how he’s currently thinking about a couple of different topics – including different types of longtermism, and things 80,000 Hours might be getting wrong. Links to learn more, summary and full transcript. This is very off-the-cut compared to our regular episodes, and just 54 minutes long. In the first half, Arden and Ben talk about varieties of longtermism: • Patient longtermism • Broad urgent longtermism • Targeted urgent longtermism focused on existential risks • Targeted urgent longtermism focused on other trajectory changes • And their distinctive implications for people trying to do good with their careers. In the second half, they move on to: • How to trade-off transferable versus specialist career capital • How much weight to put on personal fit • Whether we might be highlighting the wrong problems and career paths. Given that we’re in the same office, it’s relatively easy to record conversations between two 80k team members — so if you enjoy these types of bonus episodes, let us know at podcast@80000hours.org, and we might make them a more regular feature. Our annual user survey is also now open for submissions. Once a year for two weeks we ask all of you, our podcast listeners, article readers, advice receivers, and so on, so let us know how we've helped or hurt you. 80,000 Hours now offers many different services, and your feedback helps us figure out which programs to keep, which to cut, and which to expand. This year we have a new section covering the podcast, asking what kinds of episodes you liked the most and want to see more of, what extra resources you use, and some other questions too. We're always especially interested to hear ways that our work has influenced what you plan to do with your life or career, whether that impact was positive, neutral, or negative. That might be a different focus in your existing job, or a decision to study something different or look for a new job. Alternatively, maybe you're now planning to volunteer somewhere, or donate more, or donate to a different organisation. Your responses to the survey will be carefully read as part of our upcoming annual review, and we'll use them to help decide what 80,000 Hours should do differently next year. So please do take a moment to fill out the user survey. You can find it at 80000hours.org/survey Get this episode by subscribing: type 80,000 Hours into your podcasting app. Or read the linked transcript. Producer: Keiran Harris. Audio mastering: Ben Cordell. Transcriptions: Zakee Ulhaq.

Our first segment discusses what the MLB needs to do to get more kids interested in the game with Red Sox fan Ben Todd. After the break we run through the newest Twins news and talk about how they are trying to stay safe in the global pandemic. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

It's part two of a two-part interview with life long gamer Ben Todd. In this episode, we chat about Demon's Souls, Dark Souls, and Nioh 2, plus Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, dirty controllers, 3D Doritos, and much more! In addition to his gaming, Ben makes music! You can check out his tracks over on Soundcloud, and hit him up on Instagram and Twitter @benny_odd! Be sure to follow WDGR everywhere! Website: https://www.wdgrpodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WDGRPodcast Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/WDGRPodcast Twitter: https://twitter.com/wdgrpodcast Discord: https://discord.gg/gApE8M2 "Cyborg Ninja" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

It's part one of a two-part interview with life long gamer Ben Todd. He walks us through how he became a gamer, chats about some of his favorite games, and dives into the finer details of the Metal Gear Solid stories. In addition to his gaming, Ben makes music! You can check out his tracks over on Soundcloud, and hit him up on Instagram and Twitter @benny_odd! Be sure to follow WDGR everywhere! Website: https://www.wdgrpodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WDGRPodcast Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/WDGRPodcast Twitter: https://twitter.com/wdgrpodcast Discord: https://discord.gg/gApE8M2 "Cyborg Ninja" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

Arcola's future is at risk. Will you help us survive? http://arco.la/covid19

Arcola's future is at risk. Will you help us survive? http://arco.la/covid19

The 80,000 Hours Podcast is about “the world’s most pressing problems and how you can use your career to solve them”, and in this episode we tackle that question in the most direct way possible. Last year we published a summary of all our key ideas, which links to many of our other articles, and which we are aiming to keep updated as our opinions shift. All of us added something to it, but the single biggest contributor was our CEO and today's guest, Ben Todd, who founded 80,000 Hours along with Will MacAskill back in 2012. This key ideas page is the most read on the site. By itself it can teach you a large fraction of the most important things we've discovered since we started investigating high impact careers. • Links to learn more, summary and full transcript. But it's perhaps more accurate to think of it as a mini-book, as it weighs in at over 20,000 words. Fortunately it's designed to be highly modular and it's easy to work through it over multiple sessions, scanning over the articles it links to on each topic. Perhaps though, you'd prefer to absorb our most essential ideas in conversation form, in which case this episode is for you. If you want to have a big impact with your career, and you say you're only going to read one article from us, we recommend you read our key ideas page. And likewise, if you're only going to listen to one of our podcast episodes, it should be this one. We have fun and set a strong pace, running through: • Common misunderstandings of our advice • A high level overview of what 80,000 Hours generally recommends • Our key moral positions • What are the most pressing problems to work on and why? • Which careers effectively contribute to solving those problems? • Central aspects of career strategy like how to weigh up career capital, personal fit, and exploration • As well as plenty more. One benefit of this podcast over the article is that we can more easily communicate uncertainty, and dive into the things we're least sure about, or didn’t yet cover within the article. Note though that our what’s in the article is more precisely stated, our advice is going to keep shifting, and we're aiming to keep the key ideas page current as our thinking evolves over time. This episode was recorded in November 2019, so if you notice a conflict between the page and this episode in the future, go with the page! Get the episode by subscribing: type 80,000 Hours into your podcasting app. Producer: Keiran Harris. Audio mastering: Ben Cordell. Transcriptions: Zakee Ulhaq.

Brandon Artilies is joined this week by several special guests to share their hearts and memories of the great Coach Jim Heinz. Listen as they discuss the legacy and multitude of lives impacted by Coach Heinz both at ECS and elsewhere. Guests this week include Trey Adams, Ben Todd, Andy Bramlett, Alex Griffith, Jordan Carpenter, and Morgan Cox.

Today we bring you our interview with Ben Todd, the CEO and founder of Arcola Energy. Arcola Energy is a systems engineering company and Tier 1 supplier specialising in hydrogen, fuel cells and batteries. They build systems for zero-emission vehicles and for clean energy projects. Ben tells us all about fuel cells, the various applications his company's technology is being applied to and the projects they have worked on. It will give you an insight into the world of fuel cell integration in a number of industries including heavy industrial vehicles, rail, and marine.If there are any other subjects you would like us to cover or guests you would like us to interview please let us know via our website, or on any of our social media pages. We would love to hear from you!If you enjoyed this episode make sure to subscribe, rate and don't miss an episode!Arcola Energy website: https://www.arcolaenergy.com/AVID Technology website for more info: https://avidtp.com/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/avid-technology-group-limited/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Avidtechnology1/Twitter: https://twitter.com/avidtechnology1/AVID's White Paper Series: https://avidtp.com/about/white-papers/

Cirque du Soleil “VOLTA” is, on the surface, a circus; a big top amalgam of a number of circus-type acts and feats. But it seems reductive to leave the description there. I was given deep, “in the trenches” access to “VOLTA” earlier this week, which theoretically made it easier for me to summarize the show. Instead, the more I thought about it, the harder it became to explain. As I walked around the compound and backstage areas, the word “everything” kept bouncing in my head. The production, from what happens behind the scenes to what you see on stage, includes everything: It’s multi-generational. All the performances long-time Cirque attendees would expect (acrobatics, hoop-jumping) are there, making it a comfortable experience for the proverbial upper demos. On the other hand, “VOLTA” crescendos in a gravity-defying, dizzying BMX performance that feels more representative of a generation that can’t yet legally drink. The Cirque performers and crew are multi-continental. There’s an almost otherworldliness to the Cirque experience, as the vision and perspectives aren’t told through one distinct cultural filter. I spent most of my night in close proximity to band leader/drummer Ben Todd, who’s from Australia, and guitarist Will Lawrence, who’s British. Along the way, I also met singer/violinist Camilla Bäckman (the first Finnish musician in Cirque du Soleil). If Cirque isn’t a metaphor for the citizens of Planet Earth coming together under a shared vision, I don’t know what is. The on-stage performances straddle every corner of the performing arts. I saw ballet, dance, comedy, vaudeville, singing, acting and sports (BMX is sports, right?). The score isn’t content to lock into one groove. My preconceived notion of Cirque du Soleil’s music was “theatrical Enya.” And while a new age haze is always on the horizon in “VOLTA,” I was pulled in by prog rock moments (“Like Kids”), pop smarts (“Dancing Ants”) and synthy elevations (“Modern Jungle”). When Cirque du Soleil lands in a city, they create their own city inside it. The various tents and trailers that populate the parking lot are a sustaining infrastructure, including costume design, bike repair, gear repair, showers and bathrooms, a cafeteria with world-class (and healthy) food, and practice/workout spaces. Speaking of which, you wouldn’t be wrong to have tired legs just from watching this pre-show warmup from the rope skippers: And here’s the ceiling of that same practice space: My plan for the night was to embed with the band during the show. Before the show, I sat down with band leader/drummer Ben Todd to talk about his career and his Cirque observations, which you can hear in this podcast.   Minutes before showtime, Ben and Will Lawrence spirited me away into one of the two “band pits." The pits are essentially musician bunkers that are beneath, but still visible, on the stage.  Here’s the view from the band pit, Will Lawrence included. I was perched in the corner of Will’s space, watching him transition from guitar-to-keyboard-to-different-guitar-to-onstage-performer with a stressless grace (and a fairly constant smile throughout). To my immediate right was Ben’s drum room, where he balanced the performance aspect of the gig with providing in-the-moment direction to the band as the performance shifted, changed and twisted in some unexpected ways. How close was I to the drums, you ask? THIS CLOSE. I was wired into the stage directions and Ben’s directions via IFB device and headphones, so I could hear everything going on behind the scenes. For those of us who can’t walk and chew gum at the same time, hearing Ben direct the band while playing drums and monitoring the show comes off as a multitasking achievement. In my interview with Ben, we talked about how unforeseen circumstances can lead to him making decisions and adjustments on the fly, making each performance unique. It must have been foreshadowing, because that’s exactly what happened on the night I was there.  Because this has been the worst weather summer ever in Chicago (right?), what started as a beautiful night went south for about an hour as storms rolled through. Lightning was detected near the downtown area, and “VOLTA” had to be paused twice for safety precautions. I heard the notices come through my IFB, something along the lines of, “we’re stopping the show” (which sounded super ominous without the context of what was happening outside). Ben directed the band to kill the music as stage activity was brought to a halt for 15 minutes each time.  To oversimplify show business moments like that, shit happens. And when they happen, the incident is never as important as the recovery from it. And the recovery was seamless.  The two unplanned breaks meant songs needed to be sacrificed as the show was realigned. Will and Ben showed no perceptible shift in attitude or energy as they stole the momentum back from the weather-dictated down times. As multi-continental as the “VOLTA” cast is, it’s cool to know that the Chicago area has representation in “VOLTA.” Kevin Beverly is a hoop-diver and a back-up for lead character Waz. We snuck in a quick picture as a sign of local solidarity: Cirque du Soleil “VOLTA” runs through July 6 in the South Parking Lot of Soldier Field.   Car Con Carne is presented by the Autobarn Mazda of Evanston

Cirque du Soleil “VOLTA” is, on the surface, a circus; a big top amalgam of a number of circus-type acts and feats. But it seems reductive to leave the description there. I was given deep, “in the trenches” access to “VOLTA” earlier this week, which theoretically made it easier for me to summarize the show. Instead, the more I thought about it, the harder it became to explain. As I walked around the compound and backstage areas, the word “everything” kept bouncing in my head. The production, from what happens behind the scenes to what you see on stage, includes everything: It’s multi-generational. All the performances long-time Cirque attendees would expect (acrobatics, hoop-jumping) are there, making it a comfortable experience for the proverbial upper demos. On the other hand, “VOLTA” crescendos in a gravity-defying, dizzying BMX performance that feels more representative of a generation that can’t yet legally drink. The Cirque performers and crew are multi-continental. There’s an almost otherworldliness to the Cirque experience, as the vision and perspectives aren’t told through one distinct cultural filter. I spent most of my night in close proximity to band leader/drummer Ben Todd, who’s from Australia, and guitarist Will Lawrence, who’s British. Along the way, I also met singer/violinist Camilla Bäckman (the first Finnish musician in Cirque du Soleil). If Cirque isn’t a metaphor for the citizens of Planet Earth coming together under a shared vision, I don’t know what is. The on-stage performances straddle every corner of the performing arts. I saw ballet, dance, comedy, vaudeville, singing, acting and sports (BMX is sports, right?). The score isn’t content to lock into one groove. My preconceived notion of Cirque du Soleil’s music was “theatrical Enya.” And while a new age haze is always on the horizon in “VOLTA,” I was pulled in by prog rock moments (“Like Kids”), pop smarts (“Dancing Ants”) and synthy elevations (“Modern Jungle”). When Cirque du Soleil lands in a city, they create their own city inside it. The various tents and trailers that populate the parking lot are a sustaining infrastructure, including costume design, bike repair, gear repair, showers and bathrooms, a cafeteria with world-class (and healthy) food, and practice/workout spaces. Speaking of which, you wouldn’t be wrong to have tired legs just from watching this pre-show warmup from the rope skippers: And here’s the ceiling of that same practice space: My plan for the night was to embed with the band during the show. Before the show, I sat down with band leader/drummer Ben Todd to talk about his career and his Cirque observations, which you can hear in this podcast.   Minutes before showtime, Ben and Will Lawrence spirited me away into one of the two “band pits." The pits are essentially musician bunkers that are beneath, but still visible, on the stage.  Here’s the view from the band pit, Will Lawrence included. I was perched in the corner of Will’s space, watching him transition from guitar-to-keyboard-to-different-guitar-to-onstage-performer with a stressless grace (and a fairly constant smile throughout). To my immediate right was Ben’s drum room, where he balanced the performance aspect of the gig with providing in-the-moment direction to the band as the performance shifted, changed and twisted in some unexpected ways. How close was I to the drums, you ask? THIS CLOSE. I was wired into the stage directions and Ben’s directions via IFB device and headphones, so I could hear everything going on behind the scenes. For those of us who can’t walk and chew gum at the same time, hearing Ben direct the band while playing drums and monitoring the show comes off as a multitasking achievement. In my interview with Ben, we talked about how unforeseen circumstances can lead to him making decisions and adjustments on the fly, making each performance unique. It...

Thank you to Ben ( -- https://www.instagram.com/ben_todd_nelsons -- ) for being today's guest and for welcoming our open mic nights to your amazing pub ( -- https://www.instagram.com/thenelsonspub -- ). I forgot to mention this in the episode, but thank you also to Jimmy Cyclone ( -- https://www.instagram.com/jimmy.cyclone -- ) for introducing me to this pub in the first place. Happy 150 everyone! Thank you all for listening. Take Care. For more on the open mic nights, check out -- https://www.ukopenmic.com --

Revitalizing Toledo and Revitalizing Your City will be hosting a fundraiser for the movement "KEEP THE JAIL DOWNTOWN" over Facebook Live. Join us on our Live Stream on January 16th from 4 to 9 PM and donate to this cause via Keep the Jail's website. The hosts and guests include Kimberly Rose Ruby Morgan, Mary Olson Dutkowski, Asmi Barua, Benjamin Todd, and many more.. WHAT IS THE ISSUE?The Lucas County government is attempting to build a $185 million jail. This jail would be the most expensive jail per square foot (nearly $700 per square foot) and per bed ($284,615), that has ever been built in America. The bidding process for this jail along with the county's overall planning process have been kept secret from the public until recently, raising suspicions of foul play by elected representatives. MORE THAN A "NOT IN MY BACKYARD" ISSUEFrom the single mother working three jobs in the hopes that her child has a bright future in Lucas County, to the local entrepreneur hoping that the Toledo market will be strong enough for their business to prosper, to even a seasoned business executive that has made large investments in the region that they hope will pay off, THIS ISSUE MATTERS! This isn't just about the construction of a jail. It's about whether or not the County will have the funds to fix the roads in the future, to invest in economic development projects, and whether or not the area will be a good place to live at in the future. WHY REVITALIZING TOLEDO & REVITALIZING YOUR CITY IS GETTING INVOLVEDOur show takes a non-partisan look at politics from an economic policy standpoint. The expense of this jail puts our community at risk of being unable to make greater economic progress in the future. As a result, we believe that supporting this issue and preventing the county from making a grave mistake is important to the future of our community. HOW YOU CAN HELPOn February 26th the issue of whether to build the jail goes on ballot. While the County has large amounts of funding from the Contractors who are supposed to build this jail, and the Unions that are going to be hired to build it, Keep the Jail Downtown relies on donations from every day Toledoans

Ben Todd spent over 5 years touring the world as a featured drummer with Cirque du Soleil. In this chat with Pete, Ben talks about his career which started at the age of 3. The post EP 4 Ben Todd On Drumming For Cirque Du Soleil appeared first on Pete Barter - Play Better - Work Better.

A common objection to effective altruism is that it encourages an overly “individual” way of thinking, which reduces our impact. Ben will argue that, at least in a sense, that's true.When you're part of a community, which careers, charities and actions are highest-impact changes. An overly narrow, individual analysis, which doesn't take account of how the rest of the community will respond to your actions, can lead you to have less impact than you could. Ben will suggest some better options and rules of thumb for working together.Source: Effective Altruism Global (video).

Ben Todd of Lonesome Shack plays 3 tracks from The Switcher, & tells the story of the band’s name, and his North Mississippi blues influences. This week I’ve got that new acoustic Macy Gray album, the new Dex Romweber blues album, and pop rock from Jon Herington. I’ve also got more new music from Dale Watson, Tim Easton, John Doe, Michael Rank and yes another track from that Kiefer Sutherland album. "Ben Todd finds that Lonesome Shack groove (Ep316)" originated from Americana Music Show.

Thanks for downloading the Plane Safety Podcast with Pilot Pip, an aviation podcast from a pilot at 'Safejet' airlines. This episode has a bit of a 'spacey' feel to it.  We're doing things a bit backwards ; we start with feedback in the Squawkbox, we have a Planetail of sorts and in Topic of the Week we take a look at Time.  If you would like to donate to my London Marathon appeal, please click here The address for getting in touch with the show is feedback@planesafetypodcast.com Thanks for listening. Squawkbox : Capt Nick has some thoughts on LOC approaches and SOP. Antoine tells us a little about his approach to finding a job. Ben Todd tells about about his trip in a RV9 Jez has a question about autoland Nevil Bounds has some audio feedback regarding passports.   Rowland White ; Into the Black can be found here (I can highly recommended this authors work) Intro/outro music ; 'Beef or Mutton' by Geoff Whitehorn

Note that this interview was recorded before we were running a professional podcast. Summary and discussion here: https://80000hours.org/2015/12/interview-with-ben-who-raised-eight-figures-for-charity-through-tech-entrepreneurship/

Note that this interview was recorded before we were running a professional podcast. Summary and discussion here: https://80000hours.org/2015/12/podcast-with-founder-of-entrepreneur-first-about-being-a-startup-founder/