I have been to two conference-style events here, in both cases staying on site. It's a pretty great venue. Lots of natural places to gather comfortably in various sizes, relaxing atmosphere with lots of green, mix of indoor and outdoor, lots of rationalist-style snacks and items lying around, catering has been solid.
Only caveat is that the largest place to put an indoor presentation or meeting caps out lower than some conferences are going to want - for Manifest it was right at the edge and they set up a video feed outside.
(And it is where it is, in Berkley, for better and for worse, of course).
For anyone else who was wondering: it's physically located in Berkeley (mentioned on the website but not in the post).
Manifold market is now up for people to predict how much revenue Lighthaven will bring in over the next 12 months!
Also re: the images on the website, is it intentional that images in the gallery view (i.e. when clicking on an image) are so small? It seems a bit weird that the image width in the gallery is apparently fixed to 800 px, to the point that I can't make out many details, and yet most raw images are much much larger.
Are all the bedrooms like the ones you displayed? They weren't all like that when I visited, but that was a while back.
The variance in different rooms is quite large, but we also did a pretty huge amount of work making rooms nicer. So my guess is it's a mixture of "rooms look a lot more like the ones shown here than when you last visited" and "some rooms do just look very different than this".
We have a bunch of different bedrooms of various sizes/shapes/prices. We'll probably get more info up about them over time. (The current website is basically the minimal version we felt good about launching with after a couple days of work)
If you're running an event and Lighthaven isn't an option for some reason, you may be interested in Atlantis: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/pvz53LTgFEPtnaWbP/atlantis-berkeley-event-venue-available-for-rent
1Very cool! I'm curious: what are some concrete use cases here?
Rationalist(adjacent) stuff is somewhat obvious, but I wonder how far it extends. Like, do you envision a local Python meetup maybe wanting to use the space? Random individual rationalists wanting to sleep over for a few days for fun? Google paying to have their Search team go on a retreat and mingle with smart people?
My guess is that the ultimate hope here is for:
- All sizes of rationalist, x-risk, EA type events that seem connected to the mission (who probably get some kind of discount)
- Mid-to-large size events from various non-rationalist people or organizations (who probably get charged roughly a typical market rate)
Mostly because all events have some fixed overhead, and it's not quite worth it for meetups or groups that are smaller. The reason we bought the place was to do various on-mission stuff, the reason we're marketing it outside of that is for making sure we have enough funding to do our other mission-aligned stuff.
But, this is all my off-the-cuff thoughts, not a considered company policy or anything.
Kind of a silly question, but: how much did such a compound cost to buy/renovate, and how much does it cost to run? Just asking because I’m curious, and because it’s just past the threshold of "sufficiently bigger/with more amenities than a regular house that I can’t trust my extrapolations"
The LessWrong Review runs every year to select the posts that have most stood the test of time. This post is not yet eligible for review, but will be at the end of 2024. The top fifty or so posts are featured prominently on the site throughout the year.
Hopefully, the review is better than karma at judging enduring value. If we have accurate prediction markets on the review results, maybe we can have better incentives on LessWrong today. Will this post make the top fifty?
Lightcone Infrastructure (the organization that grew from and houses the LessWrong team) has just finished renovating a 7-building physical campus that we hope to use to make the future of humanity go better than it would otherwise.
We're hereby announcing that it is generally available for bookings. We offer preferential pricing for projects we think are good for the world, but to cover operating costs, we're renting out space to a wide variety of people/projects.
How do I express interest?
What kinds of things can I run here?
What does it cost?
We determine pricing on a case-by-case basis, but a good approximation is $100 - $250 per person per day for retreats conferences and $25 - $75 per person for parties.
We offer some groups large discounts (including free), if we think what you are doing makes the world better. Do really reach out to us if price is an issue. We will often be able to work something out.
You can use your own caterer, or we can provide catering. Our default caterer offers meals from $20/meal to $50/meal that most visitors have found decently satisfying.
We engage in some price discrimination. If we think your best alternative to our venue would be much more expensive, we may charge more than our listed price. We try to find a fair price that splits the difference between our own costs and the value you get out of the space.
We also provide more bespoke services, for an additional charge (see below). Overall we try to be reasonable about pricing, and don't expect to make much profit on the space.
What do other people say about the space?
Some testimonials from people who have run or been to events here:
What services do you provide?
For an additional charge we can provide (among many other things):
Our team has a lot of experience running all kinds of different events, from small 15-20 person dinners to 1000+ person conferences, to 2-month fellowships and research programs.
We can’t guarantee we can provide everything you need, but if you are facing some kind of problem or obstacle in the course of preparing or running your event, we can probably help you.
What are the various buildings and areas?
The Atrium
Upstairs has a common space and 7 bedrooms. Downstairs is great for parties and weekend conferences (though not available during weekday business hours).
The Bayes House
20 bedrooms, it can host sessions of up to 60 people. Includes the surrounding gardens (200+ capacity).
The Cottage
Storage and laundry. You can store things here during events.
The Den
Front of building has 7 offices/event-spaces. Back of building has 4 of our nicest and most secluded bedrooms.
The Extension
4 small session spaces and/or bedrooms, a gym, and a 60 person session space.
The Farmhouse
Common space surrounded by beautiful gardens and a nice outdoor bar.
The Guesthouse
An additional house a block away, with 10 additional bedrooms.
What is your goal with Lighthaven?
While this post is mostly about our event space offerings, we will also run our own events, fellowships, research programs and we and many of our collaborators are working on a daily basis from Lighthaven.
I expect the number of people working here to grow over time as we try to make this place into the center of a bustling community that will hopefully somehow make the future of humanity go better. If we can do it while we provide services that fund a good chunk of our ongoing operations and engage in the capitalist enterprise and produce surplus through trade, even better.