Selective Altruism & Rationalized Rejections

Denying humanity instead of hiring it.

Have you been denied the opportunity to contribute your wisdom, expertise, and skills to saving our species and the planet?

Tell us more.

Just curious about those who have? Keep scrolling to see:

(anonymously)

0 rejections shared · 0 came with useful feedback

The Wall

Click a note to hold it still. Click it again to let it go.

Rejected and feeling dejected?

Let us guess: so many AI safety orgs have rejected you without feedback after 3 work tests and 17 interview rounds that you're about to start applying to frontier labs instead? It's okay, we get it.

(anonymously)
Step 1

About you

What's your primary background?

Pick the one that fits best.

About you

How many years of experience?

 

5
05101520+

About you

Do you have any of these?

Select all that apply. Or none. We won't judge. (Unlike some.)

About you

When did you start applying?

The year you began applying to AI safety roles, fellowships or programs.

2025
2010 or earlier2026

Part two

Now, where did you apply?

One organization at a time: who it was, the general area (not the job title), and how it ended. You can add as many as you like.

The application

Which organization?

Start typing. Not on the list? Just type it.

The application

What general area?

Not the exact title, just the neighborhood.

The application

How far did you get?

 

0
0510
0
0123

The ending

How did it end?

 

The ending

Did you get feedback?

 

The ending

Was the feedback you received genuine, and valuable?

 

Last one

Can you provide any additional color?

Optional. Under 280 characters, the length of a tweet. Please leave out people's names.

0 / 280

Pinned. You are not alone.

You can see it on the wall now. It goes up for everyone once we've checked it for names.
Rejected somewhere else too? Most people have been.

Why aisafety.fail?

The current AI safety community does not comprehend the extent to which candidates are frustrated, burnt out, and giving up on getting in.

The result: some of the most capable, most excited, and most impactful candidates are slipping through the cracks, forever nullifying their could-have-been impact on the safety movement.

What do?

1

Feedback, or the lack of it.

Candidates sit through multiple interview rounds and work tests, and receive a form rejection. They learn nothing, and are sent back into the applicant pool with infinitely higher chances of recursively self-frustrating than self-improving.

2

The field has become the boy who cried “talent bottleneck.”

Great candidates spend months, even years, applying and getting rejected. Then they watch the same hiring managers who turned them down post on Slack, Discord, Substack and LinkedIn about capacity constraints and “how hard it is to find talent.”

If there’s a bottleneck, it isn’t the talent. Please do better.

Share your thoughts

This one isn't anonymous, so we can write back.