TLDR: Office in city center of Belgrade, Serbia is offered to our NGO at a discounted monthly price of 550 Euros for ~45m2. It is not lavish, but quite functional with three rooms (standing work, sit-down, and quiet room). We put down 3k ourselves, raised 2k from an individual funder, 4.4k from Manifund so far but we are looking for funding for the rest of 2024/2024 and project growth. The maximum goal gets us to cover costs of just the office rent until August 2025. If you wish to support beyond that, we have a budget (~EUR56K/year), which would include paying a Project Manager 0.5 FTE to manage the promotion of the venue and review the applications, as well as maintenance staff. If you donate just a bit, you're buying a few extra weeks to the project, which we very much appreciate!
For questions or inquiries, please email Dušan. To apply for a stay, fill in this form. If your org wants to do a retreat in Serbia, please email Tanja Trninić.
In-depth:
Belgrade AI Safety (BAIS, previously AI Safety Hub Serbia, AISHS) office has existed for 10 months now, and has attracted a few different researchers in AI Safety and some interest from EA in general. While initial work was promising, capacities are underutilized, and more effort is required to pursue further impact.
Simultaneously, Serbia has become far more engaged in AI governance. Politically, it stands at the intersection of Brussels, Washington, Moscow, and Beijing, making it a great place to develop global governance thinking. AI Safety Law Serbia project has started and is progressing well, so hopefully Serbia becomes one of the countries with saner AI policies within the next year.
Thus, we are looking to expand BAIS. Firstly, we are excited to plan Safety Spring Sprint Serbia (4S) this coming spring 2025 - a one-month series of hackathons and co-working developed together with governance researchers (we have tentative interest from APART Labs and PIBBSS researchers). This would gather about 20-30 people most excited about the project in a combination of paid and free seats at the office.
Secondly, with enough funding we would hire a full-time project manager for BAIS to pilot the project.
Finally, we would work on partnerships for regular office space commitment. The space is enough for smaller versions of programs such as ML4Good or similar retreats, without being too remote - Belgrade is a lively city and there is plenty to do and try.
Other benefits of the project's locations come from Serbia’s visa policy, which is unique:
Visa-free 3 months per 6 months to Western countries (or holders of EU/US visa)
Unlimited (w/monthly border crossings ie, 25 EUR and 3 hours) for Chinese and Russian citizens
They have a hard time staying long in other countries.
It is also fairly easy/cheap (~500 Eur start+300 Eur/month tax) to get a residency permit/health insurance/social insurance (citizenship after 3-5 years).
This makes it a good gathering point for AIS researchers. As a founder of EA Serbia and ENAIS, I believe to have found a great venue:
Fairly central (20 minutes walk to City Square)
It fits 10-15 people (more in the coffee shop downstairs if the need arises)
Activist landlords that agree with our mission
Renovated and adjusted to our needs (although funding for ergonomic furniture would go a long way)
1) Provide an office where people can be close to EU/UK without having problems with Visas/pay as much in living costs.
2) Have the capacity in case of future geopolitical shifts to quickly scale up office (and possibly housing) to help AIS researchers fleeing their countries. (e.g., had this office existed in 2022, it could have been a Schelling point for Russian/Ukrainian researchers while they found more permanent solutions).
3) Having office space is prestigious, and in my current networking efforts within Serbia, saying that AIS Hub Serbia was a physical space and being able to offer it to Serbian researchers has been a boon.
4) Organizing smaller work retreats/gatherings in the office for cheap/free for small projects that benefit from frugal retreats.
5) Office doubles as meeting/working space for EA Serbia members while capacity is not full. This is a side goal and would be phased out if the office was at capacity.
Minimum funding raised here goes directly to rents and utilities and nothing else. Currently, the necessary labor of selecting people/maintaining the office/negotiate with landlords is done by me on a voluntary basis, but as the project is growing, I want to outsource that to a project manager.
I am Dušan D. Nešić, (LinkedIn) founder of EA Serbia and ENAIS, Ops Lead at PIBBSS. I have built communities such as student councils and clubs, as well as professional organizations and academic gatherings for ~12 years, and since this project is fairly low-key, I think this is enough expertise for now. I would like to gather a board of trustees to decide on applicants, but the flow currently does not require such a level of governance, yet.
Tanja Trninic, EA Serbia Community Builder is also helping in her free time with the office space. She speaks Chinese, English and Serbian fluently, and has been an activist for almost 20 years in different movements, and in EA for the past 2.
The only extreme failure scenario is one of geopolitical turmoil capturing Serbia while we have many guests visiting, but the combined probabilities of that are sufficiently low.
Office space not being used by tenants is the most probable failure, but as it is quite cheap, not too much has been lost. I believe the project is still worthwhile based on the value of having a flexible capacity to accept researchers from Russia/China/other countries outside of EU/US/UK. Additionally, even if not many tenants are present, Goal #3 is still achieved, and so far I have found it useful.
We will also apply to EAIF and Meta-Funders, nothing confirmed as of yet.
Individuals, please apply at this link! :)
If your org wants to do a retreat in Serbia, please email Tanja Trninić.