The final arc of HPMOR, chapters 104 through 120, will begin posting on February 15th, 2015, at 5PM Pacific Time, and finish on March 14th, 2015, at 9AM Pacific Time.  (The first draft of 104-120 is now complete at 88,310 words, most of it already edited, plus 2,300 words for Ch. 103.)

Oliver Habryka is coordinating wrap parties for HPMOR; please email him if you’re interested in having a wrap party in your city. There will at least be a major wrap party in Berkeley. Updates on this later.

If there is no specific wrap party in your city, then the fallback coordination point for meeting other HPMOR readers is any Pi Day celebration near you. (March 14th = 3.14 or Pi Day.  Yes, I know that Tau Day is cooler, but I’m not going to wait until June just for that.)  If a coordination time is required other than that of the Pi Day celebration, I declare it to be 6pm local time. I have no idea how well this will work, but it seems better than nothing.

I have some room for additional cameos. If you’ve created HPMOR fan art or music, and have not yet received a cameo, please email me at yudkowsky@gmail.com with a description of which cameo names will work for you. Please make sure your email contains the word ‘cameo’, and include a link to the artwork or music for which you are to receive credit. Preference may be given to those whose allowable cameo names sound more like realistic Hogwarts students.

The Center for Applied Rationality is currently conducting their annual fundraising drive ending Jan 31st. As of now, people have donated $49,342 of the $120,000 CFAR needs to continue normal operations this year. Please consider donating to them! Without CFAR, there would be no organized attempts to actually develop, test, and teach the sorts of cognitive skills that I sometimes depict fictional characters as having.

For more on the latest developments at CFAR, please see their end-of-year update on CFAR in 2014.

Ch. 104 will post on February 15th, 2015, at 5pm Pacific Time.

Ch. 118-120 remain to be written, but I am taking the tentative plunge and saying that I currently but not solidly plan to begin posting HPMOR Ch. 104 on February 15th, 2015, and conclude with Ch. 120 on March 14th, 3.14 or Pi Day, at 12PM Pacific Time.  The idea of a finale celebration has been floated.  I’m curious as to what readers think about declaring Pi Day celebrations as the Schelling Point for HPMOR readers to meet up if there’s no larger local meetup.  I’d also like to know whether there’s any off-the-shelf software anyone would recommend for organizing meetups all over the world.

If I choose to solidify this date, I will post Ch. 103 on January 28th, 2015 at 5PM Pacific Time to announce the fact.

Speaking of finishing writing HPMOR, I’m looking for an English-speaking Chilean reader to meet me at the Santiago, Chile airport noonish on January 12th, in order to help me to get on a bus to another city (where I’ll meet up with Brienne).  Since I am not a Spanish speaker, this brief guidance would make me feel significantly less nervous about my trip.  Also, thanks to Exosphe.re for helping Brienne find the place where she’s staying and where I’ll be visiting her.

The 13-essay sequence forming my abridged guide to writing intelligent characters in fiction is now complete.

I highly recommend to everyone that they read the most recent newsletter of the Center for Applied Rationality:

CFAR in 2014: Continuing to climb out of the startup pit, heading toward a full prototype.

This has important new information about what CFAR did and learned in 2014, and where they’re heading in 2015.  CFAR is also currently running their annual fundraiser and I highly commend this as an effective use of charitable dollars.

I’d like to take this moment to commend to you the products of the following companies started by HPMOR readers / effective altruists:

Bellroy (owned by active Effective Altruists) makes elegant and functional slim-profile wallets. (They are recruiting for several roles including a data scientist. Interested readers should send an effortful pitch to jobs@bellroy.com.) Matt Fallshaw is one of Bellroy’s founders and is an early CFAR alum and active member of MIRI’s Board of Directors. I have many complimentary things to say about Matt that this margin is too narrow to contain.

General Biotics is a recent startup that is producing a pill-based probiotic that may help to replenish gut flora aka the intestinal microbiome.  They intend to donate 10% of profits to effective charities.  If you are currently unhappy with your digestive system, this is a quick way to test whether your gut microbes might be the cause.  (If you don’t have a current pain point but are interested in trying general improvements, you might want to wait for v2.)

Either Ch. 103 will post on January 28th, 2015 at 5pm Pacific Time (yay!) followed by Ch. 104 on February 15th, or I will have been distracted by something going very wrong (boo!), in which case the next Progress Report will post on February 1st, 2015 at 5pm Pacific Time.