This seems really cool. I was really excited just by reading the title of this forum piece. My initial reaction was something like, ‘Yeah, I would be willing to sign up immediately and pay a subscription fee to access that if it was an app on my phone.’ I could use it like a news app, that way I could read it during breakfast or whenever else I have a spare moment. It could be a replacement or supplement to the BBC News app I read currently.
I took a very quick look at the site on my phone, so these are just quick initial reactions. So take my comments with a pinch of salt, but I think this is probably comparable to how most people would engage with this site if they’re not dedicated forecasters or identify as effective altruists or rationalists, or something similar.
My main point is similar to another commenter on this forum post, that I’d love to be able to click on individual stories and read more about them. Even if the headline is the main takeaway, it feels like it doesn’t really sink in until you’ve read some surrounding words, thoughts, comments, analysis, etc. Another forum commenter suggested that you could get forecasters to write explanations, but that sounds a bit technical and dry. My suggestion would be something like an interesting journalistic piece that uses the forecast as the main hook and story. For instance, you could interview some superforecasters and get quotes from them to try to clarify the topic. But you should also have some surrounding discussion and analysis about the context and the story itself.
Another gut reaction was like, ‘Oh, okay, so they have stories on a couple of specific topics, but not other stuff.’ I think I was expecting to see stories on a wide variety of topics, gathered from different prediction markets and forecasting platforms. Some of these stories might be on random or frankly unimportant topics. My guess is that this would make for a much more engaging and interesting site. My guess is also that creating a truly engaging platform is more important to your mission or theory of change than focusing solely on important topics. By attracting more traffic, you’ll get more people engaging with prediction markets and forecasts, and then maybe they’ll start reading about the other topics too.
To reiterate, this seems like a really cool project. Let me know if you’d be interested in having guest writers. I’d be interested in trying to write one myself, and I imagine that a bunch of smart students would love to get some experience like that too. I could probably connect you with some. But I imagine that you could find lots more yourself pretty easily.
(I also realise that my suggestions/ impressions might be time consuming to implement and you’re just in MVP phase, but thought they were worth sharing anyway.)
This seems really cool. I was really excited just by reading the title of this forum piece. My initial reaction was something like, ‘Yeah, I would be willing to sign up immediately and pay a subscription fee to access that if it was an app on my phone.’ I could use it like a news app, that way I could read it during breakfast or whenever else I have a spare moment. It could be a replacement or supplement to the BBC News app I read currently.
I took a very quick look at the site on my phone, so these are just quick initial reactions. So take my comments with a pinch of salt, but I think this is probably comparable to how most people would engage with this site if they’re not dedicated forecasters or identify as effective altruists or rationalists, or something similar.
My main point is similar to another commenter on this forum post, that I’d love to be able to click on individual stories and read more about them. Even if the headline is the main takeaway, it feels like it doesn’t really sink in until you’ve read some surrounding words, thoughts, comments, analysis, etc. Another forum commenter suggested that you could get forecasters to write explanations, but that sounds a bit technical and dry. My suggestion would be something like an interesting journalistic piece that uses the forecast as the main hook and story. For instance, you could interview some superforecasters and get quotes from them to try to clarify the topic. But you should also have some surrounding discussion and analysis about the context and the story itself.
Another gut reaction was like, ‘Oh, okay, so they have stories on a couple of specific topics, but not other stuff.’ I think I was expecting to see stories on a wide variety of topics, gathered from different prediction markets and forecasting platforms. Some of these stories might be on random or frankly unimportant topics. My guess is that this would make for a much more engaging and interesting site. My guess is also that creating a truly engaging platform is more important to your mission or theory of change than focusing solely on important topics. By attracting more traffic, you’ll get more people engaging with prediction markets and forecasts, and then maybe they’ll start reading about the other topics too.
To reiterate, this seems like a really cool project. Let me know if you’d be interested in having guest writers. I’d be interested in trying to write one myself, and I imagine that a bunch of smart students would love to get some experience like that too. I could probably connect you with some. But I imagine that you could find lots more yourself pretty easily.
(I also realise that my suggestions/ impressions might be time consuming to implement and you’re just in MVP phase, but thought they were worth sharing anyway.)