Let's be frank, the main way to attract and retain users would be to earn money somehow. For users (or market creators) to earn money Manifold should make money first. How about if we brainstorm how to make Manifold sustainable?

@SimoneRomeo and btw, has Manifold tried to use its data to benchmark and/or train LLMs on future prediction skills? Creating superhuman predictors sounds like the most obvious and priceless revenue source to me

Based on the spikes, seems like we need to lobby for constant U.S. elections.

@EBurk superb idea

Declining raw numbers can be scary, but what's this as a percent of the total addressable market?

@WilliamGunn what does total addressable market mean?

@TheAllMemeingEye Everyone who can realistically be expected to be a retained user (as opposed to things you might put in a pitch to investors, like the size of the sports betting market). Maybe 1000 / week is that number? Is that enough for sustainability? If not, what is?

@WilliamGunn I mean ideally if things were going well there would be linear or even exponential growth, decline is a really bad situation when we're already this small in my opinion

Further down the stats page they do have stats on retention, seemingly both retention and new sign ups need to be vastly boosted for this to survive long term

@TheAllMemeingEye Oh, for sure lack of growth is not a good sign, I'm just wondering what the level of sustainability is, steady-state.

It's surprising that number of active traders is dropping while the number of active users is staying consistent-ish. What's up with all the lurkers? Is something off with the stats?

@jcb Simplest explanation that comes to mind is that it takes time for bets to pay off. If you come here with a few thousand mana, you can spend it all before your bets start to pay off and replenish you. That's not a good way to create a habit.

@WilliamGunn but:

• loans mean you don't completely run out of mana (unless you consistently make bad bets / put it all in one market and hit the per-market leverage cap)

• "that's not a good way to create a habit" doesn't explain why apparently 90% of site users in a day aren't making trades

@jcb It does if loans aren't well-understood. Agree 90% seems high.

@jcb Open in the morning, look for mispriced market, don't find one, repeat

@jcb I have been using manifold for almost 2 years and I have no idea how loans work. Even just the word "loan" sounds like a bad idea that I should stay as far as possible from 😂😂

Guys we need to brainstorm ideas for how to save the site

@TheAllMemeingEye This might be a cool way to check the effectiveness of those ideas:

@TheAllMemeingEye
I think there are two main things to consider:
1. Retention - Personally, I'm reconsidering manifold because I can't donate my mana. I feel like I might as well head over to Kalshi and donate my winnings on my own if I can't do it here. Making markets is still super fun, and I have an active D&D-esque campaign going, so I won't leave anytime soon, but if Manifold causes massive inflation on the value of Mana and doesn't reinstate donations and doesn't address the concerns of longtime users, then I will be less motivated to add money to my account.
2. New Users - My selling points- when I tell friends about Manifold- are the donations, legality, community, excitement, and utility of the platform. The fewer benefits from using the platform, the less likely I am to tell anyone about Manifold. And the folks I do tell will, for example, no longer hear my pitch about donating to GiveWell or GiveDirectly, so the "sell" isn't as powerful.

I'm just a little fish in a big sea, but that's my two cents as of right now.

@TheAllMemeingEye In my experience, many websites that aren't motivated by corporate greed and appealing to the lowest common denominator died in the last few years. I'm afraid I might have to go outside soon.

@crowlsyong I don't think they have money to donate.

@ProjectVictory I used to be able to donate my mana through the charity page and I can no longer do so. So at some point, they did have the money. That's what I thought my mana was- I invested in Mana (this platform) because I thought they had money to donate, plus a few other reasons but the main reason was donations.

@crowlsyong one glimmer of hope is that in the Manifold leadership approval index market ( /strutheo/manifold-leadership-approval-rating ) I remember SG promising me that at some point in the future a charity element will be reintroduced.

This was somewhat backed up by him betting up a market on it made in the following days ( /Robincvgr/will-manifold-implement-some-kind-o-9RnOO5ILNs ).

However, it was also mentioned that it can't involve direct mana donation, so my current guess is that it might be some kind of charity election where mana can be used as votes.

Obviously, this might not ever happen, or it might happen too late to save the platform.

@TheAllMemeingEye No kiddin'! Well I'll keep my eyes peeled for any news on that front. I sure hope the charity program can be turned back on again in some capacity that makes me feel like the money I give to Manifold can be at least partially donated.

Well, direct mana donations are clearly unsustainable, you need an actual infinite money printer to go along with the infinite mana printer that is activity bonuses, registration bonus and loans.