@NunoSempere Short answer: yes. Longer answer in your twitter DMs :)

@IsaakFreeman I'm chipping away at it in my spare time. Currently at 4.5k followers on Twitter

I'll send you a DM on twitter with a spreadsheet

Thank you!

What a scaled down budget might look like:

$10k:

• ~$5k on paying others to help me with technical bottlenecks (e.g. 2 hour consultations with relevant experts)

• ~$2.6k on content creation (e.g. software subscriptions, higher quality microphone, storage, etc.)

• ~$1.2k on paying superforecasters for content (tbh don't have a good feel for costs here yet, but want some $ budgeted for it)

• ~$600 for basic 'tools of trade' + expenses (e.g. Webflow, Twitter Blue, ChatGPT, etc.)

• ~$600 on business admin (e.g. registering the company properly)

$35k:

• ~$15k on hiring on a project basis to deliver product goals + associated product development costs (e.g. may need a server for some features)

• ~$6.4k on content creation (as above + upgraded laptop, potentially access to sound/image libraries)

• ~$5k on technical help consultations (as above)

• ~$3.6k on pre-tax salary for me

• ~$2.4k on basic tools/expenses, business admin, etc. (as above + looking into help for accounting, insurance, legal compliance, etc.)

• ~$2.4k on paying superforecasters for content

$100k:

• ~$50k on hiring on a project/task basis (as above + help on content side of things, e.g. editors)

• ~$32.6k on pre-tax salary for me

• ~$6.4k on content creation

• ~$5k on technical help consultations

• ~$3.6k on paying superforecasters for content

• ~$2.4k on basic tools/expenses, business admin, etc.

Thank you!

I see our proposals as complimentary goods, would love more real money prediction markets to include in my coverage

Full disclosure: I was given $25 by Manifund after a user experience interview. I've shamelessly decided to add it to my own project. If you think this is dodgy, please comment and I'll remove it.

Yes sir

This is so based

Amazing Austin!

I'll find a time in your Calendly to talk through your questions

Amazing Austin!

I'll find a time in your Calendly to talk through your questions

Hi Brian, my email is marcelvandiemen@protonmail.com

Crystal Ballin' and Free Basing are brilliant names, would love to talk.

Hi Dima, my email is marcelvandiemen@protonmail.com

GradeFact looks fascinating, let's chat

(Just to be transparent, my focus for March is launching the current Base Rate Times MVP)

What are your plans if you receive less than $20,000 in funding?

I will launch the MVP on March 31st regardless of funding and see what kind of traction it gets.

What kind of visitor numbers would you find acceptable...?

As long as visitor numbers are growing at a better than linear rate, I will continue the project.

My initial goal is ~20k-25k visitors per month within ~18 months (i.e. ~1/10th of current Metaculus traffic). Alternatively, something like ~1000 patreons within a similar timeframe would also be acceptable.

What are your marketing plans?
The initial target audience is superforecasters and adjacent communities like rationalists, Effective Altruists, ACX and MR readers, etc. My marketing plans are:

1) Twitter launch

I have been collecting tweets from big(ish) accounts expressing a desire for a product like Base Rate Times. Example: "this is how the news should look" (https://twitter.com/ben_j_todd/status/1504439141924278278).

I aim to get engagement from these accounts by i) directly replying to their original tweets, and ii) quote-tweeting them in a launch thread. I think this could generate ~30k impressions based on rough data from my tiny personal account (way more upside if it genuinely goes viral) --> ~250 followers to start with.

2) 'Key online influencers' (for lack of a better term)

I will reach out to influential people with an interest in 'epistemic institutions' and a track record of promoting ~similar projects. I will ask Philip Tetlock to tweet about it, Tyler Cowen to blog about it, etc.

If Scott Alexander posts about it (I think >80% chance, conditional on project being funded), the rest will follow on the back of his credibility.

3) Posting to Reddit, Hacker News, etc.

I will post it to the various forums where my target audience hangs out (e.g. LessWrong), as well as typical launch sites (e.g. Product Hunt, BetaList).

Copy in progress, but general theme will be "here's something I made that you might find useful, would appreciate your feedback." I suspect this will take a few iterations to get right.

Not an immediate priority, but eventually I would like to build something like https://www.tiktok.com/@base_rate or https://www.instagram.com/thedailyaus/.