@Gabrielle I appreciate the mods are making the best of a bad situation with the mana market, and I think your decision on the resolution of that market is reasonable. Given the circumstances, however, it's unfortunate that you started your pinned post this way, as it gives a misleading impression that the post is a statement from Manifold taking responsibility and apologizing for making a mistake:

Ultimately, Manifold messed up here, and we're sorry.

Also this sentence gives the impression that you are announcing and defending a decision not to change the sweepstakes resolution, which you have since clarified you don't control:

This does not affect the sweepstakes market, because the situation in March happened long before the sweepstakes market was created and the clarification clearly applied to the sweepstakes market.

Everything about the UI/UX and how Manifold has treated and spoken about the sweeps markets thus far suggestions the sweep market is a version of the same market with the same rules just with a different currency. It's not a new market, it's "sweepifying" an existing market. Thus all history and clarifications of the mana market before sweepification are relevant to the sweeps market. So I don't agree with the argument you make here of why the March situation shouldn't affect the sweeps market.

But the more important point is that, if you aren't speaking for Manifold and don't control the sweepstakes market resolution, we still have total silence here from Manifold as far as taking responsibility or explaining how the sweepstakes market was handled, which only reinforces the impression in my mind that the Manifold team isn't taking the issue of handling sweepstakes rules and resolutions seriously.

@Manifold

@NateWatson

Also concerning to me, is in discord the statement about another market, Mariah Carey Xmas song market, and that nobody has offered to cover refunds being an issue as to why a market hasnt been resolved yet.

If this is something Manifold hasn't planned for and is relying on someone randomly to step in to cover losses is very poor management of any kind of website or service.

@NateWatson

But the more important point is that, if you aren't speaking for Manifold and don't control the sweepstakes market resolution, we still have total silence here from Manifold as far as taking responsibility or explaining how the sweepstakes market was handled, which only reinforces the impression in my mind that the Manifold team isn't taking the issue of handling sweepstakes rules and resolutions seriously.

I pinged @SirSalty (the staff member responsible for managing sweepstakes markets) on Discord asking for such a thing soon after this market was resolved and again a couple of days ago. He said he will release a statement on this soon.

@EBSnyder

I'm not sure why you bring up the Mariah Carey market? That was a different scenario in which the market creator mistakenly gave incorrect context in the description, so Manifold decided to refund the sweepstakes cash for one side. It was unclear what would happen to the mana market but they decided to offer refunds for that one too after some thought. Market link below for reference:

https://manifold.markets/market/will-mariahs-all-i-want-for-christm?play=false

I doubt that's what is happening here though, this is a completely different case.

@Manifold This market appears to have been mishandled, and the results are far from ideal. It’s clear there were some significant missteps here that need to be addressed to prevent similar outcomes in the future.

Congratulations, you’ve officially set the bar for how not to handle something. Truly, a masterclass in turning a situation into a flaming dumpster fire.

@Manifold I am officially and formally challenging the resolution of the sweepstakes version of this market. It has been resolved incorrectly and I need a full report and committee review of the case and communications involved with the resolution, before and after (emails, chats, texts, etc.) from all parties involved. All predictions placed before the clarification should be N/A. I am providing 7 days for a response before we escalate.

@mods @Gabrielle

Ultimately, Manifold messed up here, and we're sorry. The clarification was unclear about its application to the mana market, separately from the sweepstakes market, and it resulted in the mana market being invalid, due to the situation being similar to the situation in March. To make matters worse, the mana market did need clarification that it didn't get. Because of this, the Manifold mod team has decided to resolve the mana market as N/A. We know that this isn't an ideal solution for anyone, and we should have resolved sooner, but it's the best we could do from a bad position.

This does not affect the sweepstakes market, because the situation in March happened long before the sweepstakes market was created and the clarification clearly applied to the sweepstakes market. That said, we should have clarified the market before it was sweepified, and certainly with more time before the market resolved, and we're sorry for the delay and confusion that happened because of this.

@Gabrielle does the mod team think the sweepstakes market was handled appropriately? Particularly with regards to a modification of the resolution criteria coming a few hours before close. A modification which contradicted the implied criteria carried forward from the mana market.

I completely agree on the mana market decision, and appreciate the statement, but the mana and sweep markets aren't completely distinct.

@Gabrielle Thanks for resolving to NA. That's the most reasonable step in situations like these and I hope this sets a precedent towards more prioritizing NA resolutions over partially wrong resolutions.

@Gabrielle How is the mana market NA but the Sweeps market Yes? Total incoherence.

@Gabrielle
> This does not affect the sweepstakes market, because the situation in March happened long before the sweepstakes market was created and the clarification clearly applied to the sweepstakes market.

If that's your position going forward, you'd better remove the "M/S" slider, which heavily implies that the two markets for a given prediction will always resolve the same way at least from a UX perspective.

@Gabrielle

> This does not affect the sweepstakes market, because the situation in March happened long before the sweepstakes market was created and the clarification clearly applied to the sweepstakes market.

The sweeps market was opened 95% of its time in existence as a replica of the Mana Market prior to a poorly made clarification that was not needed. Why was a clarification even needed with 4hrs until the deadline?

To be clear, the moderators (including me) had nothing to do with the clarification that was made, did not resolve the sweepstakes market, and cannot re-resolve the sweepstakes market. The clarification and resolution were done by the Manifold staff. I can’t speak to why exactly they were done or whether they should have been done.

@Gabrielle Thank you for the response. I did not know Manifold staff are not moderators.

No problem! Manifold staff, who control the sweepstakes markets, are paid employees of Manifold. We moderators are unpaid volunteers who have been given additional privileges (like resolving and clarifying mana markets) but do not run the sweepstakes markets. We also have no control over the site user interface. I’ve personally recommended that they split up the mana and sweepstakes markets more, but ultimately it’s not up to me.

@Gabrielle Unfortunate about the sweepstakes market but I think this was the best possible outcome for the mana market

@Gabrielle You don't run sweeps markets but have been "tasked with resolving Sweeps that are unambiguous" per your public discord conversation with @bagelfan

I feel hiding who executed and allowed the resolution to happen so quickly (literally the fastest sweeps resplution in sweeps history it seems) is pretty shady.

Not implying you are in the wrong in any way but saying mods have no control is a bit of a lie.

@SirCryptomind I’m fairly certain that the sweeps clarification and resolution was done by @SirSalty, he is the person who runs sweepstakes and he was commenting about why he thought the clarification was reasonable

@Gabrielle Innovative idea: instead of sweeping and editing existing markets, create separate markets for sweepstakes where you can do whatever you want without worrying about interfering with the original market or dealing with creator's intentions.

@mods , given how the "Additional clarification by Manifold admins" at the 11th hour irreparably poisoned this market, making neither YES nor NO resolution fair (YES is unfair to everyone who traded before the "clarification" and NO is unfair to everyone who relied on "clarification"), can this be resolved N/A? Thank you!

The obvious questions are: 1. What is a shutdown? and 2. When did it start?

The clarification is inconsistent and was clearly focused on explaining and emphasizing the "for any amount of time" part as including a technical shutdown.

The problem is the following part saying "If only a portion of the government is unfunded and shut down this will still resolve to yes." This is worded as saying both an unfunded period and a shut down are two different things and both are required.

So the clarification is inconsistent about what happens if there is an unfunded period but not a shutdown.

If the clarification is inconsistent with itself then either the clarification needs to be clarified or the question N/A'd.

Given this clarification I think it is abundantly clear that an unfunded period and a shutdown are two different things. The unfunded period acts as a trigger that starts a process (which might be interrupted and prevented from completing) which if not interrupted leads to a shutdown.

To me N/A seems the logical result as the clarification clearly changes sensible views of what should happen.

@mods Do you agree or where do you disagree?

I would also suggest that other questions that for example specified requiring a shutdown a 10am and don't have this clarification aimed at interpreting "for any amount of time" are clearer and should resolve no.

@ChristopherRandles Exactly.

@ChristopherRandles the shutdown began at midnight. Parts of the gov do time-sensitive, secure work, and you can use your imagination as to what that might be and how that might be affected by a gov shutdown. This is not gonna be something reported on by the mainstream media for obvious reasons (the law).

Imagine how when the power goes down, you switch to a backup generator. Now analogize this for, say, the dispersal of funds to foreign entities of national importance… you can fill in the blanks.

@benshindel Again, that definition of shutdown means this market should have resolved YES back in March 2024, when the same exact thing happened, which further supports that it should N/A now since admins clearly didn't know about that. They also added the clarification that any funding gap counts only 4 hours before market end, creating the bizarre situation that other markets (including one by justifiedUseOfFallibilism) with the exact same wording closed at around 4%. This is a clear example of admin mismanagement, and the only possible way anyone can fail to see that is if they genuinely believe manifold admins should completely change the meaning of a market 4 hours before closing such that it resolves YES when markets with the same exact wording are at 4% elsewhere.

https://manifold.markets/justifieduseofFallibilism/will-there-be-a-us-government-shutd-30cb42cc9269

@benshindel I am sure there are "Parts of the gov do time-sensitive, secure work".

However, I also gather that it is the less critical and less time sensitive parts of government that are the first to shutdown and that would seem to make sense. There are also quotes about no-one actually being affected to backup this. eg 8 days ago I posted here "A shutdown for many hours over Saturday doesn’t actually impact the lives of any human being living on the planet" by house speaker Johnson. Is that an appropriate authority on the subject? What have you posted to support your assertions? (other than hand waving 'use your imagination' type comments of your own)