NewsWrangler's dashboard

none in the top 20 I guess.

me thinks that would be an incorrect guess.

Screen shots are problematic for several reasons, such as editing, etc.

However I think the biggest negative is that they can't be readily viewed by all users.

Lesley -- I'll post a link in the comments thread for this market, as you're considering voiding and looking for input.

Destry, only as FYI/meh ... I took a screen shot of the front page with McCain on it. I can send it to "whomever" if anyone wants it.

Disclosure: I am not in this market.

The downside is that users have been locked in a market at a well communicated point in time -- at a known position.

Without notice, the trading resumes, and those users who happen to "catch" that, can either cash out and/or take more advantageous positions -- to the severe disadvantage of those users who don't know the market was reopened.

This makes it a zero-sum market.

In my case, for disclosure, when I looked at the un-suspended market, my total net worth in the market had dropped by more than 50% from where it was when the market was suspended.

As I mentioned in the market's comments thread, I was prepared to take a loss in this market -- as it involves polling, and when that poll will finally take place is unknown ... this in a very dynamic state (Pennsylvania), and I would expect the results, when they finally come out, to be significantly different than the positions I had when the suspension date was reached.

However, for a user (and I suspect there are many) to take a significant loss because of arbitrary staff procedures is not, in my view, an acceptable result.

Diana,

The image of John McCain is still there -- as of a few seconds ago.

It's the third image down -- smaller than Obama's was -- but on today's front page nonetheless.

Jenni + 2 (or more ;-)

I feel, absolutely, that you had the best of intentions -- that you and Triath wanted to (and did) create very interesting markets -- and that your wishes to un-suspend the market were done in an attempt to help make things better!

I don't disagree that flags are the desired method to bring something to the attention of an admin/editor -- and I also agree that the level of noise has picked up significantly in some of the comment threads.

There are countless examples when an editor/admin has prefaced a comment in a thread with, "Responding to a flag about this ..." Were that not the case, perhaps, I would have been less astounded to discover that this market had resumed.

And yes, while I, too, have seen the "not sure why this was suspended" notation you referred to -- the latest (praised by users') trend has been for an editor/admin to make an announcement in a market that "I will un-suspend in 24 hours, unless ..." While, as you mentioned, a broadcast email might be even better, at a minimum some communication in the thread is, in my view, required.

In this market, it would have been more helpful had you both posted your flag, and made a comment in the thread. In a similar manner, had I opened a thread here, in this forum, and not posted that information in the "comments" thread -- that, in my view, would be both poor communication on my part, as well as being unfair to the users in the market.

However, please know, none of my/these comments are in any way "finger-pointy" at you (and yours), rather they are directed to HD staff, with the intention of being helpful. Said differently, in my view, the responsibility for the lack of communication is with staff -- as it was their action that un-suspended the market, not yours.

Last, while I cannot speak for Destry, I can add that I haven't found myself disagreeing with what s/he has been saying about "user interaction"... For me, it's not about finding "what's safe" -- rather it's about finding what's effective and appropriate, and developing a core of "best practices".

[As a footnote, I wanna state what many/most folks know -- that electronic communication doesn't convey "tone", "inflection" and feeling. None of this has any intention of offending. Some people have the gift of being able to write "exactly" the way they "sound" in real life -- I'd like to have that gift!]

{sigh}

Here's another repost of the same question from the same user, instantly wagered to the max (approx H$20K) for the win. (It's been up for less than an hour.)

Will the accused terrorist Mas Selamat Kastari, who fled from a toilet in the Whitley Road Detention Centre in Singapore, be arrested by 03/22/08?

<http://www.hubdub.com/e/Market/Will_t...>

The example question, above, can be gamed by other users -- which is a significant part of what "gaming" is all about.

There are clarification issues with lots of questions currently on Hubdub.

One huge solution is for users (like you ;-) to either flag the question (like the McCain market you mentioned) with your concern or questions about it, and/or put those concerns/questions in a comment for that market, and/or open a thread here in this forum.

As you may have noticed, HD staff have recently been wayyy more proactive in responding to flags and comments by suspending the market, pending clarification.

One variant has just (recently) been posted:

49 mins ago
vitaly21 created the question Will the accused terrorist Mas Selamat Kastari, who fled from a toilet in the Whitley Road Detention Centre in Singapore, be arrested by 03/20/08?

It immediately was waged to the max for the obvious win.

The previous version was:

Total activity: hd$16,638
Created by amortifiedpenguin

Will the accused terrorist Mas Selamat Kastari, who fled from a toilet in the Whitley Road Detention Centre in Singapore on Wednesday afternoon, be arrested before 03/15/08?.

Settled as No

The Times Square markets include:

1 day ago
vitaly21 created the question Will the person or persons behind the Time Square bombing be caught by March 18th?

6 days ago
vitaly21 created the question Will the person or persons behind the Time Square bombing be caught on or before March 13th?

There were a slew of close-dated questions on these topics by "inessa21". I sent some of them to Nigel last week, who looked into them and voided them. You can look at that user's voids to see them -- these are the ones that were settled (for more than H$150K):

Total activity: hd$15,767
Created by inessa21

Will a suspect in the New York Times Square bombing that occured 3/06/08 be caught by 3/08/08?

Settled as No
Total activity: hd$19,280

Created by inessa21

Will a suspect be arrested in the death of UNC student body president Eve Carson by 3/08/08?

Settled as No
Total activity: hd$38,417

Created by inessa21

Will a suspect or person of interest be arrested in the death of Lauren Burk, an Auburn University student by 3/20/08?

Settled as Yes
Total activity: hd$53,718

Created by inessa21

Will Governor Elliot Spitzer's wife file for divorce on or before 3/13/08?

Total activity: hd$42,597
Created by inessa21
Settled as No

Ordinary users can't search for voids, so it's difficult to find a history.

I think that the frequent, close-dated with unrealistic odds postings may inspire other users to copycat the "technique".

Scottay -- if I were to create a "yes/no" question today: "Will John McCain choose Rudy Guiliani as his VP running mate?" -- and started that with initial likelihood odds of 50-50% -- that would be a gaming question, as the likelihood of that happening are significantly less than 50%.

And, when McCain officially selects his running mate, why would I need to consult with Hubdub before a decision is made? It either is Rudy Guiliani or it's not -- and that news will be on every front page in the US, and on many around the world.

Are you referring to the overall problems of setting accurate likelihood percentages on multiple outcome questions, gaming and contested settlements?

There's a growing trend of posting the identical question, save only the "settlement date".

Will Hillary Clinton drop out of the race by March 20th?
Will Hillary Clinton drop out of the race by March 21st?
Will Hillary Clinton drop out of the race by March 22nd?
Will Hillary Clinton drop out of the race by March 23rd?

Other variants are, "Will the Times Square bomber be caught by [date]?

All of these are very close dated, with generous predication odds, and are immediately (within 5-10 min) wagered to the max on the side of the virtually certain win.

This isn't aided by the "auto search function", as the purpose of these multiple and constant posts is, in my view, gaming.

Some user comments about these questions suggest these gaming questions may be causing more harm to the spirit of the site, then anything else.

Up until now, my comments in the various "Contentious Questions" threads have been unspecific.

Rather than comment directly on "war causalities" -- of any flavor -- US soldiers, Canadian soldiers, UK soldiers, Australian soldiers, Spain, etc., or on deaths of members of the Iraqi, Afghani, Turkish, or Pakistani military -- or on civilian causalities of any nationality or religion, my earlier comments tried to make the point that virtually any news story had the potential to become contentious, or could be news that some people would prefer not to read, listen to, or watch.

My quasi use of the Socratic method, apparently, has failed.

Accordingly, let me make my views on this as clear as I can:

I am 100%, without equivocation or compunction, opposed to banning, voiding, or "hiding" news-related questions (markets) that reference, measure, or inquire about death; or of war causalities of soldiers or military or civilians of any nation on the planet involved in acts of war, aggression, terrorism, murder, assassination or any other similar activity or topic.

Tomorrow evening, March 19, 2008, we will celebrate the fifth anniversary of the War in Iraq.

In my view, a war is measured by two metrics: money and death. Measurement is not to be confused with goals, reasons, or anything to do with "end result", rather money and death is how a nation, or faction, measures it's progress towards whatever end game it has declared.

In my view, the singular metric that brought about the end to the long-suffering war in Vietnam was the news reporting of the incomprehensible body count -- of US and other country's soldiers, and of the North and South Vietnamese military and civilians. When the people of this Country could no longer stomach the daily-dose-of-death reported in the news, they mobilized into massive, and unrelenting protests against the war.

The War In America:

The Vietnam War did have a major impact on everyday life in America and the Johnson administration was forced to consider the domestic consequences of its decisions everyday.

Eventually, there simply were not enough volunteers to continue to fight a protracted war and the government instituted a draft. As the deaths mounted and Americans continued to leave for Southeast Asia, the Johnson administration was met with the full weight of American anti-war sentiments.

Protests erupted on college campuses and in major cities at first, but by 1968 every corner of the country seemed to have felt the war's impact. Perhaps one of the most famous incidents in the anti-war movement was the police riot in Chicago during the 1968 Democratic National Convention. Hundreds of thousands of people came to Chicago in August 1968 to protest American intervention in Vietnam and the leaders of the Democratic Party who continued to prosecute the war.

The Vietnam War: An Overview -- Professor Robert. K. Brigham, Vassar College.

MORE FUL-FILLING, MORE TASTE

How the news is reported varies as do how Hubdub market questions are asked.

The New York Times, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, et.al., don't write their stories in bad taste. They are not vulgar, nor are they disrespectful. There are, so-called "tabloid" or "gutter-press" publications that are, to my palate, in poor taste.

So it is with the questions (markets) that probe the news.

In my view, a distinction that is not readily grasped by some users is that Hubdub is a news prediction site. Users don't have the convenience of simply reporting the news ... and choosing appropriate words to describe an event -- they need to create possibilities; outcomes -- both visible and hidden. News prediction questions, by definition, deal with the unknown, the unforeseen; the likely and the unlikely.

News services have the job of reporting Patrick Swayze's cancer. Their task is not to predict outcomes -- albeit they may offer background information on the specific type of cancer, which may imply a degree of survival. Hubdub users have the task, if they choose, of predicting the outcome(s) of Patrick Swayze. Will he survive? Will he die? Will he start a charitable foundation dedicated to cancer research? Will he become an advocate/spokesperson for an existing charity/foundation?

There are an infinite number of outcomes that can be predicted for Eliot Spitzer, for war and war causalities, and for Patrick Swayze.

To use a tired, but apt, example ... Hubdub users don't get to report that Eliot Spitzer resigned -- Hubdub users are asked to predict outcomes of what Eliot Spitzer allegedly did. Will he resign? Will he be charged with any crime? Will the call girl(s) be identified? Will he be divorced? Will it be revealed that Eliot Spitzer had unsafe sex? Did Spitzer wear boxers or briefs? What kind of condom does he use? How long was intercourse? How big/small is his penis?

I think Hubdub can reasonably determine where the line gets drawn, in the above example, between questions/markets that are in reasonably good taste, and those that are not.

Likewise, questions concerning "body counts" can be in reasonably good taste, or in poor taste. No one, as far as I know, is suggesting that questions concerning causalities should be allowed if they are written in poor taste, or are disrespectful -- however, questions about causalities are not intrinsically disrespectful simply by being asked.

And, there is another side of "US soldiers" that always needs a bright light to illuminate it from the darkness that may often surround it. Kruijs commented in Contentious questions (part 3):

"... it should be a matter of concern to the American people how many of their soldiers die far away from home. Just as it should be a concern how many people are killed by US soldiers.
It is part of your (I mean US) Identity to go to foreign countries and bless them with democracy.
So please, be fair and do not try to hide the dark side of the medal."

John F. Burns wrote the other day in The New York Times:

"Beyond these, there were the instances when America’s intentions were betrayed by its troops in more personal ways, with the abuse and torture of Iraqi detainees at Abu Ghraib, with the shooting deaths of 24 civilians in Haditha and with the rape and murder of a 14-year-old girl at Mahmudiya, along with the killing of three other members of her family, all leading to court-martial hearings that tore at the heart of anyone who starts from a position of admiration for the American armed forces. The Marine offensive that recaptured Falluja from Islamic militants in November 2004, virtually flattening the city without achieving more than a temporary change in the arc of the war, may also draw its share of condemnation. "

War Torn - Five Years

I have no doubt that there are folks who don't want to read about atrocities committed by US military. If we only want the "nice" questions on Hubdub, then any questions created on topics such as these must also be banned.

To sum up:

1. I do not support option #1.

2. I do not support the gist of option #3 -- specifically, I do not believe "these questions ... should be kept separate in some way from the rest of the site."

If Hubdub wants to implement some form of "safe" filter -- that's fine, if the default is "show all questions". How Hubdub plans to implement tags/filters that apply to all forms, variants and flavors of death that could be contained in virtually any question -- and in all of the comments that accompany them -- is for you to work out.

3. I am absolutely opposed to voiding the two questions enumerated: "Patrick Swayze" and "US and coalition troop deaths".

Whichever way you proceed, my warmest advice would be to "take baby steps". Were you to consider voiding ... "any future variant of those questions", please try to consider unintended consequences.

In my view, there is an extremely simple answer available to make a decision on this issue -- simply answer the following "yes or no" question, and then apply that same answer to Hubdub:

Should news reporting about death, or of war causalities of soldiers or military or civilians of any nation, involved in acts of war, aggression, terrorism, murder, assassination or any other similar activity or topic be banned from newspapers, television and all other media outlets?

This is a tough one.

There's an old saying, "the first reports from the battlefield are always wrong".

Adding to the difficulty is the delay in getting reports out of Tibet -- even if they were accurate at one point in time, they may be inaccurate by the time the story is filed.

I would stay away from the "official government figures" ... I don't know that there is anyone there -- from the BBC, ITN, or Reuters -- that could file a report.

Maybe craft a different question on the topic? I think if you leave it open (re-open, then void on the 20th, "if") it won't solve the problem at hand -- the comments in the market will likely continue along the same lines.

My cent-cent worth.

(I am not in this market.)

Only as FYI, I just looked and there were 251,153 signatures, with access from the East Coast US.

Here's one non-main stream news site (college newspaper), dated Friday, March 14, 2008, but no time stamp. [emphasis added]:

"Supporters can visit Guinness’s web site devoted solely to this endeavor—proposition317.com—and sign the petition. The company is hoping to gain one million signatures, but it is shy by almost 900 thousand. Even if it does reach this goal, Proposition 3-17 would still need congressional approval."

<http://www.uecrescent.org/articles/st...>

do I detect a whiff of the "google server type of question" difficulty here?