New features and other updates are now starting to appear on Metaculus. Below is a list, which we'll continue to update as updates appear. Please use this thread to comment on these new features, note bugs, etc.

Enjoy!

Update 2020-11-05

(Actually this went live a few days ago but just now getting around to updating this thread)

• You can now invite users to your private questions! Make a private question, and look for the "share private question" button, where you can invite any user. You can later remove them if you like. After they accept, they can make predictions on your question and you form a little "community" that has a community prediction. You still have control over resolving the question. Have fun! (Note that for now there is a limit on how many users you can invite, so don't get too carried away.)

• Search is now waaayyy better. Try it! It's full-text search of the questions.

• You can also "power search" categories by putting e.g. "+bio" into the search field to get only things in the bio category, or "-bio" to exclude the bio category.

• Made sliders larger on continuous predictions to make them easier to use on mobile. Also limited the graph (PDF/CDF) frame rate on mobile devices.

• Made some fixes/improvements to the question creation form

• New power "M" for Metaculus Moderators, so you can easily find all the moderators on the platform

• A bunch of other little bugfixes and optimizations

Update 2020-08-27

• Big track record update: you can now for a given question or a set, see how accurate you are as a function of time. That is, in the Metaculus or individual track record you can hover over a point to see your accuracy vs. time, and you can also look at questions' accuracy a fraction or amount of time before closing.

• You'll notice a new workflow for creating new questions. Rather than one big text box, the background, question itself, resolutions conditions, and fine-print are all now separate items. We think this will standardize and improve question formats. You'll also find a new short, punchy "title" field that can be used for a more compelling headline while still keeping the question nice and Metaculus-precise.

Update 2020-08-14

• There are several new features in personal and platform track records:

  • There are now two different types of continuous calibration plots. See the text with each, but in both cases a flat curve corresponds to perfect calibration.

  • There is now much more flexible filtering by category and other tags under "filters."

• The "embedding widget" — allowing you to embed live Metaculus questions on any HTML page - is now a bit more powerful, giving you a little menu so that you can change its appearance. This widget can be found in the "share" area to in the upper-right of a question-detail page.

• Various other minor improvements and bug fixes.

Update 2020-04-22

• Continuous predictions now allow for much (3x) narrower distributions. If you're feeling bullish, now's the time to update your predictions.

• There used to be some cases where the Metaculus prediction on the continuous prediction graph wouldn't match the text and, relatedly, cases where the community prediction on the track record didn't match what it showed on individual question pages. Both of these should now be fixed.

Update 2020-04-20

• When you first draft a question it is now in "draft" status until you click "submit." So you can leave questions without fear that a moderator will see your half-finished mess before you're ready!

• There's now a separation of powers: mention @moderators for question support prior to launch, and @admins for editing after launch and for resolution.

• The Metaculus prediction now appears in the widget if it's available.

• Several small bugfixes.

Update 2020-04-05

• The Metaculus prediction for continuous questions is now live! You'll be able to see it for closed questions, and you can check the track record to see the Metaculus "postdiction" on already-resolved questions. At the moment, the Metaculus prediction is fairly simple and doesn't do that much better than the community one — but we'll be working to improve the algorithm of both the continuous and binary ones in coming weeks.

Update 2020-04-01

• You can now see the track record for continuous (numerically valued or date) questions on your profile or the Metaculus track record page.

  • Note that the definition of the log score has changed, and that we now plot Brier scores with better values up (and to the right in the histogram), so that Log, Brier and Points all line up.

  • There are also some new dotted lines, indicating values for maximally uncertain predictions.

Update 2020-03-15

• Users can now embed mini versions of Metaculus questions on their own webpages (look for the little provider in the "share" region in the top left of a question to get HTML for embedding it.)

• When you haven't yet made a prediction on a question, the prediction sliders will now look a little different. They'll be gray (binary questions) or dotted (graph on continuous questions).

• The community prediction will now be hidden until 10 different users make predictions on a question, instead of being visible if one user makes 10 predictions.

• Scientific notation ought to look better in continuous prediction graphs.

• Changed the placement of the "report" button for comments.

• A couple of backend fixes and improvements.

Update 2020-02-24

• For continuous questions, you can now hover over the prediction graph to see the relative probability that you have assigned to any given point.

• Also for continuous questions, you now have the option of viewing your prediction as either a PDF (probability density function, the default) or a CDF (continuous distribution function). To unlock the CDF you must either be level 3 or unlock the corresponding power on your profile page.

• Bug fix: on the profile page, accounts with over 100 comments will now load additional comments correctly.

• Bug fix: removing all your predictions on a question via anti-predicting will now also remove the question from your track record and your list of predicted questions.

Update 2020-02-13

• New @moderators tag that notifies all (currently) moderators.

• There is now a "report as problematic" button (little "!") for each comment. You can report as spam or as otherwise problematic. Reports go to moderators.

• New autocomplete of @mentions. As you type you'll get suggestions including (a) moderators; (b) people who have commented on this question and (c) the question author.

• Question resolution is now a "high weight" event so recently-resolved questions should appear near the top of the "featured" list.

• Rankings page now include leader-boards for recently opened questions (not just recently resolved ones), which is much more relevant to newcomers.

• Bug fix: everyone can now duplicate their own private predictions.

Update 2020-01-24

• New Metaculus reminder system. For a nominal tachyon fee, anyone can write themselves a reminder on any question and then get emailed their reminder at a later date. You can pick the exact date that you want to be reminded, or you can be reminded to come back to a question once it opens, or you can use reminders to alert you to a big change in the community prediction.

• Private note comment type. Private notes are just like regular comments, but only you can see them. Use your private notes to write down calculations, model notes, or anything else you might not want to share.

• You can now see all of the questions you've upvoted by selecting "interested" from the player status menu on the question list page.

Updates prior to 2019-12-21

• Recalibration of level colors, and addition of levels above 20.
• Added more information to lower-right quadrant in question detail page.
• Repaired bug in contests.
• Repaired bug in category filter on track record page.
• Community prediction now invisible by default until the first 48 hours or 10 predictions, whichever comes first.