In addition to not being able to exchange $100 for a set of contracts, there’d be some awkwardness over determining where to set the starting trade value. Notice in the original article it’s initally $15 to sell and $20 to buy, reflecting the fact that a 6 character mystery implies a base probability of 16.6% for each character. If you naively started a slasher at $15 sell/$20 buy, someone who believes two survivors is likely would immediately bid all characters up to $30 sell/$40 buy.
Though you’re right, most slashers don’t try nearly as hard to surprise you as murder mysteries do. A movie that establishes a romance subplot 10 minutes in would immediately see those two characters bid up to at least $50.
People like Ezra Klein are hearing Eliezer and rolling his position into their own more palatable takes. I really don’t think it’s necessary for everyone to play that game, it seems really good to have someone out there just speaking honestly, even if they’re far on the pessimistic tail, so others can see what’s possible. 4D chess here seems likely to fail.
https://steno.ai/the-ezra-klein-show/my-view-on-ai
Also, there’s the sentiment going around that normies who hear this are actually way more open to the simple AI Safety case than you’d expect, we’ve been extrapolating too much from current critics. Tech people have had years to formulate rationalizations and reassure one another they are clever skeptics for dismissing this stuff. Meanwhile regular folks will often spout off casual proclamations that the world is likely ending due to climate change or social decay or whatever, they seem to err on the side of doomerism as often as the opposite. The fact that Eliezer got published in TIME is already a huge point in favor of his strategy working.
EDIT: Case in point! Met a person tonight, completely offline rural anti-vax astrology doesn’t-follow-the-news type of person, I said the word AI and immediately she says she thinks “robots will eventually take over”. I understand this might not be the level of sophistication we’d desire, but at least be aware that raw material is out there. No idea how it’ll play out, but 4d chess still seems like a mistake, let Yud speak his truth.