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gwern comments on Open Thread, May 5 - 11, 2014 - Less Wrong Discussion

2 Post author: Tenoke 05 May 2014 10:35AM

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Comment author: Anders_H 05 May 2014 04:05:06PM 9 points [-]

There is a lot of interest in prediction markets in the Less Wrong community. However, the prediction markets that we have are currently only available in meatspace, they have very low volume, and the rules are not ideal (You cannot leave positions by selling your shares, and only the column with the final outcome contributes to your score)

I was wondering if there would be interest in a prediction market linked to the Less Wrong account? The idea is that we use essentially the same structure as Intrade / Ipredict. We use play money - this can either be Karma or a new "currency" where everyone is assigned the same starting value. If we use a currency other than Karma, your balance would be publicly linked to your account, as an indicator of your predictive skills.

Perhaps participants would have to reach a specified level of Karma before they are allowed to participate, to avoid users setting up puppet accounts to transfer points to their actual accounts

I think such a prediction market would act as a tax on bullshit, it would help aggregate information, it would help us identify the best predictors in the community, and it would be a lot of fun.

Comment author: gwern 06 May 2014 02:56:41AM 6 points [-]

Why would LWers use such a prediction market more than PredictionBook?

Comment author: Anders_H 06 May 2014 04:25:08AM 2 points [-]

Good point . I actually didn't know about PredictionBook. Now that it has been pointed out to me, I see that there is already a decent option, so my suggestion would be less valuable. However, I still think it would be useful to have a prediction market that operates with Intrade rules. Whether that is worth writing the code is another matter..

Comment author: Jayson_Virissimo 06 May 2014 03:20:38AM 2 points [-]

Because karma?

Comment author: gwern 06 May 2014 03:33:13AM 11 points [-]

I don't think karma matters as much as people think it does, but if that's the only reason, LW could be programmed to look on PB.com for a matching username and increase karma based on the scores or something, much more easily than an entire prediction market written.

Comment author: Eugine_Nier 07 May 2014 03:52:18AM 1 point [-]

That has the problem that people can inflate their scores by repeatedly predicting that the sun will rise tomorrow.

Comment author: gwern 07 May 2014 02:42:13PM *  2 points [-]

Karma is even more easily - and invisibly - gameable.

Comment author: Benito 07 May 2014 04:06:07PM -1 points [-]

Up vote.