Wisdom Hive

One key question for the Wisdom Hive project is this: what is the best way of implementing a prediction market given the technologies available to us?  Most of the answers to this question are obvious and even quite conventional, but it’s worth examining the question - and the answers - in more detail.

First of all, what requirements does a prediction market have?

1. Some form of data storage, to store the current state of the market and its participants
2. Some interface by which that state can be altered
3. A means for participants to discover the state of the market and observe changes
4. The means to create new markets and share them with others
5. To achieve all of the above using open standards

The first requirement is easily handled by any kind of database, though we might return to the specifics later.  The second requirement is where things start to get interesting, especially as the decision here will also determine the decisions made for the third and fourth requirements.

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Before going into any more depth about prediction markets, this post should serve as an additional basic primer in the concepts of how these markets function (newcomers may also wish to read our first post).  The aim of this post is to set out the basic assumptions that will be incorporated into future posts. (more…)

Prediction markets work by trading.  Prices are determined by what individuals trading in the marketplace are willing to pay.  But what if there’s only a small number of people in the marketplace?  What if nobody is buying, or nobody is selling? (more…)

Given that ‘markets’ are currently deemed by many intelligent people to be responsible in some way for a string of global calamities, it might seem like an odd time to be promoting the virtues of markets.  And yet, that’s what any prediction market advocate must do.  How can we do this, and does this mean that we’re in favour of all markets everywhere? (more…)