Here, courtesy of Inkling Markets. It’-s only $5,000 of play money per trader. But that’-s still a start, so please sign up and let’-s see if we can make the world a better place (i.e. do we invest more in this issue or other issues).
Let me know if you have improvement suggestions. Thanks in advance!
Cross-posted from Caveat Bettor.
Read the previous blog posts by Caveat Bettor:
- The Democrat SC Showdown: Intrade v. Zogby
- Zogby beats Intrade in predicting Nevada caucus winner Clinton.
- The GOP SC and Dem NV Showdown: Intrade v. Zogby
- Latest Intrade v. Zogby contest is up.
- Who said prediction markets were perfect?
- Intrade markets and Zogby polls agree in New Hampshire
- The Iowa Showdown: Zogby v. Intrade
Good idea. Congrats. If it achieves some liquidity, then maybe the other exchanges will follow.
One challenge for a global warming market is that the main “event outcome” you want a prediction for will play out in many different ways in a noisy process over a matter of decades. If, for example, all you had was a “How much warmer will it be in 2057?” market, you won’t get enough trading to sustain interest.
I’d recommend that you try to implement many markets addressing different aspects of the global warming topic.
– official estimates of carbon dioxide emissions
– Arctic ice melt
– coastal flooding
And other markets built off different elements of global warming predictions. Then I’d suggest adding the occasional fun or goofy market – predict the success of a global warming themed book or movie, the number of SUVs owned by Al Gore as of a certain date (might be hard to get data), how many times the phrase “global warming” will be mentioned in the President’s state of the union address. These entertainment-based markets may keep some traders visiting and active.
I think the pilot programs only give you 90 days to run your market, and some of these ideas really focus on a longer lasting market, but I think even in the 90 days you could have some fun and get ideas for some later, more developed market. Who knows, if you are successful, maybe Inkling will give you an extension.
Mike, you’re the man.
Cav, you put your market in the wrong place. Put it on the main public betting exchange, where everyone can see it and access it easily.
Chris, I agree that being in the public markets makes it easy for users, and that is a good thing.
I see two reasons for going “solo”: one is that a market manager in the pilot program gains access to much more information about trades and market operations. You don’t have access to nearly as much detail as a market manager in the public markets.
A second consideration is for branding. Sure you can be a global warming market manager in the public markets, there are a few related markets going on now and others past. But to a degree they all get lost in the mix.
Going solo gives Cav the ability to collect a cadre of dedicated global warming issue traders without having to worry about the general noise of all the politics and technology and sports and other entertainment markets in the Inkling public markets. I can see folks signing up for a global warming market because they find the issue compelling who would never sign up for a generic prediction market opportunity. (Later, once they learn about PMs, then they’ll come on over to the big board.)
Mike, could you have both? Could be present on the public betting exchange AND have it as your own sub-domain name? Go asking that to Adam Siegel.
I worry about liquidity.
I’m not sure how to promote this to the widest public view possible. Please tell me the explanation that my 6 year old could also understand.
You could also add further variations on the same market. Instead of four options, choose eight or ten. Or create another market that breaks up the most popular current bands into smaller bands. (ie, 0.61-0.63, 0.64-0.66, 0.67-0.70) Another option would be to create a market with just different bands (ie, 0.75) and compare the distributions.
I mention these because they could potentially provide a more finely-grained probability distribution for you.
Jed, thanks for the suggestion. My original idea seems to match yours (every tenth Celsius increment) from my original post on this http://caveatbettor.blogspot.c…..stion.html
I was going for simple as possible at Inkling, given the free trial only running through to the end of the year.
If we could do longer dated contracts, 2 years or more, and if it were real money, I completely agree with you.