Tag Archives: internal prediction markets

Inkling Markets GodFather Speaks Out.

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Taking his propos and applying them to Adam Siegel and Nate Kontny, you&#8217-d get that:

  • The key is Adam Siegel and Nate Kontny&#8217-s determination. They refuse to fail.
  • The key for Nate Kontny was to find out a good co-founder &#8212-that was Adam Siegel.
  • [M]arket is the biggest determinant in the outcome of successful startups. […] Smart people [like Adam Siegel and Nate Kontny] will find big markets.

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Same things could be said of David Perry and Ken Kittlitz, or Emile Servan-Schreiber and Maurice Balick.

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Deep Throat on the journalists fatigue for reporting on prediction markets

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When we recently talked to a MSM reporter for a major article, he/she specifically said he/she didn&#8217-t want to write about public prediction exchanges because &#8220-there is nothing new there,&#8221- and was even hesitant to write about the activities of certain private, high-tech companies because they already have a reputation for &#8220-trying anything.&#8221- If that attitude is prevalent among other journalists, there may already be a fatigue setting in which is why you saw very little interest in the latest WSJ article on political prediction markets. Thinking about the readership of the major business press, through several feature articles there is already an awareness about the basics. There is limited return in writing yet another: &#8220-people are trading on everything from housing futures to political candidates, isn&#8217-t that amazing?&#8221-

There also seems to be very little innovation coming from the major public exchanges. When&#8217-s the last time any of the major prediction exchanges did anything truly noteworthy with their platform that was worth writing about? […]

The novelty of it all is wearing off, the &#8220-wisdom of crowds&#8221- stories have been done, and the public exchanges are going to need to come up with Act II, either through innovation, new content strategies, or partnerships.

STRAIGHT FROM THE DOUBLESPEAK DEPARTMENT: NewsFutures CEO Emile Servan-Schreiber, well known to chase tirelessly the Infidels who dare calling prediction markets their damn polling system, is eager to sell the confusion to his clients and whomever would listen.

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Emile&#8217-s made up a phrase that means nothing (except in his fertile imagination), &#8220-a proprietary prediction market variant&#8220- &#8212-sounds like a red herring to me.

Unlike Consensus Point, Inkling Markets and Xpree, NewsFutures is the only prediction market software vendor not to have adopted Robin Hanson&#8217-s MSR &#8212-a simplified trading technology now in use in most enterprise prediction markets.

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REBUTTAL: SalesForce, StarBucks and Dell demonstrate that enterprise prediction markets as intra-corporation communication tools (as opposed to forecasting tools) are overhyped by the prediction market software vendors and a little clique of uncritical courtisans.

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SalesForce

My Starbucks Idea

Dell&#8217-s IdeaStorm

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No need of trading technology to get feedback and suggestions from employees. A simple voting mechanism is more than enough.

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Previously: Enterprise prediction markets give voice to serious, technology-minded professionals who really know their vertical (engineers, analysts and contractors) —and reveal how frivolous and unpertinent most horizontal managers are.

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Enterprise prediction markets give voice to serious, technology-minded professionals who really know their vertical (engineers, analysts and contractors) -and reveal how frivolous and unpertinent most horizontal managers are.

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Via prediction market pioneer Emile Servan-Schreiber of NewsFutures [*], the New York Times (2 pages):

At InterContinental Hotels, Zubin Dowlaty, vice president for emerging technologies, decided to create an online market last fall to “harvest and prioritize ideas” from within the hotel’s 1,000-person technology staff. “We wanted to tap the creative class that may not be able to voice their ideas,” Mr. Dowlaty said. With InterContinental’s prediction market, players were asked to submit ideas anonymously, with a description and the benefit to customers and company. The bettors were given virtual tokens, each receiving 10 green ones to be placed on the best ideas and three red for bad ideas. There were no limits on the number of times bettors could change their wagers as new ideas came to market, and the market was open for four weeks. The five top ideas (most green tokens), five bottom ideas (most red) and the top five bettors (most accurate, according to market consensus) were listed regularly. The winners got $500, while second- and third-place finishers received $250 each. The winners, Mr. Dowlaty said, were engineers, analysts and contractors, not managers. More than 200 people participated, submitting 85 ideas. One person proposed bringing back quarter-operated vibrating beds. “That one got beat down really fast,” Mr. Dowlaty said. The winning ideas were suggestions to improve searching the company’s Web site to find and book hotel rooms. Two projects have been started as a result of the market, Mr. Dowlaty said. Next, he said, prediction markets may be opened up to InterContinental’s customers, probably beginning with members of its Priority Club loyalty program. They could bet in markets for improving service and offerings, with points redeemed. “It’s the next frontier and the natural progression for this,” Mr. Dowlaty said.

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InTrade-TradeSports, unlike BetFair-TradeFair, do manage internal, enterprise prediction markets.

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Previously: Do Google’s enterprise prediction markets work?

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New Product Innovation: Enterprise Prediction Markets Can Help.

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Via the New York-based Yahoo! Research scientist who was video-interviewed by the New York Post, the other day- Teck-Hua Ho &amp- Kay-Yut Chen:

New Product Blockbusters: The Magic and Science of Prediction Markets
Teck-Hua Ho &amp- Kay-Yut Chen
50/1 (Fall 2007): 144-158

New product innovation is a strategic business activity that involves significant financial resources and managerial attention. Most new product launches fail because existing methods are unable to forecast their commercial successes accurately. In this article, we describe a market-based method to address this gap. This method capitalizes on the power of the “wisdom of crowds” by allowing people to interact in organized markets governed by well-defined rules. The working of these markets relies on five scientific principles referred to as I4C (pronounced as “I foresee”). These markets motivate people to share information freely through a price discovery process. Prediction markets seek information aggregation from a large group of diverse individuals by encouraging active participation. We demonstrate the power of the markets with real application examples from a wide variety of industries.

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More:

The principles are incentive, indicator, improvement, independence, and crowd.

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New Product Innovation: NewsFutures, Inkling Markets, Consensus Point and Xpree can help.

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New Product Innovation: Enterprise Prediction Markets Can Help.

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Via the New York-based Yahoo! Research scientist who was video-interviewed by the New York Post, the other day- Teck-Hua Ho &amp- Kay-Yut Chen:

New Product Blockbusters: The Magic and Science of Prediction Markets
Teck-Hua Ho &amp- Kay-Yut Chen
50/1 (Fall 2007): 144-158

New product innovation is a strategic business activity that involves significant financial resources and managerial attention. Most new product launches fail because existing methods are unable to forecast their commercial successes accurately. In this article, we describe a market-based method to address this gap. This method capitalizes on the power of the “wisdom of crowds” by allowing people to interact in organized markets governed by well-defined rules. The working of these markets relies on five scientific principles referred to as I4C (pronounced as “I foresee”). These markets motivate people to share information freely through a price discovery process. Prediction markets seek information aggregation from a large group of diverse individuals by encouraging active participation. We demonstrate the power of the markets with real application examples from a wide variety of industries.

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More:

The principles are incentive, indicator, improvement, independence, and crowd.

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New Product Innovation: NewsFutures, Inkling Markets, Consensus Point and Xpree can help.

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Enterprise Prediction Markets: Co-Creating An Organizations Future

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Prediction Markets: Co-Creating An Organization&#8217-s Future – (PDF file) – by Inside Knowledge Magazine&#8217-s Victoria Axelrod and Jenny Ambrozek – 2008-05-10

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David Perry of Consensus Point:

Yes, markets are early warning systems for many things, they give you a sense of what your people know and do not know.

Prediction markets are not necessary if everyone has perfect knowledge- markets are designed to tell people what they do know, to be quiet when they do not
know and are designed to get around take place over time, allowing for prices to fluctuate depending on traders’ confidence.

The longer the markets run, the more informed. They are like wine, they get better with time.

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Emile Servan-Schreiber of NewsFutures is cited too.

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YouTube Videos on Prediction Markets

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I have created a &#8220-Prediction Market Videos&#8221- category in my &#8220-Links&#8221- page. I have listed there the InTrade and the Jed Christiansen webspots at YouTube.

Any other link(s) to suggest, folks?

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Jed Christiansen: What is a prediction market?

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Jed Christiansen: How can I use a prediction market for my business?

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Inkling Markets, one year later

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Much, much better. Last year at the same time, in March 2007, I was selectively critical of some of the statements they did put in their (now old) version of their website. Adam Siegel has made good progress in mastering and conveying the problematic of enterprise prediction markets. I think that if Inkling Markets can truly deliver a service that can help companies mitigate business risks, and if they can prove positive results, then their client roll could be multiplied by a factor of 1,000 or so in the next 10 years.

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Adam Siegel:

Two years ago the only way to run a prediction marketplace was to roll your own or call a vendor/consultant and have them set up software and run markets for you. It took many weeks, often months. Today with Inkling Markets it take seconds. […]

[#1] Improve forecasting of key performance indicators
Track and raise awareness of key success metrics to identify and mitigate risk factors before it&#8217-s too late.

[#2] Expose product quality problems early
Identify design and production anomalies before a product (physical or virtual) is brought to market to avoid expensive repairs and recalls.

[#3] Predict risk to your supply chain
Run a &#8220-web&#8221- of markets about the risk factors to your supply chain to predict internal and external events that would cause inefficiencies or disruptions.

[#4] Foster a culture of innovation
Determine which new ideas and process improvements will have real business impact vs. the &#8220-nice to have.&#8221-

[#5] Create new interactions with users
Build a dedicated community of users around a marketplace of questions relevant to your business area and brand. […]

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Adam Siegel (Inkling Markets CEO) in Forbes:

[Prediction markets] can significantly:

  1. improve forecasts of key performance indicators,
  2. provide a more realistic understanding of project-completion dates,
  3. identify quality-control problems early in the development life cycle,
  4. improve demand forecasts within the supply chain,
  5. and allocate resources more appropriately across research-and-development projects.

[I have edited the formatting of this excerpt.]