Hacker News

Show HN: Did prediction markets do any predicting this midterms?(app.artifactbin.dev)

34 points by nuwandavek 1 day ago | 20 comments

I've heard so much about how prediction markets are the guiding light in this dark world. But when put head to head against polls or Nate Silver's FLIPR model, they are really a wash. Especially looking at flipped or close-by-polls races, there is no alpha compared to a traditional poll-based model. Was this obvious to everyone else too? Can we treat them like the entertainment they are and tax them for the terrible ads?

[–] glimshe 1 day ago

We should permanently rename "prediction markets" to "betting markets".

People linked to them came up with the "prediction" nonsense to sound modern and technological as a way to dissociate themselves from the life/family destroying gambling of old.

But they are gambling, pure and simple, with no value to society.

[–] avaer 1 day ago

Probably combination of "information laundering" and "betting market".

If you are making money (i.e. beating the "house") you are by definition laundering information, and profiting off of deniability. Everyone who isn't doing this is the sucker losing money on a betting market.

The funny thing is these companies want to be considered information laundries, because that's what serves the real customer (politicians, celebrities, etc). The people "betting" (i.e. losing) are the product.

[–] gruez 1 day ago

>If you are making money (i.e. beating the "house") you are by definition laundering information, and profiting off of deniability. Everyone who isn't doing this is the sucker losing money on a betting market.

???

There's no allowance for skill? Even in financial markets, there's no reason to believe why people who continually beat the market must be insider trading. That's not the same as saying that people should be day trading, but that doesn't mean the reverse is true.

[–] conorcleary 21 hours ago

Even Burry wants more than a one year time horizon.

[–] shizcakes 1 day ago

What’s with the mouse cursors? I can barely read this on mobile because it’s covered with “guest” pointers

[–] 1e1a 1 day ago

I think it would be less distracting if they updated at a reasonable rate. If the pointer events were serialized using a small binary format, the update rate could be raised dramatically with minimal bandwidth increase over the current implementation.

[–] nuwandavek 19 hours ago

Sorry! Never has so many people using the site at once before! Removed them :)

[–] Shank 1 day ago

I really think the main factor in determining if prediction markets are valuable is their predictions from outside election day. Once the “blue tsunami” was “expected” most of the markets shot overwhelmingly in one direction as the night wrapped up. You need to have a boundary for comparison that isn’t influenced by election night. Starting at 5AM is a decent cut point but I would argue the final poll date is the best comparison.

Love or hate PolyMarket, it should be on this list too.

[–] devin 1 day ago

Neat idea, thanks. Why show the cursors on here? I found them somewhat distracting and am not sure what purpose they're serving.

[–] nuwandavek 19 hours ago

Removed them! Sorry, never had so many people using the site at once before :)

[–] jmathai 1 day ago

It's an interesting idea but I closed the page without reading it because it was so distracting.

[–] closetkantian 1 day ago

I agree this is unreadable

[–] woggy 1 day ago

Unreadable

[–] arionmiles 1 day ago

>I've heard so much about how prediction markets are the guiding light in this dark world.

Who are these people?

[–] 0gs 21 hours ago

people making money by exploiting other people by profiting off of prediction markets aka gambling startups, is my guess.

[–] Grimburger 1 day ago

Seems like someone is trolling hn, holy moly that web design

[–] kkoncevicius 1 day ago

I mean, if we look at this another way:

  Number of errors with the polls: 30
  Number of errors with Kalshi: 25
  
  Error reduction: 16%

Quoting Scott Alexander [1]

> Either over a long time scale, a prediction market will always be at least as good as the best expert, authoritative organization, or other information source. Or you can get rich quick.

[1]: https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/prediction-market-faq

[–] netsharc 23 hours ago

I flagged and killed it, because of the dumb cursors.

[–] unclebucknasty 1 day ago

>But when put head to head against polls or Nate Silver's FLIPR model, they are really a wash

I'm actually not a fan of prediction markets for reasons.

But, them being "a wash" with fancy-pants models and expensive, not super-efficient polling processes is actually pretty remarkable.

[–] fsckboy 1 day ago

what are people suggesting is the "right" way for prediction markets to indicate that they are accurate? what should prediction market prices be if they are predicting accurately?

if you can predict accurately, you will win all your plays. If who you are predicting is the favorite, and the favorite wins, you will earn less money than if you can predict the upsets. That's what the markets do, you do the predicting, the market rewards you.