- NewsFutures
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Prediction markets company NewsFutures (2000-2010) has evolved into Lumenogic, the first consulting company entirely dedicated to delivering collective intelligence solutions to senior management.
Founded in May 2000 by Emile Servan-Schreiber and Maurice Balick, NewsFutures, Inc. is one of the earliest providers of prediction markets to both the general public and private companies. It is at the forefront of the application of Collective Intelligence and prediction markets to business forecasting, innovation and decision making. It is one of several companies that help large corporations set up private prediction markets to capture the collective foresight of their employees or client base, as described in James Surowiecki's book The Wisdom of Crowds. NewsFutures is one the few prediction market companies cited in the book.
From September 2000 to October 2009, NewsFutures operated one of the best known prediction market games on the Web, listing contracts on over 120,000 events on a wide variety of topics in current events, politics, finance and sports. In 2003, James "wisdom of crowds" Surowiecki wrote in the New Yorker: «In a sense, the NewsFutures traders are only trying to do what op-ed writers, TV pundits, and Presidential advisers attempt to do every day: predict the future. The big difference is that the markets are far more likely to be right.»
The NewsFutures market had a distinctive international flavor because it also operated markets in French and in Hungarian, enabling U.S.-based players to trade with European counterparts, each in their own language. From November 2001 to January 2004, USA Today co-branded the NewsFutures Sports and Money prediction markets.
During the 2003-2004 National Football League season, the play-money predictions of NewsFutures were systematically compared to the real-money predictions of TradeSports (now Intrade) and found to be just as accurate (Servan-Schreiber et al., 2004) [1]. This result contradicted the conventional wisdom that "putting your money where your mouth is" should enhance prediction market accuracy', and it has served to enhance the credibility of play-money markets and boost their adoption in enterprise contexts where real-money betting is illegal.
NewsFutures has also launched in 2007 the first charity-driven prediction market, Bet2Give, where real money was being wagered but all profits must be given to charities of the winner's choice. The Bet2Give experiment folded in June 2011 for lack of participants.
References
- Stier Lumenogic Mines Workers’ Opinions for U.S. Air Force, Multinationals Bloomberg, August 30, 2011
- Lohr Betting to Improve the Odds The New York Times, April 9, 2008
- King The CEO Guide to Prediction Markets Business Week, August 3, 2006
- Servan-Schreiber, Wolfers, Pennock & Galebach (2004) Prediction Markets: Does Money Matter? Electronic Markets, Vol 14, No 3
- Robinson Play-money? Not to these news investors. New York Times July 5 2001
- Surowiecki Decisions, Decisions. New Yorker March 17 2003
- Bartiromo Betting for Charity. CNBC December 21 2007 (video)
External links
Categories:- Prediction markets
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