Influenza A (H1N1): The world does not care about our prediction markets.

Posted on September 17, 2009 by Chris F. Masse

A pandemic of H1N1 flu is underway.

Yet, not a single news organization has recently published about prediction markets on the propagation of the pandemic of H1N1 flu.

NOT A SINGLE ONE.

The usefulness of prediction markets is over-rated by a small coterie of greedy betting operators, edgy economics professors, hyper motivated software vendors, and phone-booth conference organizers.

The real world does not give the first fig about prediction markets. We should change our approach. We are losing the information war. Your suggestions?

Next: Have the public prediction markets ever been taken seriously by the media and the decision makers during the 1988–2009 period?

About Chris F. Masse

Founder and President of Midas Oracle
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One Response to Influenza A (H1N1): The world does not care about our prediction markets.

  1. Robin Hanson says:
    September 17, 2009 at 5:38 PM

    If H1N1 were more deadly, there’d be more interest in forecasting the number of victims. So far it seems about as deadly as an ordinary flu, which ordinary folks also aren’t very interested in tracking. Now if there a market in the chance of very high death rates, that might gain more public interest.

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