Libya — Muammar al-Gaddafi – [5 spellings: Gaddafi, Qaddafi, Gadhafi, Khadafy and Khadafi]:

Bahrain — Khalifah ibn Sulman al-Khalifah:

Yemen — Ali Abdullah Saleh:

Iran — Mahmoud Ahmadinejad:

Iran — Seyed Ali Hoseyni Kh?mene’i:

GEO TAGS: Middle East – Northern Africa.

Previously: The liberation of the Arab countries will ultimately lead to a war with Israel. — [PREDICTION]

Next: Justin Wolfers didn’t inform the Freakonomics readers about InTrade’s mistake related to the contract statements of the ‘dictator departure markets’.

World

On Sunday Tehran was relatively quiet compared to the past weeks street violence, but with fresh calls from the opposition for reforms and a new election it’s doubtful we’ve seen the worst of it. Despite the spirit of protesters, Hubdub forecasts there’s only a 16% chance Ahmadinejad is disempowered.

Will President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad be disempowered or resign?

Politics
The battle for universal health care is heating up and any chances of a well behaved and restrained fight are quickly diminishing. How likely is that we’ll get the damn thing this year? Hubdub says we’ve only got a 48% chance.

Will the U.S. enact a comprehensive health care plan in 2009?

Entertainment

After Indiana Jone’s last adventure involving aliens, the thought of another Lucas and Spielberg pillaging of a classic doesn’t have me too enthusiastic. Better yet it’s 96% likely the next Indiana Jones doesn’t have Harrison Ford in it.

Will there be a fifth Indiana Jones film starring Harrison Ford?

Business
Is Steve Job’s return to Apple imminent? Well, judging from predictions on Hubdub and the latest news the answers yes!

Will Steve Jobs return to be Apple’s CEO in 2009?

Sport

The oldest and most prestigious tennis tournament in the world has had some of the most exciting matches, including last year’s instant classic with Nadal and Federer. Although Nadal is skipping Wimbledon, it’s no less exciting. Currently Roger Federer is the frontrunner with a 44% chance of wining Wimbledon.

Who will win the 2009 Men’s Wimbledon?

Trading percentages given are at time of posting and may not match up with markets after the fact due to Hubdub users forecasting on said markets. Posted from the Hubdub blog.

Good plug of HubDub inside an economic analysis segment.

Video

- An event is “retarded” when it is after the others on the timeline.

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- I use the term “advanced, primary indicator” to talk about the leading sources of information that active traders rely on.

- Last time, in the title, I said that the InTrade traders were “retarded”, in the sense that they were late to compute that Israel will not attack Iran in the second semester of 2008. One InTrade trader (I presume he / she is) took strong exception with my wording. Sorry for that, man / woman.

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RANDOM HOUSE UNABRIDGED DICTIONARY:

- retarded = to be delayed

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Here’s the updated version of the story in question:

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- US Military Chief Says Any Attack on Iran Would be Destabilizing.

- Israel has signaled the U.S. and other allies that air operations to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities are not imminent.

- Pentagon chiefs fear that Israeli plans for an attack on Iran’s nuclear programme will fail to destroy the facilities because neither the CIA nor Mossad knows where every base is located.

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Explainer On Prediction Markets

Prediction markets produce dynamic, objective probabilistic predictions on the outcomes of future events by aggregating disparate pieces of information that traders bring when they agree on prices. Prediction markets are meta forecasting tools that feed on the advanced indicators (i.e., the primary sources of information). Garbage in, garbage out… Intelligence in, intelligence out…

A prediction market is a market for a contract that yields payments based on the outcome of a partially uncertain future event, such as an election. A contract pays $100 only if candidate X wins the election, and $0 otherwise. When the market price of an X contract is $60, the prediction market believes that candidate X has a 60% chance of winning the election. The price of this event derivative can be interpreted as the objective probability of the future outcome (i.e., its most statistically accurate forecast). A 60% probability means that, in a series of events each with a 60% probability, then 6 times out of 10, the favored outcome will occur; and 4 times out of 10, the unfavored outcome will occur.

Each prediction exchange organizes its own set of real-money and/or play-money markets, using either a CDA or a MSR mechanism.

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- US Military Chief Says Any Attack on Iran Would be Destabilizing.

- Israel has signaled the U.S. and other allies that air operations to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities are not imminent.

-

Explainer On Prediction Markets

Prediction markets produce dynamic, objective probabilistic predictions on the outcomes of future events by aggregating disparate pieces of information that traders bring when they agree on prices. Prediction markets are meta forecasting tools that feed on the advanced indicators (i.e., the primary sources of information). Garbage in, garbage out… Intelligence in, intelligence out…

A prediction market is a market for a contract that yields payments based on the outcome of a partially uncertain future event, such as an election. A contract pays $100 only if candidate X wins the election, and $0 otherwise. When the market price of an X contract is $60, the prediction market believes that candidate X has a 60% chance of winning the election. The price of this event derivative can be interpreted as the objective probability of the future outcome (i.e., its most statistically accurate forecast). A 60% probability means that, in a series of events each with a 60% probability, then 6 times out of 10, the favored outcome will occur; and 4 times out of 10, the unfavored outcome will occur.

Each prediction exchange organizes its own set of real-money and/or play-money markets, using either a CDA or a MSR mechanism.

-

-

-

Explainer On Prediction Markets

Prediction markets produce dynamic, objective probabilistic predictions on the outcomes of future events by aggregating disparate pieces of information that traders bring when they agree on prices. Prediction markets are meta forecasting tools that feed on the advanced indicators (i.e., the primary sources of information). Garbage in, garbage out… Intelligence in, intelligence out…

A prediction market is a market for a contract that yields payments based on the outcome of a partially uncertain future event, such as an election. A contract pays $100 only if candidate X wins the election, and $0 otherwise. When the market price of an X contract is $60, the prediction market believes that candidate X has a 60% chance of winning the election. The price of this event derivative can be interpreted as the objective probability of the future outcome (i.e., its most statistically accurate forecast). A 60% probability means that, in a series of events each with a 60% probability, then 6 times out of 10, the favored outcome will occur; and 4 times out of 10, the unfavored outcome will occur.

Each prediction exchange organizes its own set of real-money and/or play-money markets, using either a CDA or a MSR mechanism.

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© NewsFutures