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I view “The Oracle” as infotainment —it is serious news about the world of financial markets and the global economy, but it is also an opportunity to have a good laugh at those who put us into this L-shaped recession.

In this episode, watch out the 5 charts featured by Stacy Herbert. They sparked out interesting discussions. Good job.

As for Max, he is very funny. (He is still bad at reading “le prompteur”, though, but he will improve this skill over the next episodes.)

Watch the show on Blip.tv, this time —that’s the last video, below. It seems that Max couldn’t upload the third YouTube video.

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UPDATE:

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It is both informative and entertaining —and it has rhythm and style.

• The TV show has 3 parts, as you all know, and each of these 3 parts focuses on one single issue. Excellent.
• The interview of the main guest (this time, Peter Schiff) is well conducted and long enough so we can capture many insights —not just snippets.
• The main guest is now a person of global stature —as opposed to the French, German and Arab guests (with strong foreign accents) we had to endure in the previous episodes.
• Stacy Herbert (“The Queen Of Facts”) has finally been tamed. It was about time. (Women.) She now focuses on one single issue, introducing the issue of each of the 3 parts of the show.
• Her “headlines” are now usable —they are now well readable on the TV screen. (She puts black headlines on a white screen, whereas The McLaughlin Group would rather put white headlines on a black screen. Both techniques are usable. It is a question of taste.)
• She gave us a very good chart in part one. I want her to show one chart in each of the 3 segments of the show. I WANT CHARTS, STACY.
• I never met Max Keiser in person. He was described to me as a friendly, low-key fella. But as soon as the red light flashes on the camera, he becomes another man —a funny, sometimes hilarious, financial animal, who immediately becomes the center of the attention. There is that expression in English that sums it up: ‘he is stealing the show’, literally. He expresses his contrarian arguments in a Daffy Duck-like voice, with some kind of exuberant body language rarely seen on TV —the fella is a spectacle by himself.
• I hope that The Oracle (the disco machine that beams out the predictions) will be re-introduced in the show. It was a good gimmick.
• I also hope they will feature prediction market charts, later on.
• Overall, the show is a very good piece of infotainment. I never quite saw this on TV before. There is the hilarity, but there is also the seriousness of dealing with the global banking, financial and economic crisis —quite not a laughing matter in the first place. Quite a mix.

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Enough blogging.

Now, watch the show.

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James K. Galbraith

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Don’t worry, I will publish the YouTube and Blip.TV videos on Saturday, for those who can’t catch BBC World News.

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Political prediction markets open up a new way to buy votes… by manipulating price.

That’s roughly what they discussed together. They developed that a bit.

I will put up the YouTube videos tonite or tomorrow, for you to watch them, if you can’t catch BBC World News on your cable or satellite.

FYI, HubDub (not InTrade or BetFair) was cited on Putin.

(By the way, HubDub CEO Nigel Eccles is on the East Coast these days, so if you want to meet him, send him an e-mail.)

Previously

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On tomorrow’s The Oracle show run by Max Keiser, Joseph Stiglitz (on his way to Davos) talks about prediction markets.

Check the BBC World News website for local times.

I will re-publish the YouTube videos on Saturday. Check this space.

In 2003, Joseph Stiglitz used the words “absurdity” and “mockery” when dissing one aspect of Robin Hanson’s Policy Analysis Market. (Few people know that the “terrorism futures” idea was imposed by someone else than Robin Hanson, actually.)

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