

Analytics X Prize - Predicting Homicides in Philadelphia - tshtf
http://analyticsx.com/

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ghshephard
To precisely state what others have implied - the prize was deliberately set
low so that there would be no incentive to murder someone in order to win the
prize. The prize is "symbolic" rather than "incentive."

If the prize was $1mm, then someone out there might have been inspired to
murder people in particular areas after predicting they would be killed in
that area.

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Scott_MacGregor
Seriously $100 to do statistical work? The site looks very nicely laid out,
but I have to wonder what the purpose of this competition is.

My first inclination with such a low prize amount is to be a little suspicious
of the motives behind this effort. For instance, is some local political
figure wanting to do something that might be viewed as controversial and this
site is a CYA move before taking that action?

What I mean is will this site be used by some politician to set himself up to
make the statement in public "We tried to get X done with this website
campaign, paid millions of the taxpayers money for web development, even
offered a cash prize (without saying how much the prize was) but the results
were trivial so now we have no other option than to do Y (whatever
controversial thing the politician’s contributors wanted done in the first
place).".

To the OP: if this is your site and you are seriously looking to promote it
and attract contestants you might want to think about bumping the $100 grand
prize up to at least $1,000. It seems to me the $100 will not be enough (after
taxes) for people to take the effort to get involved. Maybe seek monetary
sponsorship from the city for the prize amount.

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dantheman
This doesn't seem to have any relation to the "X Prize" as run by
<http://www.xprize.org/>

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jpwagner
you can tell by the prize amounts...

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motters
Any system which has human psychology in the loop is going to be difficult to
predict. I'll be impressed if these kinds of phenomena can be predicted
though. We already know that crime is more likely in certain neighborhoods,
but whether you can make more specific predictions than that I don't know
(almost getting into precrime territory).

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chaosmachine
"A Grand Prize ($100) is awarded at the end of the calendar year to the best
performing submission."

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jdrock
Blech. This is not an easy problem and that's all they offer? <snarky>Is that
the dollar value Philly puts on a life?</snarky>

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jdrock
Not understanding the downvotes. Solving this problem would easily save
hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not millions, in law enforcement and
litigation costs. To put a paltry $100 reward for _preventing murder_ is,
frankly, pathetic.

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gloob
The prize isn't for preventing murder; it's for predicting murder. There are
significant practical differences, particularly with respect to the incentives
created.

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romanows
In fact, if your submission helps prevent murders, you would tend to lose the
contest.

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pavel_lishin
Well, predicting murders would cause a re-allocation of the police
department's resources, arguably preventing some of those murders.

