

A Financial Prophet Online Is Vilified in Reality - credo
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/16/world/asia/16minerva.html

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3pt14159
I've often thought about finance blogs from a binomial distribution point of
view. Say, that out of the 25M+ finance blogs (<http://bit.ly/ep75e>) there
are about 100k serious ones. Say that each week for a year each blog makes a
verifiable, binary outcome prediction. Also assume that there is a 50-50
chance of that prediction coming true. We could expect 4 or 5 of those 100k
blogs to be right 40 weeks of the year JUST BY GUESSING. Let alone some actual
insight. Say you were one of those winning blog readers, and week after week
this blogger keeps getting things right. Like Bear Stearns going bankrupt, for
example. Every now and then (s)he could get something wrong, but there would
always be a reason, or (s)he could say that the outcome is just temporary, and
that the true outcome is anytime now.

You (and eventually, your friends) would start investing your money along
his/her advise, and if the blogger is really, really popular (s)he could start
moving the market enough to change the odds from 50-50 to 60-40.

I don't really know how to stop this, but it is interesting.

~~~
ubernostrum
You realize you've just described a genuine, in-the-wild scam, right?

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whatusername
that and the old idea that enough monkeys pounding on typewriters can
reproduce the works of shakespeare.

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kailoa
Sometimes technology has a way of overwhelming societies capability to adapt
to it.

Cocaine problems in the US. Ultrasound in a country with a one child policy
and a strong cultural preference for boys. Here, rigid societal hierarchies
are subverted by the anonymity of the internet.

Technology has the amazing power to shape society as well as mirror it.

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colinplamondon
That thing read like Ender's Game Peter/Valentine playing politics as
Lock/Demosthenes, except South Koreanified and economic.

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jibiki
Is there an American version of this guy? It seems like all the really well
known American pundits are non-anonymous...

