Sources: Google In Talks To Acquire Twitter • Hacker News Board

Re: Sources: Google In Talks To Acquire Twitter

#61

Post by Eliezer » Fri, Apr 03, 2009, 7:32 PM UTC

ashot wrote: post #33

qeorge wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HubDub (a prediction market) has been doing this for nearly a year: http://punditwatch.hubdub.com/ TechCrunch's score is a telling 13%.

these scores are not comparable because they are missing a critical piece of the puzzle: the likelihoods of your predictions. I predict everyday for the rest of the year that the dow jones will be above 2 and below 4 million. The right measure is to take the difference between market and pundit opinion (you know like a real market, except unlike companies these always end at 1/0 on a certain date - like a covered opt…

No, they took that into account.

Re: Sources: Google In Talks To Acquire Twitter

#62

Post by whughes » Sat, Apr 04, 2009, 2:03 AM UTC

jimbokun wrote: post #56

jonknee wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of those just started: http://wrongtomorrow.com/ I should start adding Mike Arrington quotes, he's almost as bad as Scoble.

"But discussions between the companies are confirmed." Strictly speaking, there is no prediction in the article. This is a claim about the present. Granted, he has already had to amend the original claim ("late stage" vs. "early stage" talks), so take him to task over that rather than imply a prediction is being made.

That's true, but I think that it is nitpicking. There is a claim here: "Google in talks to acquire Twitter" -- which has a questionable truth value. This is exactly the type of statement which a predictions site could test (whether it is true or not).

Re: Sources: Google In Talks To Acquire Twitter

#63

Post by geuis » Sun, Apr 05, 2009, 7:20 AM UTC

ojbyrne wrote: post #42

geuis wrote: post #22

This is the worst thing that could happen to twitter. Google's brand doesn't have quite the same cachè it used to. Today, it means being bought with no improvements to the service for at least a year after that. Look at Grand Central and Jaiku as examples.

Ok, spelling/grammar nazi time. The accent over cache would be only slightly pretentious if you didn't have it pointing the wrong way (caché is the slightly archaic spelling you're struggling to remember). But the fact that the word you're looking for is "cachet" makes it a double fail.

So glad you could take the time to correct me. Just made my day. So yeah, I forgot "cachet" as an alternative spelling and was typing the comment from my phone. So you're the $10/hr Digg guy? Still sore about that?

Re: Sources: Google In Talks To Acquire Twitter

#64

Post by sam_in_nyc » Mon, Apr 06, 2009, 3:31 AM UTC

ahoyhere wrote: post #46

sam_in_nyc wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They wouldn't have to brand it as Google. Think: Yahoo buying Flickr. I also could imagine some pretty terrible things happening to Twitter... like, for example, the site displaying "FUCK OFF" on every page load, forever.

Yahoo! couldn't resist fucking with Flickr, though. Or delicious. Think about the damn tying it to freakin Yahoo! accounts, which look like they're out of the stone age, and the "you have to log in every 2 weeks to save a bookmark" feature they added to delicious, etc., etc. etc. If people fuck with Twitter like that, it'll be gone. Service instability is one thing. Adding so much friction is another.

Not being a Flickr or Delicious user myself, other than created an account to try it out, I don't know all the end-user effects of the Yahoo acquisitions. But it seems like Flickr and Delicious have turned out alright!

Re: Sources: Google In Talks To Acquire Twitter

#65

Post by gwern » Wed, Apr 08, 2009, 9:37 PM UTC

glenstein wrote: post #36

yan wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

exactly the idea I had for a site.

Wow, I guess I'm #3. But my idea quickly expanded into a full fledged "credibility index"- because why not keep track of present-day claims they make about things already known to be false? It seems like one in the same issue to me. And wouldn't it make sense to quantify the vagueness/concreteness of statements made? It's easy for a pundit to say something is "dangerous for America" without giving a specific conseque…

Whoa there! Sounds like you let the perfect be the enemy of the good! That's unfortunate; think of all the lost time.

Re: Sources: Google In Talks To Acquire Twitter

#66

Post by glenstein » Mon, Apr 13, 2009, 7:58 PM UTC

gwern wrote: post #65

glenstein wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, I guess I'm #3. But my idea quickly expanded into a full fledged "credibility index"- because why not keep track of present-day claims they make about things already known to be false? It seems like one in the same issue to me. And wouldn't it make sense to quantify the vagueness/concreteness of statements made? It's easy for a pundit to say something is "dangerous for America" without giving a specific conseque…

Whoa there! Sounds like you let the perfect be the enemy of the good! That's unfortunate; think of all the lost time.

not sure what you mean. I wasn't being critical, I was actually encouraging the development of such sites. And I fully believe in the feasibility of eventually using all those different metrics I had described. It's doable, and I want to see it.