Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Prediction markets are ushering in a world in which news becomes about gambling

theatlantic.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 517 posts

Re: Prediction markets are ushering in a world in which news becomes about gambling

#71

Post by sowbug »

Buttons840 wrote: post #65

This is a problem, a net negative and a sign of a weakening society. But, one silver lining, maybe, is gamblers are a little less likely to fall for fake news. Maybe? It seems hard to be a climate change denier when you're about to gamble on it. Or maybe people will find a way to gamble while still living in completely different reality bubbles. Probably. If you thought your neighbor was politically extreme last elec…

But, one silver lining, maybe, is gamblers are a little less likely to fall for fake news. Maybe?

Only in a truth-agnostic sense. Good gamblers in player-banked games (poker; rock, scissors, paper) vs house-banked games (slots) are good at figuring out what the other guy is representing. The actual truth is much less significant.

Re: Prediction markets are ushering in a world in which news becomes about gambling

#73

Post by toss1 »

bluecalm wrote: post #18

Isn't Polymarket very low stakes? For example "Will Trump acquire Greenland before 2027" market (the main one for this issue) has only 14m USD volume. This is like 2 orders of magnitude less money than is bet on El Classico 2 times a year. There are risks connected when prediction markets run wild but Polymarket ain't it. There is also utility. It has high predictive value (it beats polls for elections from a little…

It beats polls for elections ONLY until someone notices it is being used as the basis of news stories and figures out it will be four orders of magnitude cheaper to manipulate that small market and make the news idiots broadcast that opinions have changed than to actually deploy all the adverts needed to change the opinions.

The very low stakes you point out make this even easier to put a thumb on the scales.

Goodhart's law: "When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure"

The point of the article is that as soon as the "news" started reporting on prediction markets or corporatized gambling as if it was a measure of sentiment, it ceased to become a good measurement. That point has long passed.

Re: Prediction markets are ushering in a world in which news becomes about gambling

#74

Post by tbrownaw »

keiferski wrote: post #24

I’m increasingly convinced that the single most important concept to understand in the 21st century is Chesterton’s Fence: "Chesterton's fence" is the principle that reforms should not be made until the reasoning behind the existing state of affairs is understood. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._K._Chesterton#Chesterton's_... Gambling isn’t a new problem, but apparently we thought it would turn out differently this…

> Gambling isn’t a new problem, but apparently we thought it would turn out differently this time, for some vague unclear reason.

The things I've seen have been either "it's not right to tell me not to" or "non-participants can get useful information by observing the odds". What I haven't seen is claims that it won't be net-harmful to participants.

Re: Prediction markets are ushering in a world in which news becomes about gambling

#75

Post by xboxnolifes »

kelipso wrote: post #50
keiferski wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh, I don’t think not wanting gambling and amoral behavior to consume society makes me a conservative in any real sense of the word. More just common sense pragmatism, is how I’d put it.

The Chesterton’s Fence argument is an argument against progressive social changes, no?

No, sometimes social change is putting up a fence. And if social change is sometimes putting up fences, that would mean that not all fences are supposed to be torn down.

Re: Prediction markets are ushering in a world in which news becomes about gambling

#77

Post by bshaughn »

b65e8bee43c2ed0 wrote: post #51
bshaughn wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It gives people in power, wether it be the government or even an NBA ref, a vehicle to profit off of conflicts of interest / fixing games / etc... Ive seen people point out White House press conferences do weird shit, like cut the conference 10 seconds before some polymarket prop bet of "how long will this press conference be". Much more heinously, a few months ago right before one of Trumps asinine tariff announceme…

>It gives people in power, wether it be the government or even an NBA ref, a vehicle to profit off of conflicts of interest / fixing games / etc... there is the stock market for those things, where insider trading is nigh invisible to public.

I think you have completey missed my point. The stock market only allows you to trade securities, and (in theory) there is a lot of regulation and enforcement on who buys / sells stocks. Additionally, no one has the power to magically set a stock price to be a certain price on a certain date.

Polymarket all of a sudden makes it much easier to make money betting on an outcome people control. Looking at polymarket, I see bets paying 100-1 based on the number of tweets Elon makes on a given day. I see another at 100-1 on wether the US airstrikes Iran today with $66m riding on it. All of a sudden theres an incentive of a life changing amount of money for goons in the whitehouse to strike Iran for shits and giggles.

Did you know that in 2007 some NBA Refs were caught rigging games for just $2000 a game? Now Refs don't even need to be payed off when you can make a position anonymously with bitcoin.

Re: Prediction markets are ushering in a world in which news becomes about gambling

#78

Post by andrepd »

Buttons840 wrote: post #65

This is a problem, a net negative and a sign of a weakening society. But, one silver lining, maybe, is gamblers are a little less likely to fall for fake news. Maybe? It seems hard to be a climate change denier when you're about to gamble on it. Or maybe people will find a way to gamble while still living in completely different reality bubbles. Probably. If you thought your neighbor was politically extreme last elec…

> But, one silver lining, maybe, is gamblers are a little less likely to fall for fake news. Maybe?

5 minutes browsing polymarket comments will dispel that notion really fast.

Re: Prediction markets are ushering in a world in which news becomes about gambling

#79

Post by tbrownaw »

keiferski wrote: post #53
kelipso wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Chesterton’s Fence argument is an argument against progressive social changes, no?

No, it’s an argument against removing rules / making changes without deeply understanding why those rules exist in the first place, and what might happen when they are removed. It’s perfectly fine to be for progressive social changes, as long as those criteria are met. I’d call that a pragmatic approach, not a conservative one.

> I’d call that a pragmatic approach, not a conservative one.

The other meaning of "conservative", the one that's opposite "reckless".

It should in theory be possible to take a conservative approach to being progressive.

Re: Prediction markets are ushering in a world in which news becomes about gambling

#80

Post by bluecalm »

_DeadFred_ wrote: post #66
vlark wrote: post #48

Stop calling them "prediction markets" and start calling them what they really are: corporatized bookies.

At least in gambling they don't let the sports referees and players gamble. This is just another racket for those in power to continue making the world worse for just a little bit more gain for themselves. Edit: Throttled like always, you guys hate me (and reality/law in this instance) https://www.nbcnews.com/sports/sports-gambling/20-charged-ba...

>>At least in gambling they don't let the sports referees and players gamble.

Oh c'mon now. This is completely impossible to police. Players and referees are not under constant supervision. They have families, friends, partners. Some of them got caught but you can be certain most weren't because it's just very difficult to catch.

There are always multiple people who know about key players' injuries, illness, other factors. The game is negative sum and additionally insiders take a a chunk for themselves. It's worse then roulette which at least doesn't pretend to be fair.

Post reply on HN