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by freejazz 19 days ago
>where the risks of insiderism or gaming are negligible, and there's extremely large public interest in it.

So what's the point of polymarket, then? If at best we get "negligible" "insiderism", how is it that we are supposed to be benefitting from this as a society the way OP and others insist that revealing insider preferences "would"
1 comments
WarmWash 19 days ago
Because it's the most effective tool we know of for surfacing the true odds of something (Which also includes the fact that insiders will place outsized bets to move the needle towards the truth.)

An example would be the latest presidential election, where professional pollsters at them at almost 50/50, but the prediction markets had trump by a landslide. He went on to win even the popular vote.

The benefit comes to people who don't even participate, and just take notes.

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freejazz 19 days ago
>An example would be the latest presidential election, where professional pollsters at them at almost 50/50, but the prediction markets had trump by a landslide. He went on to win even the popular vote.

Trump didn't win by a landslide and he barely won the popular vote...

>The benefit comes to people who don't even participate, and just take notes.

Praying someone has an example besides the election, to which it seems to have made absolutely no difference at all

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somenameforme 19 days ago
It's not supposed to make a difference but to provide information to people, which it does a great job of. Go browse Polymarket and the odds they lay on most of everything are about as close as one can get as to the "real" odds of that thing. They're essentially like a superhuman pollster. I'm a big fan of them but have not placed a single bet. It's simply that if you want to see what's happening in the world, a browse of their front page is way more informative than browsing a e.g. news website, especially in modern times.

As for the election, a Republican winning the popular vote by a couple million can't be called a landslide in nominal terms, but it is in terms of normal results. The DNC currently completely controls California and New York. After those 2 states alone Trump was down 7 million votes in 2020. The rest of the states tend to be either very small or relatively competitive. To make up the popular vote amongst them requires a very large edge. Polymarket had Trump as a 2:1 favorite the day before the election, and he would indeed go on to win every single swing state. The corporate media and their associated pollsters had Harris ahead.

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freejazz 19 days ago
If the information does not make a difference, what is the point of the information? White noise is "information". Yelling "fire" in a crowded theatre is "information". What is the point?

> As for the election, a Republican winning the popular vote by a couple million can't be called a landslide in nominal terms, but it is in terms of normal results. The DNC currently completely controls California and New York. After those 2 states alone Trump was down 7 million votes in 2020. The rest of the states tend to be either very small or relatively competitive. To make up the popular vote amongst them requires a very large edge. Polymarket had Trump as a 2:1 favorite the day before the election, and he would indeed go on to win every single swing state.

And the numbers were actually much more closer to what the national media outlets reported... so again, what is the value of the "information" on polymarket? All it reflected was that there were a couple of whales that were betting hard for Trump. The results did not remotely reflect the polymarket odds at all as you concede. I'm not sure how you think that doesn't end the conversation, but it seems to be more of a political point you are making that is divorced from the reality of the numbers reported.

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somenameforme 18 days ago
I'm not really sure what you're trying to say. Perhaps I don't know what you mean by "make a difference." But providing accurate odds on a wide array of topics isn't yelling fire in a crowded theater and the results of the election did reflect the polymarket odds.
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freejazz 18 days ago
But you already conceded the odds were not accurate.

> But providing accurate odds on a wide array of topics isn't yelling fire in a crowded theater and the results of the election did reflect the polymarket odds.

I didn't say they were. You are making the broad meaningless distinction of implying that the "information" provided by "prediction markets" has any value. If it does not have value, what is the point of having the markets?

>Perhaps I don't know what you mean by "make a difference."

If the availability of the information makes no difference societally, then what is the value of the information? I'm not sure if you are being so obtuse on purpose, or what. But you keep saying it provides information... so what? As I pointed out... white noise is information.

> and the results of the election did reflect the polymarket odds

No they did not. Trump did not win by twice as much and certainly did not in the popular vote.

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