You have BEEN SCAMMED. The PAM Site to trade on terrorism is a SCAM...

[radwriter0555]

can't you see it?

Don't you GET it?

ANYONE can post the Darpa logo with a LINK.

Don't fall for it.

Care to wager on when the media figures it out? I say.... within 5 hours. It's now noon, Pacific Time.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

1. Do you have any...

independent verification of this?

[radwriter0555]

9. Try this site...

http://hanson.gmu.edu/ifpubs.html#Hanson


Idea Futures
(a.k.a. Prediction Markets, Information Markets)
by Robin Hanson

(This is my top web page on idea futures. Go here to find my publications on idea futures.)
The Idea Our policy-makers and media rely too much on the "expert" advice of a self-interested insider's club of pundits and big-shot academics. These pundits are rewarded too much for telling good stories, and for supporting each other, rather than for being "right". Instead, let us create betting markets on most controversial questions, and treat the current market odds as our best expert consensus. The real experts (maybe you), would then be rewarded for their contributions, while clueless pundits would learn to stay away. You should have a free-speech right to bet on political questions in policy markets, and we could even base a new form of government on idea futures.
One can subsidize a market on a question, offering extra rewards to those who bet right on this question. This subsidy is an "information prize", offered to those who first provide information on a question, in contrast to an "accomplishment prize", given to those who first accomplish some task. Instead of patronizing academic basic research via proposal peer-review, we should use prizes more.

Publications Idea Futures has been described in many publications by myself and others, including both academic journals and popular media.

Web Games There are many web sites which let one bet on sports, but the Foresight Exchange (FX, previously called Idea Futures) was the first general web betting game, and was the first to allow users to introduce new claims to bet on. Begun by Sean Morgan, it won the 1995 Prix Ars Electronica Golden Nica for world's best web site. Over 1500 players now bet play money on over 200 questions of their choosing. Check out the current betting odds, an independent 'Zine, and m o r e. The game's developers once formed a business, Ideosphere (now wholely owned by Kumo Software) that now seems defunct. Recently other play-money markets have appeared, such as Hollywood Stock Exchange, Invisible Hand Electronic Market, Fanatasy Futures, and NewsBet. (I have no relation with or stake in any of these ventures.) I think the odds in these markets are often too optimistic, but they do pretty well considering, and a real money market would do much better.

(Another web market, Java Idea Futures, isn't really an Idea Future in the above sense; they trade perhaps-not-yet-written Java Applets.)

[nostamj]

2. wolfowitz admitted it was real this morning

at a Senate hearing. and said it would be taken down...

[DagmarK]

3. I kinda trust my SENATOR, Mr. Wyden, who sits on the intelligence comm..

to ferret out hoaxes and scams before he makes a federal issue of it.

Check out his statement on his senate website: www.senate.gov

**if you are joking.......I apologize. You seem serious......

[ChompySnack]

4. Hmmm.

According to the NYT:

Pentagon Plan Is 'Terminated'
Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz said today that a plan for an online futures market to help in predicting terror attacks was being "terminated."

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/29/politics/29WIRE-PENT.html

Wolfowitz is testifying on capitol hill about a scam?

[madfloridian]

5. ABC covered it last night as verified.

:hi:

[w4rma]

6. No scam, unfortunately Poindexter and Rumsfeld really pushed for this (n/t

[gristy]

7. This is what happens when you come in at the middle of the movie...

I thought it was a scam last night, but it isn't. There are NO denials from the gov't today. They did however, announce its cancellation.

Do you Google???? :hi:

[htuttle]

8. Hmm.....I'll take you up on that wager. I think it's real

Here's the offical project page for it on Darpa's website:
http://www.darpa.mil/iao/FutureMap.htm

It's called another project name (FutureMAP), but refers to precisely the same program:

The DARPA FutureMAP (Futures Markets Applied to Prediction) program is a follow-up to a current DARPA SBIR, Electronic Market-Based Decision Support (SB012-012).  FutureMAP will concentrate on market-based techniques for avoiding surprise and predicting future events. Strategic decisions depend upon the accurate assessment of the likelihood of future events.  This analysis often requires independent contributions by experts in a wide variety of fields, with the resulting difficulty of combining the various opinions into one assessment.  Market-based techniques provide a tool for producing these assessments.

<snip>

Markets must also offer compensation that is ethically and legally satisfactory to all sectors involved, while remaining attractive enough to ensure full and continuous participation of individual parties.  The markets must also be sufficiently robust to withstand manipulation.   FutureMAP will bring together commercial, academic, and government performers to meet these challenges.

On the other hand, some really wiggly stuff comes up when you do a whois on WWW.POLICYANALYSISMARKET.ORG: (personal information X'ed out)

Registrant: 
Net Exchange ( UWHJFAOOUD )
XXXXX High Bluff Dr 
Suite XXX 
San Diego, CA 92130 
US 

Domain Name: POLICYANALYSISMARKET.ORG 

Administrative Contact: 
Net Exchange  ( GCEMFQRWGO )         [e-mail] 
XXXXX High Bluff Dr 
Suite XXX 
San Diego, CA 92130 
US 
858 XXX-XXXX 
Technical Contact: 
Network Solutions, Inc.  ( HOST-ORG )            [e-mail] 
XXXXX Ridgetop Circle 
Dulles, VA XXXXX 
US 
1-888-XXX-XXXX fax: [phone] 

Record expires on 12-Mar-2006. 
Record created on 12-Mar-2003. 
Database last updated on 29-Jul-2003 15:02:17 EDT. 

Domain servers in listed order: 

NS1.IPOWERWEB.NET            64.70.61.130 
NS1.IPOWERDNS.COM            12.129.206.202 
NS2.IPOWERWEB.NET            12.129.206.200 
NS2.IPOWERDNS.COM            12.129.206.203 

I do find it very strange that DARPA would use a yahoo.com address for the domain name registration. It was the email of a guy named 'Jeff van Dorn' (or similar...maybe Jeff Vandorn....Vandolet, maybe? Nah...)

BUT WAIT...I find a site for "Net Exchange" (the domain name holder above) here:
http://www.nex.com

On the 'About Us' page, it says:

Net Exchange is continually advancing intellectual property surrounding CCDM. A close relationship with the Division of Humanities and Social Sciences at Caltech is maintained. This relationship provides access to the Advanced Economics Laboratory and the latest research in economic theory. In addition, funded research with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is leveraged for the next generation of Deal Optimization Solutions.

So that would explain why the private company is in there.

All in all -- I think it's real. I DO NOT think it's a hoax

[mrfrapp]

13. Personal Info

"On the other hand, some really wiggly stuff comes up when you do a whois on WWW.POLICYANALYSISMARKET.ORG: (personal information X'ed out)"

Why have done that? The information is in the public domain and anyone can get it by going through the same process that you did.

[htuttle]

15. I realize that....

...but if I post someone's email or phone on here, the mods will freak out.

[nolabels]

14. Did you get that adress "High Bluff Drive"

LOL

[radwriter0555]

16. Did you catch the address in DULLES VA? @ the CIA?

most likely?

and how about this.....


Markets and Decisions:
A workshop on the uses of markets for decision support
Sponsored by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency

June 11 and 12, 2002

Executive Conference Center
3601 Wilson Blvd.
Arlington, Virginia

Recent research, in the fields of economics, finance, marketing and decision analysis, has demonstrated the power and flexibility of markets as devices for the aggregation and summarization of information. The workshop will survey that research and explore the application and adaptation of these emerging tools to military and security purposes.

http://marteksys.com/martek/DARPAConferenceSpeakers.html


Joyce Berg Univ. of Iowa
MarTek prediction markets
Robert Berman CIA another tool in the arsenal
Ely Dahan MIT
UCLA securities trading of concepts (STOC)
Leslie Fine Hewlett Packard predicting uncertain events in small groups
Michael Foster DARPA introduction and concluding remarks
Tom Gallagher ISIG prediction markets and investment advice
Robin Hanson George Mason
Net Exchange conditional markets
John Ledyard CalTech and Net Exchange combinatoric markets
Pete Locke George Washington U. legal issues in information markets
Forrest Nelson Univ. of Iowa
MarTek conference moderator
George Neumann Univ. of Iowa
MarTek equilibrium prices in markets with few traders
David Pennock NEC modeling information incorporation in markets and market games
Charles Plott Caltech the design of pari-mutuel systems as information aggregation mechanisms: applications of laboratory experimental methodology
Thomas Rietz Univ. Iowa
MarTek election markets, the IEM experience
Vernon Smith George Mason U. information aggregation in electricity markets

[chadm]

10. Trading in death...

something the Republicans are already quite good at. I see this as a natural evolution.

[americanstranger]

11. Sorry, it was real.

Of course, Congress put a stop to it this morning.

http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/bw-exec/2003/jul/29/072902584.html

But it was real - the government gave the company a $350k grant for start-up:

http://www.fbodaily.com/archive/2002/07-July/03-Jul-2002/a-awd.htm

I found two other listings of grants for this last night on gubmint sites, but that was the only link I saved - and now the page seems to be gone.

It was real.

-as

[Ilsa]

12. Is Neil Bush a major player

in the company that got the contract for this obscenity?