Homework assignment week 9: Prediction Markets

30

October

2013

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This week’s theme is prediction markets. We just had a quick overview of what prediction markets are during the lecture. Ms Li told us some applications like the American elections and gave us some information about is. So prediction markets seem to be very precise, but I pointed out two issues concerning prediction markets in my homework assignment.

The first issue is about market manipulation. Because prediction markets use the crowd, we should be aware of people that are willing to manipulate prediction markets in order to ensure that the outcomes of those markets will be as reliable as possible and can contribute to a good prediction of a certain event. The occasions where people tried to manipulate prediction markets didn’t work out that negative and it only caused a sort of a ‘hype’ or a ‘buzz’ but it actually didn’t influence the end prices significantly.

The second issue is about the prediction of influenza that pops up every year. Through a prediction market among health care workers (they sit front row in a terms of flu information). They can predict the intensity of the influenza because it is divided in phases that health care workers can indicate.

Homework assignment week 9 – Mitch Huisman

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Want to earn money? Use crowdfunding!

19

October

2013

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Last week a Dutch news program (EditieNL, RTL4) had an item about crowd funding. In relation to the topic of next week which is crowdsourcing and crowd funding, I will give you a quick look into the world of crowd funding.

What is the best thing you could do in times of crisis? Saving money on a bank is not attractive because of the low interest rates. The fastest way to earn money is probably crowd funding.

Crowd funding is investing your money in (small) businesses. It is usually done on the internet and you don’t even need a bank. The biggest crowd funding platform in the Netherlands is Geldvoorelkaar.nl. This platform is a market for people that want to borrow and who want to lend money. The money borrowers can be consumers and companies.

Should you do it or not?
The Geldvoorelkaar.nl website shows us a lot of investments. You can even start with a small amount of money for a 7 to 8 percent interest. So you can ‘donate’ to someone who likes to start a gym but has not enough money him/herself.

What are the advantages and disadvantages of crowd funding?

Advantages:

  • You can invest also a small amount of money;
  • Interest rates are higher than saving money on a bank;
  • Risks are low, but you must know how you get your money;
  • You can choose which consumer of business you like to help to reach their goals yourself.

Disadvantages:

  • The company you invest in can go bankrupt;
  • You can’t determine the credibility of the one who needs the money;
  • Risks are higher than saving money, there is no profit guarantee.

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Tourism and Social Media

28

September

2013

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I know a lot of you guys come from outside the Netherlands and I know there must be a moment that you were on the internet looking for a good university or school and courses with nice subjects. You finally decided to choose the Social Media and Social Network course here at the Erasmus University in Rotterdam, the Netherlands.

But I am actually wondering whether you used social media to get the information you would like to know about (maybe Europe), the Netherlands, Rotterdam, the university and even the course? And what social media did you use? Have you checked wikis or blogs?

I namely found an article about the role of social media in online travel search. The usage of social media is getting more important when people are travelling. E.g. in the Netherlands you see various sites on which you can see a lot of reviews from people who have been to that particular destination. The most popular site in the Netherlands is zoover.nl.

This interesting article is a research about the search of holiday destinations on the internet. How much do we use Google, Wikipedia, review sites, virtual communities  when looking for an accommodation or destination? In 2010, 40% of the Social Media sites were virtual communities and 27% were review sites (like lonelyplanet.com).

If you like to know more about their findings, I would recommend you to read this article!

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0261517709000387

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Prosumption

23

September

2013

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I found an article related to this week’s topic ‘Engaging customers and prosumers’. Prosumer is a combination of producer and consumer. What most people actually don’t know is that they are prosumers theirselves. Think about filling your own car at the gas station and preparing your own food in (modern) restaurants and building Facebook because users give a lot of information that made Facebook so big.

I think there are many pros and cons for this topic. You could say that product will get better because people are more involved in the production process (like giving suggestions).

In this article you will get the chance to see several examples of prosumption and I think this will give you a good preparation to this week’s lectures.

Please note that this article consists of 3 pages!

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865586914/Prosumption-Why-just-about-everybody-unwittingly-works-for-free.html?pg=3

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