The Industry Standard

What Company Is Offering:
The Industry Standard features news and analysis that covers emerging technologies and companies, venture funding, acquisitions, site launches, and other developments in the internet space. Additionally, The Standard aggregates community knowledge in a quantified fashion, thereby ranking both the knowledge of the individual community members themselves, as well as the value of the information the community provides as a whole. This system is built as a prediction market, intersected with a reputation-based social network.

How It Works:
Their prediction market is a place where, for entertainment purposes, you can bet on the chances of future events occurring or not occurring, using a virtual currency called "Standard Dollars". The predictions listed on the market are all related to the online economy, which touches nearly all businesses these days. If you see a prediction on the site where you believe you know the future outcome, place a bet and see if you are right. If your bet is correct, you’ll win more "Standard Dollars" to bet on other predictions, and your community rank will increase. If you’re really good, you may also win prizes.

The Community Consensus (Odds) is a rolled-up percentage of all the community's bets on that prediction, meaning it represents the consensus of the community as to the probability of that event. We calculate this not only by the number of total bets, but more importantly, we calculate the amount of Standard Dollars wagered in total. For example, if there is a prediction stating, “Apple will sell 10 million iPhones by October 31, 2008” and the community odds are at 65%, that means the community believes there is a 65% chance that the event will occur by the date specified. Ultimately, the consensus is built off of all of the betting actions of the community, bets in favor and bets against.

More at:http://thestandard.com/