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Create a number of distinct and essentially random systems for choosing the winners of presidential elections -- based on solar flares, skirt lengths, weather patterns, and so on. With each presidential election, publish the results of the correct systems and chuck the rest.
128 is a nice round
number. In a two-party presidential election, you can expect half of them to be right. At four years, 64 will remain, at eight years 32, and so on. In twenty-eight years, you can expect to have one system which has correctly predicted the previous seven presidential contests. Market the rights to reveal its choice for the eighth, at which time you should be about ready for retirement in any case.
Stock Investment Version
http://www.investorhome.com/scam.htm
This one phrases it as unsolicited stock tips. [ConsultingDetective, Oct 04 2004, last modified Oct 21 2004]
[link]
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Why wait 28 years? Try your 128 predictors out on seven *past* elections and get immediate results! |
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Last week's_Economist_ magazine (Nov 9 2000?) had a table with several "random" predictors (including hem length) and election results for the past 50 years. Most were pretty accurate: a great example of small samples being statistically insignificant. |
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I've heard a similar scheme being suggested (I don't know if jokingly) for becoming a trusted financial advisor. The first week, you convince 64 people that some stock will go up (or down). The next week, you make a split prediction for the 32 for whom your prediction came true. And so on, until you run out of sample; now you've got one person that thinks you're pretty much infallible. |
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[jutta]'s version is superior, because the results of each event and the predictions of each predictor are not public. Not only will you have a small number of people who think that you are infallible, but a much larger group will stick with you because you've only been wrong once or twice. The [link] I found shows that this is widely known to exist and deserves an [m-f-d]. |
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