4 ms·

You will hear nothing about Google+ a year from now. You heard it here... well, probably not first, but you heard it here.

• Baughn 15y ago
  That seems like an unwarranted level of confidence. Could you explain your reasoning?
  • khafra 15y ago
    He's using Reference Class Forecasting[1]. Without digging deep into Google+'s unique features, he's betting that it will do roughly what other web services in the class "Facebook competitor" and "Google-owned foray into social networking" have done in the past. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reference_class_forecasting http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reference_class_forecasting
    • Eliezer 15y ago
      Eyup.
• william42 15y ago
  What probability would you put on this?
• wedrifid 15y ago
  In meatspace conversation I had Eliezer make the prediction concrete in scope and give it a number. From one year after the date of the parent comment Eliezer expects that Google+ will not appear on Hacker News (except as a mistake, an obituary, an "It failed, I told you so!", etc). The probability Eliezer assigned to his prediction being correct: 55%. I asked for the number with the intent of betting against him. At that figure I am not quite comfortable staking money. That is, I am not sufficiently confident that google+ has a significantly more than 45% chance of taking off. (Because I think that 45% chance of still being significant in a year is a good place to be, given the potential payoffs!)