I just got back from Las Vegas a month ago, having attended the Consumer Electronics Show. Gambling is a way of life in Vegas and if you can figure out odds, you can bet on just about anything there. But operating systems and consumer electronics?
Rather to my surprise, it turns out that there is a corner of the gambling world that’s focused on tech, startups, gadgets and consumer electronics, and just like a horse race, there are odds makers who assess the industry, product and demand then come up with odds of a specific outcome.
For example, what are the odds that Radio Shack would drop into bankruptcy? Twenty years ago that’d have been a longshot, but today, well, this week saw the company doing just that, sadly.
More interesting is to look at specific products or experiments and try to assess when they might be on the market as viable products. Google had a good run with Google Glass, but ultimately it was a bust and they’re no longer available. Could you have predicted that?
Or, more to the point, how about Microsoft’s really cool HoloLens (shown below), a pair of glasses right out of a sci-fi epic that actually let you interact with a Windows 10 system through projected holograms. Sounds like something from the future, doesn’t it?
I haven’t had a chance to try the HoloLens yet, but the Oculus system is really quite slick and it’s hard to describe the intuitive feel of a system that shifts what you see as you move your head around. Turn to the right and what you see shifts right accordingly. The effect is that you really are in an immersive, 3D world that’s all around you, and even up if you lean back to view the “sky”.
The consumer electronics mavens are consequently offering odds on which of the two will sell more in the twelve months subsequent to them both being on the market. 2:1 for the HoloLens, versus 1:2 for the Oculus Rift.
Which means if you bet $100 on, say, the HoloLens outselling the Oculus, then if it did you’d get paid $200. Same bet on the Oculus and if it outsold the HoloLens your payout would be $150.
Heck, you can even bet on anticipated price of the HoloLens, on whether Windows 10 is released before July 1, 2015, or whether the cost of Windows 10 for new users is under $150. And my favorite, if you look at articles on projecting tech odds, you’ll find funny entrants like the odds that Cortana and Siri will combine forces to destroy us.
They’re putting the odds at 1:1. Let’s hope that’s a losing bet, eh?