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Two Information Aggregation Mechanisms for Predicting the Opening Weekend Box Office Revenues of Films: Boxoffice Prophecy and Guess of Guesses

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  • David Court
  • Benjamin Gillen
  • Jordi McKenzie
  • Charles Plott

Abstract

Successful field tests were conducted on two new Information Aggregation Mechanisms (IAMs). The mechanisms collected information held as intuitions about opening weekend box office revenues for movies in Australia. Participants were film school students. One mechanism is similar to parimutuel betting that produces a probability distribution over box office amounts. Except for "art house films", the predicted distribution is indistinguishable from the actual revenues. The second mechanism is based on guesses of the guesses of others and applied when incentives for accuracy could not be used. It tested well against data and contains information not encompassed by the first mechanism.

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  • David Court & Benjamin Gillen & Jordi McKenzie & Charles Plott, 2015. "Two Information Aggregation Mechanisms for Predicting the Opening Weekend Box Office Revenues of Films: Boxoffice Prophecy and Guess of Guesses," Natural Field Experiments 00541, The Field Experiments Website.
    • Handle: RePEc:feb:natura:00541
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    3. Jordi McKenzie, 2023. "The economics of movies (revisited): A survey of recent literature," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(2), pages 480-525, April.
    4. Sonja Radas & Dražen Prelec, 2021. "Predicted preference conjoint analysis," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(8), pages 1-16, August.
    5. Sonja Radas & Drazen Prelec, 2019. "Whose data can we trust: How meta-predictions can be used to uncover credible respondents in survey data," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 14(12), pages 1-16, December.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D01 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Microeconomic Behavior: Underlying Principles
    • D02 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Institutions: Design, Formation, Operations, and Impact
    • D03 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Behavioral Microeconomics: Underlying Principles
    • D47 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - Market Design
    • C9 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments
    • C53 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling - - - Forecasting and Prediction Models; Simulation Methods
    • C70 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - General
    • C92 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Group Behavior
    • C93 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Field Experiments
    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading
    • G - Financial Economics

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