Saturday, June 26, 2004

Looking for One Thing and Finding Another

I went looking this morning for the homepage of Kent Smetters of Wharton, the co-author of the "45 trillion dollar black hole" paper Niall Ferguson mentions in Colossus as signifying the eventual withdrawal of the "American empire" (his phrase, and definitely not mine).

I was looking to see was his model available online - it wasn't. However, I did find what looks like a very interesting, and non-technical paper on insurance mechanisms to protect against terrorism, a subject I've written on before in posts here and here.

Having tried to contact TerrorBet, it seems that they are no longer in operation; I doubt whether a betting exchange as they have planned would work as a practical informaton mechanism, as there would probably not be the business to justify infrastructure cost. Neither can I see what seems to be a business with no real derivatives knowledge or financial strength leaping in to intermediate between the larger institutions.