Casey Newton

Yeah, I mean, this just seems like something that is obviously more widespread than we know about.

Like, if you have material, non-public information about a military operation, like, what are you going to do?

Sit there and collect your freaking paycheck like a chump?

Or are you going to go online and make some dough betting on the outcome?

I loved this one because my understanding, and correct me if I'm wrong, is that there's this prediction market for, like, what is the temperature in Paris?

And the way that they gauge this is with this, like, series of thermometers that are placed in various parts of Paris.

And that this insider trader allegedly, like, basically took a hairdryer or some other heating device and, like, held it next to one of these sensors.

Can you just tell me what happened here?

I fell for that one.

So how did they actually tamper with the temperature sensor?

Totally.

And I think that is ultimately bad for the markets themselves.

Market integrity is obviously very important.

If people start to feel like they're competing on these markets with people who have access to like insider information, that's going to dissuade them from doing it.

I mean, I was thinking about this after the Bad Bunny halftime show at the Super Bowl.

Where there were lots of prediction markets on what songs Bad Bunny would perform and various other things.

Celebrities will appear.

Celebrities will appear.

And there were active prediction markets.

And it turned out that like probably some of the people betting on those markets were like part of the halftime show or had watched the rehearsals or something.