In the ten years that we’ve been running the Narcissist Forecasting Contest, we have incorporated three major innovations, if you don’t count Mabel the prognosticating hound toward the total.| Braff & Co.
Twenty-five is something of a lucky number around here.| Braff & Co.
In the five days between the murder of the CEO of the insurance division of UnitedHealthcare on December 4 and the arrest of a suspect yesterday, the regime in Syria collapsed and a jury delivered a verdict in the six-we...| Braff & Co.
If you follow the news coming out of Argentina, you know that President Javier Milei has been shaking things up like an inverted gourd of yerba mate. Amid his layoffs of government workers, cuts to subsidies and pensions...| Braff & Co.
Today's post is a somewhat wonky exploration of how different kinds of forecasters and techniques fared in the US presidential election. I banged it out in an hour, so please excuse errors and—better yet—point them out t...| Braff & Co.
Like many readers of this blog, I’ve been keeping an eye on the set of prediction markets where people are trading contracts related to the US presidential election, now less than three weeks away. The site Election Bett...| Braff & Co.
Nate Silver’s new book, On the Edge, is an ambitious annex to his 2012 book, The Signal and the Noise, this time featuring star-studded interviews and a shiny new set of metaphors.| Braff & Co.
Watching all the improbable plot twists in the US presidential election, one might be tempted to buy a Costco-sized tub of popcorn, anticipating that the final third of our 2024 forecasting contest will be equally suspen...| Braff & Co.
The most romantic proposition in the 2024 forecasting contest was resolved today, albeit in the least romantic direction.| Braff & Co.
When we last posted, the US presidential race was entering Act II. By that, we mean Act II of XLIX. Events are faithfully following the archetypal storytelling frameworks, but from top to bottom instead of across.| Braff & Co.
Say you're trying to predict the outcome of the US presidential race. Will Joe Biden be reëlected? You may ask one person out of these three:| Braff & Co.
Like Dorothy and Toto, our 2024 forecasting contest cannot stay away from Kansas for long.| Braff & Co.
I live in an old house with lots of weird technology grafted onto it, at least on the inside. We run air conditioning, recharge our mobile phones, and light up our ridiculous smart fridges with electricity bought from Rh...| Braff & Co.
Students at the most selective US universities—along with prospective students, and everyone’s parents, and let’s throw in taxpayers—have been noticing what's happening on campus.| Braff & Co.
A casual reader of this blog may think, “Man, that Adam Braff sure spends a lot of time and energy on forecasting.”| Braff & Co.
Every day, people ask me: “When will AI eliminate the very last knowledge worker’s job?” And by “people” I mean the voices in my head.| Braff & Co.
Earlier this month, in a disconcertingly empty office building in Cambridge, Massachusetts, I stood next to the Union Jack and took an oath of loyalty to King Charles III. In my left hand was a hardcover copy of George O...| Braff & Co.
Earlier this month, a genie conjured up beers, biceps, and Post Malone on national television. This act of generosity touched hundreds of people—not because it really happened, but because it resolved Proposition #1 in o...| Braff & Co.
On the side of the final-four bracket that doesn’t include groundhogs and Bernedoodles, we have an important question to resolve. Who’s better at seeing the future: people or machines?| Braff & Co.
It looks like 2024 will be a good year for USA Olympians, Christopher Nolan, and fugitives from the International Criminal Court. On the flip side, things aren’t looking up for Anheuser-Busch, romantic Swifties, or third...| Braff & Co.
There’s a person reading this who already knows the names of the big winners in this quadrennial year: the future holders of the presidency, Olympic gold, and the America’s Cup. Could that person be you? One of my hedge ...| Braff & Co.
As is traditional at this time of year, I recently sat down to write the propositions for the Narcissist Forecasting Contest. Both to hype up my forecasters and to exert as little of my own effort as possible, I crowdsou...| Braff & Co.
Here’s how to read The Fund, Rob Copeland’s gossipy profile of the hedge fund Bridgewater Associates. At the end of each chapter, ask yourself: assuming all this is true, how much would they have to pay me to work there ...| Braff & Co.
When we last checked in on the 8th annual Narcissist Forecasting Contest, we were wondering if the FDA would withdraw approval for the blockbuster drug Ozempic and its kin. On reflection, this prospect was so unlikely th...| Braff & Co.
The medical history books will say that after COVID there came another strange wave of maladies: Ozempic finger, Ozempic face, Ozempic butt. Their effects were aesthetic—a droopy thinning-out of body parts belonging to p...| Braff & Co.
My family, knowing that I spent much of my boyhood lighting things on fire using the rays of the sun and a fresnel lens, gave me a Rösle butane torch for my birthday. Not being a crème brûlée guy, I use the torch mainly ...| Braff & Co.
The criminal trial of Sam Bankman-Fried was playing for barely a week when it got upstaged by more important world events.| Braff & Co.
You are probably familiar with the concept of ghosting: not the kind related to Halloween but “the practice of suddenly ending all communication and avoiding contact with another person without any apparent warning or ex...| Braff & Co.
George Santos, Hasan Minhaj, and ChatGPT walk into a bar. They order a round of drinks. The bartender slides the check in front of them.| Braff & Co.
One of the best pizzas you ever had was consumed at home in April 2020.| Braff & Co.
Like many Americans, I’ve been working multiple jobs in the post-pandemic era. One of these is to drive an irregularly scheduled shuttle between Providence and New York City.| Braff & Co.
Over the past weekend, did all your data-loving friends stop returning your calls? Were they last seen on Thursday afternoon, reading and re-reading OpenAI’s announcement that it would soon be rolling out an analytical p...| Braff & Co.
Take this short quiz to see if this book review is right for you:| Braff & Co.
I was of three minds, Like a tree In which there are three blackbirds. —Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird| Braff & Co.
Having a sideline as an adjunct lecturer means you never know what, or whom, you will be called upon to teach next.| Braff & Co.
It feels like years since Damar Hamlin was resurrected on live TV, the six-pound Toadzilla was discovered in Australia, and we kicked off our annual forecasting contest. But all those things happened in January. Since th...| Braff & Co.
In early March 2020, with the pandemic lapping at our shores, my wife took the next logical step beyond stocking up on hand sanitizer. Believing that the feds would soon dynamite the bridges and tunnels that might allow ...| Braff & Co.
In case you’re interested in dogs that don’t bark, one major non-event of the upcoming weekend will be Apple’s decision to not (yet) remove TikTok from the App Store, which will resolve the associated proposition in our ...| Braff & Co.
You’re standing in Moynihan Hall of the refurbished Penn Station, weighing your improbably good food options.| Braff & Co.
Long ago, in a faintly remembered era called “January 2023,” we asked ChatGPT to try its luck in our annual forecasting contest. This got us exactly nowhere. The ChatGPT corpus ran only through 2021, making that particul...| Braff & Co.
Every time I look at my investment portfolio, I feel like I could really use some oracle bones. As we have known since the Shang dynasty, heating up an ox scapula produces cracks that enable you to see the future. If all...| Braff & Co.
Do you get achy bones when it’s about to rain? Do co-workers pester you about how to fill out their March Madness brackets? Have you always suspected, without trying to make a big deal about it, that you have the gift of...| Braff & Co.
Welcome to a brand new year: time to hit the overcrowded gym, throw out your refined carbohydrates, and get ready for the 8th annual Narcissist Forecasting Contest.| Braff & Co.
Are 111 heads better than one? The answer depends on whether the last thing you read was James Surowiecki on the wisdom of crowds or Charles Mackay on the madness of crowds.| Braff & Co.
According to the American Psychological Association, rationalization is “an ego defense in which apparently logical reasons are given to justify unacceptable behavior that is motivated by unconscious instinctual impulses...| Braff & Co.
The heavy hitters have been eyeing curveballs all year, piles of money have been lit on fire, and there are just three more games to be played.| Braff & Co.
The young partner from McKinsey’s Frozen Head Recovery and Transformation Practice escorted me down the hall in a suburban office park.| Braff & Co.
Last month you may have come across this cheekily interactive New York Times feature on the phenomenon of bosses spying on remote workers through their keyboards and webcams. The first character we meet is a “longtime fi...| Braff & Co.
