The Quants and the Oscars: who's predicting what for the Academy Awards?

Thales of Miletus, the pre-Socratic philosopher who possibly gave us the immortal words “Know Thyself”, was one of those original geeks with his head quite literally in the clouds(once, studying the stars above, he fell into a well). He didn't care much for money, but, to prove that he could make some if he wished to, he once turned his attention to olive markets. He figured out that the coming season would see a bumper crop, rented the presses around his city and when his forecast came true, made a killing by renting them out at market price. Geeks do it by predicting it right.

Some of the cleverest quants these days have also been looking at stars, working on their numbers and making some predictions. On Oscar winners. Here's a quick guide to who they are and what they say. The big night—or morning, for us in India (6AM IST to be precise)—will tell us how right they were.

Google Google, with its dominant position in online search and an army of engineers who swear by numbers, has enviable real-time access to what the world is most interested in at any point of time. I am not too sure if that interest would translate into an award; after all, Hollywood tends to be interesting for people for a variety of reasons. Yet, a high search volume, close to Oscar date, could well reflect the chances of the nominees. Don't rule this out.

Google's Oscars go to
Best Picture : Argo
Actor: Hugh Jackman (Les Miserables)
Actress: Jennifer Lawrence (Silver Linings Playbook)
Director: Steven Spielberg (Lincoln)
More from Google

Nate Silver
Nate Silver became a kind of hero after he correctly predicted the outcome of the American presidential elections last year using nothing more than a laptop armed with his data and statistical models. He also wrote a fascinating book on the subject, The Signal and the Noise (reviewed here) which looks at the art and science of prediction across various fields, from the weather to earthquakes to the economy. It comes as no surprise that he has an interest in the Oscars; he tried predicting the awards twice before and met with decent success, but nothing close to the accuracy of his electoral predictions. So he tweaked his model, based on the lessons from getting the elections right. His blog has a fascinating explanation of the parallels between the two.

And Nate Silver's Oscars go to:
Best Picture: Argo
Best Director: Steven Spielberg (Lincoln)
Best Actor: Daniel Day-Lewis (Lincoln)
Best Actress: Jennifer Lawrence (Silver Linings Playbook)
More from Nate Silver

PredictWise
David Rothschild is a lot like Nate Silver: he prefers data and models over gut feel and his call on the American elections was almost spot on. He too has focussed his crystal ball on the Oscars before; last year, he correctly predicted that The Artist would win Best Picture. He uses prediction markets—Hollywood Stock Exchange,  Intrade, Betfair,  Betdaq,  Smarkets—and a game he developed to arrive at his own list. He is an economist with Microsoft Research.

And the PredictWise Oscars go to:
Best Picture : Argo
Best Director: Steven Spielberg (Lincoln)
Best Actor: Daniel Day-Lewis (Lincoln)
Best Actress: Jennifer Lawrence (Silver Linings Playbook)
More at PredictWise. And play the WiseQ Oscars Game here. It's for science!

Farsite
In the normal course, the Farsite team (check out their profiles here) uses a mix of data, statistical models and industry research to help businesses sell more. Over the last several weeks, though, they have been busy blogging about Hollywood, and specifically the Oscars, often sharing interesting insights and infographics on the subject. Their predictions are very much in line with what all others are saying.

And the Farsite Oscars go to:
Best Picture : Argo
Best Director: Steven Spielberg (Lincoln)
Best Actor: Daniel Day-Lewis (Lincoln)
Best Actress: Jennifer Lawrence (Silver Linings Playbook)
More at Farsite

Brandwatch
Brandwatch is yet another firm that is looking at the Oscars with the tools it usually reserves for businesses. It's different from most of the other predictions in our list, both in terms of approach and presentation. The tool it uses for The Credits, an online magazine of Motion Picture Association of America, was developed by one of its analysts, Edward Crook. It relies on the reviews and comments on the internet, from websites, blogs, Facebook, Twitter, online forums and so on. It overcomes the issue we mentioned with regard to Google search earlier, in that it takes into account the context of a comment as well as the sentiment it expresses. Its presentation might be confusing at first sight, but gets interesting after you spend a few minutes on it. Like Google, it's real time.

The Brandwatch Oscars go to:
Best Picture : Argo
Best Director: Steven Spielberg (Lincoln) / David O Russell (Silver Linings Playbook)
Best Actor: Daniel Day-Lewis (Lincoln)
Best Actress: Jennifer Lawrence (Silver Linings Playbook) / Jessica Chastain (Zero Dark Thirty)
(For Indian viewers looking for a desi connection, Brandwatch has (as of this writing) Life of Pi taking home three awards—Cinematography, Production Design and Visual Effects—tying with Lincoln for most awards in 2013.)
More at Brandwatch & The Credits.

And here are a few glimpses at the leading contenders.

Argo:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w918Eh3fij0[/youtube]

Lincoln:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiSAbAuLhqs[/youtube]

Silver Linings Playbook:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EI_3ywJLQio[/youtube]

Zero Dark Thirty:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYFhFYoDAo4[/youtube]

Life of Pi
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_J3cNY929k4[/youtube]

The thoughts and opinions shared here are of the author.