Crowdsourcing a Forecast? Ran a Twitter contest about Microsoft in Smartphones

I had an idea on Twitter last week and thought it would be a fun little game among some of my most dedicated followers and a way to give away a nice little freebie gift. Since I have been quite public about how I think the Nokia and Microsoft partnership will fare in the coming early years (in other words, I have been extremely pessimistic about it all) and I have said in public I expect Nokia to have about 8% market share in smartphones end of 2012 when all their smartphones should be running the Microsoft Windows Phone based operating system, and that Microsoft overall would only have about 10% at that time, I wondered what would be the guesstimates of my followers on Twitter.

So I asked my followers to submit their guesses. Almost immediately the response was better than I expected, to I refined the contest, to give the guess to the accuracy of one tenth of one percent (ie 8.4% or 12.3% etc). Also as I would be giving away a prize (free ebook) to the person who guessed the closest, I also said that any one number % guess, would be given on a first-come, first-served basis, so whoever was first to claim a given exact percentage, would have that number and be the only one obviously eligible to win the prize at that specific number. Any Twitter follower would be allowed only one guess. And as some started to request numbers that were already taken, I would then tell them which were the nearest numbers above and below their request, that were still available.

This was all fine and good until about 120 entries had come in over the weekend and I found that several whole ranges of numbers were taken. First to go were 7.x and 8.x, soon also 5.x, 6.x and 9.x went. By Tuesday morning we had over 150 entries and all numbers from 4.6% to 13.4% were taken and 14.x also was all gone.

I had also thought that this would be an interesting test of crowd-sourcing, the wisdom of the crowd, Alan Moore's 'Nobody is as clever as everybody' etc. But I had unwittingly spoiled part of the precision of this 'instrument' in forcing people to pick unique numbers. Why didn't I let people pick multiple times the same number if they wanted, I could have easily given them each the winning prize as its an ebook haha, no real printing costs for me, etc.

I'm sorry I was not thinking. This could have been far more revealing if we had been able to see where the guesses were clustered, if many for example picked 8.4% and 8.6 % or whatever..  And by Tuesday, so many of the numbers were gone, that some who wanted a number, were now forced many whole numbers away to the 'nearest available' number.

What I did do, was to back on Twitter to see all submissions, to try to collect the 'first guesses' ignoring if those were taken, but unfortunately there were so many comments that I couldn't get back to the beginning. That would have been probably more telling than just this list we have now.

So, first, for all who have already entered (or who may still want to enter) here is the official entry list of all who had submitted a guess and gotten a number by Tuesday 8 November 2011. What is the market share in smartphones of all Microsoft based operating systems sold in Q4 of 2012, including Nokia phones running Microsoft (but ignoring all non-Microsoft Nokia phones such as running Symbian, MeeGo etc) and any other smartphones running Windows but ignoring tablets and PCs. Each entrant is up to accuracy of one tenth of one percent. The names here are the Twitter handle and in parenthesis the name on TW behind that handle. The official entries are:

Tweetvote of what will be Microsoft Windows Phone 7 market share at end of Q4 of 2012, a little over a year from now:

0.4% - @3GDoctor (David Doherty)

0.5% - @MyInnerSperse (Bruce Burke)

0.9% - @tonyfish (Tony Fish)

1.0% - @BenFletch (Ben Fletcher)

1.1% - @Dutchcowboy (M Lens-FitzGerald)

1.4% - @gibtang (Gibson Tang)

1.6% - @josiefraser (Josie Fraser)

1.7% - @miusuario (Omar Moya)

1.8% - @r_g (Ged Carroll)

1.9% - @lukabirsa (Luka Birsa)

2.0% - @rionov (Rio Novrianto)

2.1% - @jmacdonald (Jonathan MacDonald)

2.6% - @simplynand (simplynand) - said 2.63%

2.7% - @eldarmurtazin (Eldar Murtazin)

2.9% - @Starlo777 (Steve D)

3.1% - @dougsymon (Douglas Symon)

3.2% - @devonseaglass (Ian James Cox)

3.3% - @edent (Terence Eden)

3.4% - @jakublipinski (Jakub Lipinksi)

3.5% - @virtopeanu (Dan Virtopeanu)

3.6% - @ClaireBoo (Claire Boonstra)

3.7% - @cibyr (Ian Cullinan)

3.8% - @mobilezeitgeist (Heike Sholz)

3.9% - @AgileArtem (AgileArtem)

4.1% - @sdemidov (Sergey Demidov)

4.2% - @ilocco (ilicco elia)

4.3% - @c1rrus (James Nash)

4.4% - @Pierkka (Pirkka Poole)

4.5% - @mobilesguruji (Ankush Kala)

4.6% - @juhariis (Juha Riissanen)

4.7% - @yeswap (Dennis Bournique)

4.8% - @Guamguy (Guamguy)

4.9% - @InvulgoSoft (Thomas Andersen)

5.0% - @kaimac (kai macmahon)

5.1% - @sirraH77 (Harri Viitamaki)

5.2% - @jamescameron (jamescameron)

5.3% - @sbepstein (steve epstein) - said 5.25%

5.5% - @hockamania (Daryl Goh)

5.6% - @Miss_mobile_web (anne thomas)

5.7% - @ian_martin (Pablo Medeiros)

5.8% - @NOMOSDesign (NOMOS Design)

5.9% - @tom866mot (Tomislav Tomic)

6.0% - @Madijn (Michael N)

6.1% - @HarveiBeili (Harvey Beilinsohn)

6.2% - @russellbuckley (Russell Buckley)

6.3% - @kapten_grogg (Anders Mellqvist)

6.4% - @michielb (Michiel Berger)

6.5% - @DHDe22ers (Dick)

6.6% - @PinnacleSalesUK (Pinnacle Software) - Said 6.55

6.7% - @ei_HMcCarthy (Hugh McCarthy)

6.8% - @leeomar (Lee Omar)

6.9% - @ju_key (Uwe Kaminski)

7.0% - @arnozinho (arnozinho)

7.1% - @r0gu (Rogu)

7.2% - @CWmobil (Computerwoche Mobil)

7.3% - @OWStarr (Oliver Starr)

7.4% - @bookmeister (bookmeister)

7.5% - @fribeiro1 (Fernando Ribeiro)

7.6% - @drostyboy (steven)

7.7% - @rabschi (Cornelius Rabsch)

7.8% - @Rock35 (Rock35)

7.9% - @nokleby (ChristiAN)

8.0% - @slackerninja (rishi alwani)

8.1% - @suarezjulian (Julian Camilo Suarez)

8.2% - @yousifabdullah (Yousif Abdullah)

8.3% - @phil_linttell (phil Linttell)

8.4% - @reyes (Mauricio Reyes)

8.5% - @NeilMilliken (Neil Milliken)

8.6% - @Teemu (Teemu Kurppa)

8.7% - @anshelsag (Anshel Sag)

8.8% - @baranyurdagul (baran yurdagul) - said 8.75%

8.9% - @O_NunoPereira (Nuno Pereira)

9.0% - @3fs (ThirdFrameStudios)

9.1% - @bhuwan (bhuwan)

9.2% - @wpruvot (Wandrille Pruvot)

9.3% - @ThatChrisSmith (Chris Smith)

9.4% - @kojacker (kojacker)

9.5% - @cybronics (Jerome Derozard)

9.6% - @indigo102 (Martin Wilson)

9.7% - @_sommer (Hrvoje Sommer)

9.8% - @jainrounak (Rounak Jain)

9.9% - @tomdunbar (Tom Dunbar)

10.0% - @mbrit (Matt Baxter-Reynolds)

10.1% - @Eshanse (Esben Hansen)

10.2% - @mattjbush (matthew bush)

10.3% - @ccoc (Colin Crawford)

10.4% - @khouryrt (Rita El Khoury)

10.5% - @karipelaaja (Harri Manninen)

10.6% - @barbaraballard (Barbara Ballard)

10.7% - @Pishba (Patty Hartwell)

10.8% - @eccella (Nigel Alexander)

10.9% - @AndyTow (Andy Tow)

11.0% - @rodrigottr (Rodrigo Arantes)

11.1% - @fneuf (fneuf gazouille)

11.2% - @aktiwary (Ashutosh Tiwary)

11.3% - @punkedge (Pankaj Bengani)

11.4% - @_wideangle (Juha Meronen)

11.5% - @wishblizz (wishblizz)

11.6% - @bartfuzzle (Bart Fussel)

11.7% - @garelaos (Gareth Jones)

11.8% - @pannkaz (Pankaj Kapoor)

11.9% - @raimundo (raimundo vazquez)

12.0% - @syamant (syamant sandhir)

12.1% - @seetu (Sitaram Shastri) also said 30M is number

12.2% - @billboxer (william fasse)

12.3% - @Mawkins (Mark Hawkins)

12.4% - @bernardosanchez (bernardosanchez)

12.5% - @janole (Jan Ole Suhr)

12.6% - @gcameron00 (Graham Cameron)

12.7% - @Markies (Mark de Kock)

12.8% - @cybette (Carol Chen)

12.9% - @teemuo (Teemu Ollilainen)

13.0% - @lesanto (Glenn Le Santo)

13.1% - @asrialbaker (asrialbaker)

13.3% - @bmkatz (Brian Katz)

13.4% - @mjjagpal (mj)

13.6% - @AlexeiBoiko (Alexei Boiko)

13.7% - @Haaza (Marko Haaja)

13.8% - @gcsanda (Gergely Csanda)

13.9% - @anti_nomy (Mike)

14.0% - @abouillot (Alexandre Bouillot)

14.1% - @darlingbuds (Andrew Darling)

14.2% - @lassi (Lassi Kurkijarvi)

14.3% - @kmtee (KM Tee) said 14.32%

14.4% - @MBBdV (muriel devillers)

14.5% - @tim_harrap (Tim Harrap)

14.6% - @talakem (talakem)

14.7% - @kimmolehto (Kimmo Lehto)

14.8% - @IzanCoomonte (Izan Coomonte Suarez)

14.9% - @markjenniskens (Mark Jenniskens)

15.0% - @slackerninja (rishi alwani)

15.1% - @RamziD (RamziDziri)

15.3% - @sonicnights (Neil Ramsay)

15.4% - @kaienmy (kaien)

16.1% - @thompabompa (Thomas Strindberg)

16.2% - @chip_mk (Petar Chichev)

16.4% - @spurcola (philip bland)

17.0% - @Rhymo (Raimo van der Klein)

17.1% - @adrahon (Alex Drahon)

17.5% - @zahidtg (Zahid Ghadialy)

17.6% - @mauricioiwata (Mauricio Iwata)

18.5% - @laowaijoha (joha)

18.6% - @verydeepsleep (Wyn)

18.7% - @msantoni82 (MS)

19.4% - @simon_staffans (Simon Staffans)

19.6% - @theovalich (Theo Valich) - said 15.1% WP7 and 4.5% WP8

19.8% - @Hari0o7 (Hari Gupta)

19.9% - @hephail (Werner Egipsy Souza)

20.0% - @autiomaa (Daniel Schildt)

21.6% - @RussB (Russell Beattie)

25.0% - @vincente @Vincent everts)

25.1% - @aape (Aape Pohjavirta)

25.2% - @teppohudson (Teppo Hudson)

27.7% - @barneyc (Barney Craggs)

28.2% - @tkoola (Timo Koola)

29.3% - @tjytweets (TJ)

35.0% - @hardeep1singh (Hardeep Singh)

43.2% - @snagdragon (ihatesheeps)

There are also guesses entered by the following people, who had selected a number which was already taken (and had not yet sent their next requested number):

@albertcuesta (Albert Cuesta)

@Ew4n (Ewan MacLeod)

@KenLittle (Ken Little)

@miusario (Omar Moya)

@pvesterbacka (Peter Vesterbacka)

@stephen_oman (Stephen Oman)

@ZecaJacintho (Zeca Jacintho)

The prizes? The person who has the nearest number will get three free ebooks of their choice from my ebooks series as published by TomiAhonen Consulting, ie my Pearls ebooks and my statistics volumes the TomiAhonen Almanac and TomiAhonen Phone Book (and any other similar ebooks published by the time the contest results are finalized)

The two nearest guesses who just missed, will both also get one free ebook as the runners-up.

The actual formal 'official' number will be based on the following formula - the total smartphone unit sales of Q4 will be the average of the four analyst houses reporting regularly smartphones sales per quarter ie IDC, Gartner, Canalys and Strategy Analytics. The actual units sold/shipped (no distinction to be made) of Microsoft OS based smartphones will not be the number reported by anyone else except any of those four analyst houses so any mysterious measurements by for example Microsoft or Nokia (like Google announcing its 'activation' numbers) will not bring any subject of controversy. Not all of the 4 analyst houses report OS market shares, but we'll take Microsoft market share as the reported unit number of those of the four analyst houses who actually do report it either in units or as market share percentage (calculating the unit sales out from that). Again, the average of those reported.

So it won't be 'Tomi's number' haha. it will be the mathematical average as reported by those big 4 analyst houses.

Now what 'did' we learn from the votes. The lowest vote is 0.4% and the highest is 43.2% but the average is only 10.1%. Remember the 'conventional wisdom' by many analysts and press seems to expect Microsoft in the 20% and above ranges. Out of all who guessed only 6% felt comfortable Microsoft would exceed 20% by the end of next year, so this very unscientific (and no doubt skewed) result seems to suggest a nasty 'realty check' to the Nokia and Microsoft watchers sometime after Christmas next year haha..

Obviously one has to point out that the sample is skewed in two ways - first, that most who read my Tweets tend to be rather seriously interested 'mobilistas' and very interested in mobile. The more the Nokia+Microsoft partnership results in pure 'mobile-like' and non-USA patterns of sales and adoption, the more this group might understand the likely future, but if the Microsoft partnership pushes Nokia products more to an 'PC-like' (Microsoft legacy) pattern and perhaps business users and USA success, then my followers will perhaps be biased against that kind of pattern.

Another obvious bias is me - my followers have heard my repeated vitriol against the Nokia Microsoft strategy and some may have had their minds 'poisoned' or at least influenced by me. A random sampling of mobile experts who do not follow me or read my blog would very likely score an higher expectation of Microsoft's chances, on average.

Yet it is very interesting. Over 150 guesses made and the vast majority expect Nokia and Microsoft combined to be somewhere in the 6% to 14% range of market share - well well below the total of what Nokia and Microsoft had independently just nine months ago, before Stephen Elop put Nokia in its death-spiral and abandoning most of its market share.

If you want to make your entry and join this fun game, send me a Twitter comment in the open (not a private Twitter message) ie start your Tweet with @tomiahonen and send in your number you'd like to take - please check in the above list that your intended number is not already taken. I will accept entries until the end of November 2011. Then we have to wait a bit over 13 months to find out who was most accurate in forecasting Microsoft's smartphone market share for Q4 in 2012.

 

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