Following the Related Press’ name earlier at present that President-elect Joe Biden had received victory over incumbent Donald Trump within the U.S. presidential race, the 174 year-old group — which has been masking elections since 1848 — subsequently printed their name on the Ethereum and EOS blockchains, triggering no less than one prediction market consequence. 

Nevertheless, some have expressed skepticism concerning the validity of utilizing such a name as an oracle, elevating broader questions on certainty and determinism in good contract-based prediction markets. 

On Oct. 15, 2020 Everipedia — the for-profit encyclopedia and blockchain firm — introduced they’d be supplying information signed with cryptographic proofs that the information got here from the AP to EOS and Ethereum with using infrastructure supplied by the Chainlink oracle community. 

“We can be making historical past as the primary to immediately signal AP’s race calls and publish for blockchain use,” stated Everipedia VP of Enterprise Improvement David Liebowitz in a press launch. 

Following the announcement YieldWars, the gamified yield farming and aggressive prediction market platform, launched a Trump/Biden prediction market utilizing the AP information as an oracle. The market attracted over $250,000 in bets in simply two days. 

In an interview with Cointelegraph, one of many nameless co-founders of YieldWars, Owl, stated that Everipedia’s collaboration with the AP was a pure alternative:

“When researching the choice(s) extra, it grew to become clear that it was our greatest possibility. AP is sort of arguably essentially the most trusted information outlet on the planet and being an nameless mission, we knew that to ensure that folks to belief us we wanted a definitive supply.”

Nevertheless, critics — lots of whom seem like supporters of Donald Trump’s claims that the election has not been definitively determined — have argued that the AP is inadequate as an oracle. 

Stated one Twitter user, 

“Let yourselves down there, placing falsehoods on the blockchain as truth is a harmful street, he might go on to win it, however recounts and courtroom proceedings are in motion, so how can or not it’s on the blockchain as truth.”

One other person, sporting the moniker “cryptoilet,” asked, “So am i able to additionally write onto the blockchain that i’m President now?”

Owl, nonetheless, thinks that future races and predictions markets will be capable to provide a extra sturdy assortment of oracles, ideally quashing these complaints:

“Sooner or later, I envision there being a number of oracles like AP and I predict within the subsequent election that we’ll see that. Having plenty of trusted oracles settling markets ought to settle nearly all disputes.”