Nothing focuses the betting mind like the possiblity of a statistical edge. PicksPal.com is an otherwise innocuous Silicon Valley-based Web site for sports fans that enables money-less betting on a wide range of sports. But, according to an effusive TechCrunch, the site has discovered that a small subset of its 100,000 registered users tend to predict sports outcomes with uncanny accuracy. So, beginning next Tuesday, the site will launch Genius Picks. "For $10, users can get access to the collective wisdom of the 30 best PicksPal players over the previous five weeks in a given sport, and get five predictions on upcoming games," reports TechCrunch's Michael Arrington, who believes that the combination of open, user-generated predictions "could change the way we predict sporting event outcomes. And it could therefore have a big impact on sports betting markets."

The news has set off a first-rate debate on the relative merits of the "wisdom of the crowds" among an interesting mix of Web 2.0 loyalists and Vegas-hardened statisticians. "I never bought into the ‘wisdom of crowds’ thing," writes one TechCrunch reader. "And for the same reasoning I _have_ always bought into the ‘wisdom of extremely competent crowds’ thing." Naturally, others are quick to wonder about applying the principle elsewhere: "How about emulate the site for stock markets experts?" asks A Wannabe Blogger.

The Browser suspect that it's quite possible that the ease of access and transparency of sites like PicksPal will improve information flow in sports markets, and others. But we are dubious it will somehow confer an advantage on those who pay $10 for a Genius Pick, or otherwise greatly alter the flow of gambling or investing cash flows. As another savvy TechCrunch reader points out: "So the wisdom of the public as generally good at rating their chances of winning.... [But] this is no good for actually making money on the win pool though since it’s a tote - it’ll never pay more than the percentage, combined with the totes rake you lose." We think that means that the odds will always adjust to the prevailing public opinion. It's like they always told us: In gambling, the house always wins.