Post Your 2012 Predictions Here

[Brown]

20. Canada will anounce that the penny will be phased out.

From the CTV Newsennies will still have value but will no longer be minted. Note that this measure was a COMPLETE secret to everyone, yet I foresaw it successfully. There is no retrofitting or poetic license here. This one's an on-the-nose hit.

To all you so-called psychics out there: BEAT THAT!!

Sure, phasing out had been talked about before, but it had never been done. The folly of minting a coin that cost more to make than it was worth had been recognized for a while, but I predicted that 2012 would be the year that the announcement to phase out the penny would be made, and I was right. The fact that the news came as a big surprise to many in Canada suggests that there was no obvious expectation 2012 would be the year.

Leaving aside the fact that many of my predictions in this thread have already come to pass (and 2012 is not even one-quarter over), this particular prediction stands out. I will crow about this prediction because it was totally legitimate and spot-on. (That's not to say that there wasn't a bit of a "trick" in making it, however.) You will be hard pressed to find any "professional" psychics who can do better than this.

This prediction continues to amaze. It was specific, and right, and (according to media reports) a total surprise to the public. After the prediction was made, Canada stopped minting pennies and this month removed them from circulation. For some people who may be wondering why pennies are no longer given as change, the Canadian government has a helpful web site: Phasing out the Penny. Not only was my prediction right, it was nearly word-for-word accurate, using the same terminology as my prediction:

In Economic Action Plan 2012, the Government announced it would phase out the penny from Canada’s coinage system.

I hope to be able to speak at the next Amazing Meeting about the remarkable success I had as a predictor of the future:

I have now prepared a presentation in which I have identified ten of the most important techniques that I used (and some that I did not use). This presentation would be suitable for the Amazing Meeting.

There is nothing special in the notion that there are ten techniques; indeed, one early draft of the presentations identified fewer than ten techniques, and a later draft identified more than ten. Also, there is considerable overlap of the techniques, and they often work together in concert. I plan to explain how several of the techniques worked to produce a solid--even stunning--hit. But when you deconstruct how the prediction was made, the hit doesn't seem quite so stunning after all.

If indeed I give this presentation at the 2013 Amazing Meeting, there is likely to come a point in which I will ask the audience to confirm that the predictions in question were were made, and really were published, prior to the events predicted. "Are there any forum members out there?" I might ask, and then ask for forumites to confirm: "These were REAL predictions, right?"

I have since decided that two of the techniques are so closely related that they really ought to count as a single technique. So, in my current version of the presentation anyway, there are nine basic non-psychic techniques for being a good predictor.

 

[Spektator]

(snip)
5. Mickey Rooney's final movie appearance will turn out to have been in "The Muppets."
(snip)

This has come to pass, as has Mr. Rooney. His obituary in Variety confirms that his last movie appearance was in that film.