[R] investing in ideas and decision support system experimentation

[davosjhitch]

we're looking for help to analyze some theoretical data-sets, essentially
outlining the progress of a given number of ideas over time, by using R in
conjunction with mysql databases.

let's say there is a game, and the point of the game is to find the most
worthwhile solution. let's extend that and say that this solution (or number
of solutions) need to be validated by a community. and that community can,
and has incentive to, promote ideas they think are good. they can do this in
multiple ways: investing $ into an idea, rating, commenting on, and adding
to the idea. 

we need to consider investments, including time of investment relative to
life of idea (and life of idea within the game's timeline), and risk taken
by the investor at time of investment. it may also be important to look at
investment amount trends (and possibly risk trends) in the context of time.
the ratio of investment count to unique investment count is also potentially
important. investments will not be entirely transparent, that is, a player
can see their percentage stake in an idea, but not necessarily how much the
other players have invested. 

let's say we also introduce a rating system and a way for initial ideas to
be 'enhanced.'

now we have multiple possibly estimable parameters that could tell us a
story and allow the 'best ideas' within our construct to bubble to the top. 

we need help approaching our data sets in a mathematical, algorithmic way.
we'd ultimately like help on how to make the decision of *what's the most
validated idea* but we don't know quite what distributions or statistical
models would be appropriate to use for comparative analyses. 

Possible values:
rating: scale from 1-10
investment: limited to individual's available holdings. holdings can range
from nothing to potentially billions (although at the time of this writing
hover around a max of 50,000).

Rules:
• ideas and their enhancements may both be rated, but only initial ideas
carry an investment value.
• time to submit ideas and vote on or invest in them is limited and that
limitation varies widely, but typically ranges from a few hours to many
weeks.

some things we're concerned about: 
favoring early adopters of ideas; avoiding players 'gaming the system' to
push an idea through; making investment importance relative to actual
support by the community, not just to larger investors. 
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