Why hive minds might work

I watched a video on hive minds.

I found it interesting, I'm going to try and capture why I found it interesting and try and do some research later. I'd be interested in any research articles people might know about it. There is a wiki page, I've not dug into the articles linked yet.

I suspect it is overblown but it has some interesting facets to it compared to other ways of aggregating knowledge (such as prediction markets or voting or meetings). My initial thoughts were:

1. Continuous feedback. You can get an idea of what other people think. If people are dead set against your first option, you might choose to put your weight against your second option, updating your knowledge.

2. The updating is anonymous and risk free, so you don't have to worry about losing face or money.

3. You can see how many people are updating, so you can gauge the strength of their beliefs and update your own.

It lacks any form of reputation or weighting on past accuracy. I'm not sure if that is a positive or negative.