zlacker

>>jimbob+(OP)
The older I get the more I hate gambling. When i was younger I tended to think "hey it's their choice" but i've realized how unfair our society is in terms of things like this.

Food, gambling, etc. are all backed by hordes of brilliant well paid people trying to get you to ruin your life so they make money. On the other side is just regular people like us stressed out trying to survive.

This isn't some "freedom" issue, it's an incredibly huge power asymmetry and I think "we the people" need protection from these forces

>>snapca+0M2
Agreed it feels like nothing more than taking advantaged of underprivileged people. There are likely people who have better means doing sports betting too but the way the ads are everywhere, I get mail from DraftKings even though I've never used it. Predatory is a good word for it. I feel similarly about state lotteries. The ads always manipulate people by making it seem like high-octane fun where people are just winning massive sums of money when the reality is you click a couple buttons and then allow random chance to decide whether or not your money disappears.

>>chanks+BR2
I thought online sports gambling was predatory and then I heard about this little fact:

If you win a lot, they'll effectively kick you off the platform, or make it non-economical to "play" by reducing your max bet sizes down to $1.

Even more diabolical, and clear evidence this shit should be outlawed completely: if you lose a lot, they will increase your maximum bet size

>>llamai+WX2
this pattern is a pretty defensible way to run a sports book. obviously you don’t want to accept large bets from someone who is doing arbitrage or consistently has inside information.

any business with variable prices works this way, if some mysterious person shows up to your car dealership and seems really excited to unload a bunch of used cars on you, you should feel nervous that you’re overpaying or something is wrong with the cars.

in my view the diabolical part is the predatory marketing tactics, and making gambling platforms ubiquitous.

i say this as someone who, like you, thinks legalizing sports betting is an ongoing disaster, but wants the strongest arguments against it.

>>currym+a33
People conceive of gambling as a game where the house typically has a slight edge through fees, information, or structural advantage in the game itself. I don't think this "ban if winning" behavior fits with people's model of "fairness" even in the intrinsically unfair world of gambling.

I think a very good first step legislation would be to require disclosure of this behavior. Public appetite would probably be very strong and it wouldn't run afoul of any of the other "people should be free to play games" arguments. You can play the game, but the owner of the game is required to disclose the rules of it.

>>llamai+e83
Everyone knows you'll get banned for counting cards at Blackjack, but they don't have to catch you red handed. They just have to catch you winning too much. Fixing sporting events is very lucrative and there are criminals doing it. Probably not in the NFL, but it definitely happens still in individual sports like boxing. A blanket policy of banning people who win a statistically impossible amount seems reasonable.

>>jeremy+bA3
It's not "a statistically impossible amount." That sounds like another great regulation to put in place though. If they can prove cheating or statistical unlikeliness then go ahead.

Regarding "everyone knows" - right! Does "everyone know" this about sports betting apps? If no, then they should. If yes, then no problem requiring unambiguous disclosures.

>>llamai+OD3
i think the number of random gamblers who get so consistently lucky that their bet size gets reduced, is probably quite small. this is because you usually lose money betting on sports, because sports betting is bad. it's mainly going to be people doing obvious arbitrage, and secondarily people who truly are professional gamblers.

this can also be spun in a positive way: if that does ever happen, the bookies are literally forcing someone to quit when they are ahead! isn't that considerate of them.

unfortunately, i think sports betting platforms just have many strong arguments that controlling bet sizes in this way is fine.

>>currym+cF3
Then no harm done in requiring that disclosure before people make an account!

Of course the entire business is built on creating the belief that a user can make a ton of money. Due to this mechanic, this is an actual lie.