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Polymarket gamblers threaten to kill me over Iran missile story

timesofisrael.com

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Re: Polymarket gamblers threaten to kill me over Iran missile story

#231

Post by ipython »

idiotsecant wrote: post #156
ipaddr wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The insiders ruin a market like this. Unlike in sports/stocks there are no rules / punishment for insider trading.

Insider knowledge is essential, that's the whole point. Expose the most information possible. The real problem is people who try to influence the perception of outcome after the fact, like in this case. That is exactly the opposite of what is supposed to happen, but it's an unavoidable consequence of money being involved.

And hence why a prediction market including bets on the time and date of specific acts of violence… could present a moral hazard?

Re: Polymarket gamblers threaten to kill me over Iran missile story

#234

Post by riskable »

dominicrose wrote: post #84
fzil wrote: post #3

Man the moral degradation is off the charts. Prediction markets are easily the worst things to grace the internet by far and its not even close.

It still bothers me that it's banned in France, as many types of bets are. It's clear that nobody should risk money they can't afford to lose because that's what causes people to panic and behave in unpredictable ways. There should be ways to limit usage instead of a full ban or full authorization.

You've got the problem of prediction gambling framed incorrectly. It's not a matter of people losing money on bad bets, it's all about incentivized corruption and causing bad events (even catastrophic) so that a few may profit from them. It creates a perverse incentive for bad things to happen.

As the odds shift and the potential payout grows, prediction markets can essentially fund crimes of all kinds and cause disasters. Simple example: Imagine if the payout for someone being assassinated goes really high. Eventually, people will be placing bets on that person being assassinated and make sure it happens.

But it can get much worse than that! Imagine bets on dam collapse, buildings burning down, school shootings, even traffic accidents!

Prediction markets are a bad idea all around and should be banned everywhere. It should be a no-brainer. In fact, we should all place bets that the world leaders of countries that allow prediction markets will be assassinated!

Re: Polymarket gamblers threaten to kill me over Iran missile story

#235

Post by markus_zhang »

amarcheschi wrote: post #90
markus_zhang wrote: post #16

The gambling market is really bringing out the worst of us.

Years ago I was friend with a guy who played tennis at international levels (say top 1000 players). He regularly received death treats on social networks from people Gambling on him to win/lose (and the opposite happened)

This is insane. And I'm sure he doesn't want to hire bodyguards just for that. I hope he get over with it eventually.

Re: Polymarket gamblers threaten to kill me over Iran missile story

#236

Post by walthamstow »

Waterluvian wrote: post #43
fzil wrote: post #3

Man the moral degradation is off the charts. Prediction markets are easily the worst things to grace the internet by far and its not even close.

I think the idea behind a prediction market is pretty interesting, especially from an economics dataset point-of-view. And there's probably a lot of fun, harmless things to bet on. eg. "Will Conan lead an extravagent musical number at the Oscars?" But we're in an era of less and less responsible government oversight, so the whole thing naturally gets ruined if there's no guardrails to prevent peoeple without souls or…

You'd have to define extravagant first. No highly-regulated bookmaker in the UK would take that bet as written.

Re: Polymarket gamblers threaten to kill me over Iran missile story

#237

Post by Pay08 »

wmil wrote: post #184
bitmasher9 wrote: post #32

I don’t understand how this isn’t an immediate open and shut case for the police, assuming certain facts are verified independently. At the point that you’re making death threats to strangers you should be removed from civil society.

Reporters for The Times of Israel get a lot of death threats. I doubt this was the author's first one. So it's common and hard to prosecute because the person threatening is most likely in another country.

Especially since a lot of the quotes in the article sound like Google-translated Hebrew.

Re: Polymarket gamblers threaten to kill me over Iran missile story

#239

Post by alpineman »

markus_zhang wrote: post #16

The gambling market is really bringing out the worst of us.

Day trading too, and day trading led us down this path. Everyone is a gambler now. All morals are out the window.

On a side note, I find it incredible crypto trading/day trading/meme stock trading etc is not recognised as a bigger societal problem. It is 100% gambling and has the same negative externalities associated with it. But none of the tools gambling companies need to abide by (blocklists, warnings, limits, etc) apply to trading.

Re: Polymarket gamblers threaten to kill me over Iran missile story

#240

Post by zbentley »

zbentley wrote: post #111
epolanski wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're being dismissive and aggressive while dodging the questions. I routinely read the news, and I've been taught in school that critical reading involves doubting and focusing on facts, sources and proofs. No sources and verifiable proofs? No facts. Which is why the journalist put emphasis on his sources behind the missile attack: he knows how much sources and proofs are important. If you can fake screenshots, why…

Narrowly (skipping the question of whether this journalist should have included copies of evidence), GP is right: most journalists with verified source material quote it/assert what it contains, rather than linking or copying it verbatim. That’s how serious journalism has always worked. The reputation of a newsroom is understood to back up a reporter’s assertion about their source. Whether or not it should work that…

Addendum: A significant exception to that rule is when the journalist themselves is the source or an involved party in the story, e.g. when Jeffrey Goldberg from the Atlantic was included in a Signal chat with US government officials discussing war plans: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2025/03/trump-a...

In such cases, the journalist likely will publish raw data/screenshots, since they're functioning both as the source and the reporter.

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