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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

#901

Post by hgomersall »

margalabargala wrote: post #754
alephnerd wrote: post #744

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think there's a fair point to be made that Polymarket and similar sites are not fundamentally different from e.g. sports betting. > Strong regulation and legal consequences... Functionally, you are correct. But the crux of the issue is Polymarket and Kalshi (YC W19) have successfully argued that they are technically a platform that is democratizing "futures", and thus falls under the CFTC - not gambling. Nothing…

Which is of course a blatant abuse of our legal system, since they are doing nothing different than a casino's roulette or blackjack tables. "Red futures pay out at 2:1!" "Get your future here on whether the dealer's cards are higher than your own!"

Well the real insight here is that most "investing" is gambling.

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

#902

Post by thaumasiotes »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #855
stephenbez wrote: post #841

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There were other prediction markets like Intrade which was founded in 1999. I had coworkers who made a significant amount of money doing prediction market arbitrage for the 2012 election.

Intrade confuses me. It was illegal to use Intrade as a US citizen; in fact, some people I personally know who were into that scene had to maintain foreign bank accounts. What has changed, exactly, to make Polymarket legal where Intrade was not?

> What has changed, exactly, to make Polymarket legal where Intrade was not?

Polymarket opened a subbranch to handle US customers subject to US law. It's separate from Polymarket proper, which remains illegal for US citizens to use.

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

#903

Post by b345 »

yonixw wrote: post #514
bigyabai wrote: post #474

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Avoiding threats is non-optional for most Israeli journalists: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_journalists_killed_in_... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_Military_Censor

The reason no one responds to this list is because it's just one big gish gallop It's enough to see that you brought a link to the Israeli Military Censor to hint at a conspiracy, to understand who you're dealing with. But even if you go into the list, you'll see at the top that those who were shot were in the middle of the battle, where Israeli forces were surprised, to the point of massacre alongside civilians. And…

How does one say that a media worker is fair game, but a journalist is not? Both are classified as civilians under international law [1]. There are several airstrikes as the method of execution of these journalists as well. Good job cherry-picking the "favourable" examples. Also, I don't know what you're on about, but ICC is clearyly investigating Israeli war crimes of targeted journalist executions [3]. [1]: https://cpj.org/2023/10/journalist-casualties-in-the-israel-... [2]: https://cpj.org/data-methodology/ [3]: https://ifex.org/iccs-israel-palestine-investigation-will-in...

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

#904

Post by bnlxbnlx »

margalabargala wrote: post #797
saalweachter wrote: post #776

Earlier quoted context omitted.

... if I post a multi-paragraph long reply on the incentives created by betting on less infant homicide, am I going to find out that you understand perfectly well what the incentives are, and that was the entire point of your comment?

The actions people have taken in accordance with sports betting incentives is everything up to and including murder. The moral ideal the parent commenter associates with sports doesn't make that okay. If you have a point to make about how the age of the person being murdered means it's a categorical difference rather than a difference of degree I'll read it.

[dead]

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

#905

Post by plomme »

onion2k wrote: post #885
margalabargala wrote: post #624

As someone generally against gambling, I think there's a fair point to be made that Polymarket and similar sites are not fundamentally different from e.g. sports betting. The issue of bribing/threatening a sports player to throw a game has existed for over a century. It's not a new problem. The only thing special about Polymarket is the expansion of surface area. My preferred solution would be to just ban it all, or…

The existence of sports betting absolutely encourages people to throw matches and the existence of X betting absolutely encourages people to try to make X come about. The existence of something in no way encourages someone to commit a crime. That is victim blaming (if the concept of 'sport' can be a victim in this case). Sport and people who enjoy sport and people who enjoy gambling on sport don't have anything to do…

The existence of incentives can encourage crime. Why would anyone throw a game if there wasn't an upside? Nobody does anything for "free", and by creating a market you are providing liquidity leading to more "labor". A market for whether or not someone will die within x date sets up a financial incentive to kill that person. That is encouragement.

Saying that people who enjoy sport/ gambling "don't have anything to do with people who want to cheat and steal to gain materially from it" is a false dichotomy. It's nature. Ask yourself, would you throw a game in your sport of choice in a hobby league for 100 million dollars or whatever? Why not, no one gets harmed, it is a lot of money, it's not even a proper league. This applies to all levels of real world consequences, some people have a larger apetite for risk.

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

#906

Post by hhh »

gusgus01 wrote: post #777
margalabargala wrote: post #719

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I honestly don't know what your point is. The best I can come up with is: "The whole point of sports (in my opinion) is X good thing therefore betting on sports is more acceptable" Making bets on good things doesn't make the betting better. Just because Polymarket would allow you to bet money that the infant homicide rate goes down next year, doesn't mean it's a good thing to allow betting on.

His point is pretty simple. Sports don't inherently involve life or death, the whole point is that it's a competition that "respects each other's humanity", eg not a competition to the death. The same can't be said for war (bombings), which Polymarket allows betting on. Seems like a fundamental difference to me.

Sports just delay the death or move it to injury instead, and people bet on the injuries just the same.

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

#907

Post by LadyCailin »

Etheryte wrote: post #789
QuantumNoodle wrote: post #778

Still no idea how a polymarket is legal with all the insider trading opportunities.

Insider trading is not about fairness, it's about theft. If you insider trade on the stock market then, in a crude simplification, you steal profits from the company you have a fiduciary duty to, or some extension of that. It has nothing to do with a level playing ground, every trading company out there is trying to find information others can't and then trade on it.

What? How do you figure that? If I happen to know that my company is about to report very bad quarterly numbers, so I sell all my stock, then it tanks, I’ve just screwed whoever bought the stock, that in the most cases, will be some random people. The company does not benefit or hurt from stock prices unless they are buying back or issuing more stock.

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

#908

Post by kbrkbr »

margalabargala wrote: post #624

As someone generally against gambling, I think there's a fair point to be made that Polymarket and similar sites are not fundamentally different from e.g. sports betting. The issue of bribing/threatening a sports player to throw a game has existed for over a century. It's not a new problem. The only thing special about Polymarket is the expansion of surface area. My preferred solution would be to just ban it all, or…

Ban it on which grounds?

I have never in my life placed a sport bet, nor a polymarket bet. It strikes me as one of the dumbest things to do with your money and time.

But a lot of people seem to genuinely enjoy it. Gambling is part of human heritage. Regulate? Sure! Ban? I don't understand why

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

#909

Post by foobarish »

elicash wrote: post #660

Here's what a spokesperson for Polymarket said: "Polymarket condemns the harassment and threats directed at Emanuel Fabian, or anyone else for that matter. This behavior violates our terms of service and has no place on our platform or anywhere else. Prediction markets depend on the integrity of independent reporting. Attempts to pressure journalists to alter their reporting undermine that integrity and undermine the…

Polymarket should do the right thing. Unfortunately that means shut down entirely.

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

#910

Post by trashb »

fritzo wrote: post #628
scoofy wrote: post #589

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>These prediction markets incentivize the absolute worst in humanity. Just call it gambling. They aren't "prediction markets," they're just gambling. Gambling incentivizes the absolute worst in humanity.

We're not talking about gambling-as-addiction. We're talking about gambling as big players paying participants to throw fights, paying referees to call shots, and the players are the real world and the referees are journalists.

> We're not talking about gambling-as-addiction.

What makes you think this is not "gambling-as-addiction"?

It seems to me that these players, big or small, either have too much skin in the game or are compulsive gambling. To me the threats only make sense in that context.

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