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We haven't seen the worst of what gambling and prediction markets will do

derekthompson.org

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Re: We haven't seen the worst of what gambling and prediction markets will do

#401

Post by zeroonetwothree »

pcthrowaway wrote: post #242
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> unless you're also not hiring anyone from companies like Amazon, Meta, and all the other tech companies that have also ruined/preyed on society in their own way just as much as any gambling app has It depends on the role. If you were doing something deeply technical, or facing customers who loved your work, I think you get a pass. If you were building features nobody outside your company is thankful for, you need t…

Building part of a killing machine isn't really something you can defend, even if you weren't working on the part of the machine that does the killing.

We all live in glass houses

Re: We haven't seen the worst of what gambling and prediction markets will do

#402

Post by quesera »

cryptoegorophy wrote: post #53
hydroflame7 wrote: post #4

'Predictions' market is the silliest loophole for gambling. Honestly, more surprised Fanduel, DraftKings and the like who have spent millions on lobbying and buying licenses, are not fighting tooth and nail on this.

And there is a kid’s legal version! They sell them in Walmart - Pokémon packs. I don’t know how any of this is legal in a civilized country.

LEGO does it too, with "mystery minifigure" packages.

I watch kids squeezing the polybags trying to find an identifying bump or edge, hoping to either get the one they want, or at least not get one they already have.

And yeah, baseball cards are/were no different, going back decades.

But at least the financial loss here is constrained to a few dollars. I don't think these are the gateway drugs to gambling problems, but they are definitely exploitative.

Re: We haven't seen the worst of what gambling and prediction markets will do

#403

Post by hunterpayne »

pcthrowaway wrote: post #242
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> unless you're also not hiring anyone from companies like Amazon, Meta, and all the other tech companies that have also ruined/preyed on society in their own way just as much as any gambling app has It depends on the role. If you were doing something deeply technical, or facing customers who loved your work, I think you get a pass. If you were building features nobody outside your company is thankful for, you need t…

Building part of a killing machine isn't really something you can defend, even if you weren't working on the part of the machine that does the killing.

Do me a favor. Go to Ukraine with someone who worked on the Javelin anti-tank missile and tell them that. I bet the guy who worked on the Javelin will be considered a hero. You will likely receive a kick in the balls for ever daring to criticize him or repeating your post. Your take is naive in the extreme.

Re: We haven't seen the worst of what gambling and prediction markets will do

#404

Post by krick »

echelon wrote: post #376
krick wrote: post #291

All this fearmongering about decision markets lately is really annoying. If you don't like gambling — just don't gamble and shut the fuck up. It's not for you to decide if gambling is good or bad for me. If I am stupid enough to bet anything on an outcome that clearly depends on a person who could, potentially, be betting as well — it's my problem, not yours.

Gambling outside of equities and securities is a negative externality. (Investment in startups, goods, etc. makes the economy spin. Investing in what hoop a ball goes through does no good at all.) This puts plenty of people who shouldn't gamble into debt and lowers their societal fitness. The other side of the gamble is probably losing on average too. Only the house and infrequent insiders win. These private companie…

It is not for you to decide what one should or shouldn't do. Plenty of people want to gamble, and don't give a fuck of what you think they should or shouldn't do. And they are right: it's none of your fucking business.

Kalshi and PolyMarket are doing something absolutely wonderful for those people (i.e. the only people who should care about these "prediction markets" at all): they actually make betting fair, which was impossible before. It is not impossible now, because in fact there are much better decentralized markets than these (basically all you need to make a completely decentralized betting platform are Ethereum contracts), but they are handier to use and hence more popular. But it was impossible with traditional gambling, where a bookmaker can set any odds and reject any bets.

Re: We haven't seen the worst of what gambling and prediction markets will do

#405

Post by zeroonetwothree »

socalgal2 wrote: post #194
jackfruitpeel wrote: post #88

The craziest thing here is that online gambling has been legal in the UK and Ireland for many years, and it's been such an obvious negative for those countries — and had been optimized brutally like any other tech product. When I moved over to the US a decade ago, I remember thinking 'well at least they're smart enough to have banned online gambling'. I am very pro personal liberties, but this stuff is weaponized to…

> I am very pro personal liberties, but this stuff is weaponized to prey on a subset of humanity This triggers thoughts. I don't like people being taken advantage of. At the same time, I like my personal liberties. It feels like you can spin this idea for nearly anything. Apparently 25% of alcohol sales are to alcoholics. That sucks and you could spin this has the liquor companies taking advantage, but I have tons of…

25% is too low, I think it's more like 80% of alcohol sales to drinkers that consume unhealthy amounts (whether that makes you an "alcoholic" or not is rather subject).

Re: We haven't seen the worst of what gambling and prediction markets will do

#406

Post by mcmcmc »

senordevnyc wrote: post #393
mcmcmc wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People who aren’t sociopaths might argue no one should be taking advantage of this, and that the people behind these services should be in prison

“People who disagree with me are sociopaths” doesn’t have the persuasive power you seem to imagine.

Strawmen aren’t particularly persuasive either. If I said “people who think murder is okay are sociopaths” would you have a problem?

Re: We haven't seen the worst of what gambling and prediction markets will do

#407

Post by arbitrary_name »

WalterBright wrote: post #390
michaelchisari wrote: post #379

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a trite response that doesn't engage with what was originally stated. The double edged brilliance/danger of capitalism is that it constantly opens up and moves into new markets. This is good, it means once the market determines a need, capital investment can accelerate production of the good that meets that need. But the flip side is it is coming for everything. Everything will be marketized and monetized and…

> we've seen concentrated wealth chip away at regulations for decades or even rip them apart overnight. There are more and more regulations every day. Oil refineries are being abandoned in California due to regulations so heavy there's no way for them to operate anymore. A friend of mine pulled his business out of California due to stifling regulations. > Everything will be marketized and monetized and accelerated an…

but not universally. oil refineries were causing asthma and environmental degradation.

them moving to another state is a regulatory failure (they shouldn't have another jurisdiction to move to, they should just operate without imposing negative externalities on others, spelling of the refineries).

what value is clean air? what is the value of a human life? how much is your attention worth?

these are questions that capitalism should not answer, but will nevertheless try to.

Re: We haven't seen the worst of what gambling and prediction markets will do

#408

Post by hunterpayne »

kakacik wrote: post #125
bluetidepro wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm in senior leadership, and have made it clear that anyone who has worked on these products should not be hired. Can't say I agree with that specific take (and find it a bit naive to be honest), unless you're also not hiring anyone from companies like Amazon, Meta, and all the other tech companies that have also ruined/preyed on society in their own way just as much as any gambling app has.

Morals start and stop somewhere, please don't attack people when they actually show some proper morals on this forum despite the employment of many members here.

It depends, if the morals cause more harm than they prevent, then no, the people espousing those "morals" don't deserve respect. They should be treated as naive which is what they are. Also, this is why we have the phrase, "virtual signaling" which specifically means a "moral" which causes more harm than good and seems to exist mostly to make the speaker seem more ethical than they actually are. Ignorance isn't a virtue and it shouldn't be treated as such.

Re: We haven't seen the worst of what gambling and prediction markets will do

#409

Post by hirvi74 »

rvz wrote: post #383
selcuka wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> have made it clear that anyone who has worked on these products should not be hired. That's a bit cruel. Sometimes tech workers don't have the luxury of choosing their workplaces. Also companies pivot. So, say, a cryptocurrency startup might have later become a gambling website.

Or an AI company acting as a casino with offers, boosted usage and limits to get you addicted into spending more tokens + credits on their digital slot machine which accepts 'tokens' as an exchange for 'promises of productivity' and 'intelligence'. If the output doesn't work, roll the dice again and spend more tokens.

Reminds me of the US healthcare system.

Re: We haven't seen the worst of what gambling and prediction markets will do

#410

Post by cam_l »

llmthrow0827 wrote: post #377
cortesoft wrote: post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personal liberties being overrated is a wild take. I feel like this is one of those things that is easy to say when it isn't something you are interested in being infringed upon. I would be curious if you would feel the same way if people were trying to ban something you want to do.

The idea that prioritizing the good of society, rather than one's personal desires, is considered a "wild take" is just a reflection of the culture of narcissism you live in.

Again, it is kind of crazy to take polar opposite views on this.

We mostly all grow up starting off with very few personal liberties and gaining them as we get older. We routinely take them away from people of they show they cannot be trusted with those liberties.

At present that process is fairly blunt, but it could be more nuanced. And that doesn't have to mean micro judging every interaction like China's social credit system. It could mean to allow freedoms wherever possible, but curtail those freedoms, where it has a negative impact on the rest of us.

And I think the best way of doing this is to put responsibility on the person or group causing the negative impact. So the gambler who embezzles money due to the addiction is just as responsible as the company who enables their addiction. Why cant we send both to jail? Or if there is not enough cause to deprive them of liberty, divert them from jail under probation. For a company that could mean enforcing open books and monitored communications, to make sure they are on the straight and narrow..

What we need to do though is to value both society and personal liberty.

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