171–180 of 559 posts
These - especially Polymarket - should be illegal globally, as they incentivize people with power to manipulate the real world in horribly destructive ways to win a bet. I would not be surprised if people are murdered at some point to reap the payout of some related bet.
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That works in a world where everyone has equal knowledge and ability all of the time. Unfortunately, when that is not the case, sometimes humans have been known to take advantage of others. Due to this, every society on earth has created rules against various types of these situations.
That ^ is mostly true today.
If you have access to Polymarket or Kalshi, you have internet access. If you have internet access, you have access to more public knowledge than any previous generation.
Whether you use the internet to educate yourself or to gamble should be your choice. But starting today, it is no longer your choice in Spain.
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Next time there is a fire at your house I will say "he's an adult who should have been careful playing with dangerous things like fire, we shouldnt waste society's money and resources on saving his house"
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Its just a dark mirror episode. I can't imagine waking up and thinking "boy I'll really make some money if we kill Ayatollah Khomeini today"
The other side of that argument could be something like: "Dude, Khomeini better not be killed, it'd suck for me, an average iranian dude. I'd probably bet he dies so I can hedge my personal financial wellbeing for that case"
There are several things about the "these are good because people can hedge" argument which bother me and I struggle to disentangle them, but one facet is this: These betting-markets may be an inferior form of hedging, especially for non-trivial scenarios that are intended to evoke sympathy. (Civilizations have a lot of prior art in risk-management.)
For example, our statistical Iranian Dude may be much better-off using their bet-money for targeted purposes, like stocking up on useful imported durable goods that may become unavailable, ideally ones that would have resale value even if nothing bad happens.
The convenient online casino doesn't require any more than a vague sense of anxiety to bet, but that generality also limits how well you can use the money to protect yourself. If you're specifically worried about famine, better to arrange a future result of food, versus a payout of cash when nobody is selling food. If you're a factory that uses X as a manufacturing input and worried about a geopolitical blockade, you may be better off investing in alternate supplies or futures contracts for X.
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So I take it you have a problem with laws against murder, fraud, theft, etc. Aside from the government, who is it that you prefer to do judgment and enforcement?
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I'd say, because we as a group decide they are "bad".
Not sure how you can remove moral judgments from any discussion of banning
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There are bets everyday, so no matter when the ban is announced, you can always attach a conspiracy to it.
Most of Spain did not even know polymarket existed until a couple of days ago.
When I see people making money on Iran attacks, and murder of heads of state - it shows clearly something is deeply wrong with Polymarket. Its a level worse than Vegas or Indian casinos. A literal ticket to hell. I'm all for banning these evil sites.
well I see more problematic the people actually doing the Iran attacks and murder of heads of state. Betting on those is distasteful, but doing those things is where the damage lies.
[1]https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2026/04/30/polymarket-s-mil...
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You need a license to operate in Spain. The license is fairly available (EU regulations enforce this). So, Polymarket is able to obtain a license if they wish to operate in Spain, if they follow the fair rules to obtain a license. Don't want to obtain a license? Don't want to follow the rules in Spain? No problem, but no business in Spain. Websites blocking works like that, too. Which makes sense: local law > remote…
It's not cut and dry to differentiate between the act and the wager. One issue is that prediction markets provide financial incentives to perform actions in the real world. For example, if I want a head of state murdered, I can wager lots of money that they won't be murdered. If somebody wants to earn that money, they can simply bet against me and then murder them. It's not an dispassionate wager like betting on roul…