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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

#511

Post by morkalork »

heavyset_go wrote: post #216
echoangle wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not even close to being the worst thing in my opinion. There are people driven into suicide by blackmailing them over social media and people selling murder for hire on the Darknet. Some death threats are pretty harmless compared to that, assuming that nothing actually happens (which is pretty likely in my opinion).

> people selling murder for hire on the Darknet. It's always a honeypot, no one besides local junkies and people with personal beefs will do a murder for hire that a working person can afford. There are people who are dumb enough to go to prison after paying like $1k-$10k for a "murder", like after a flight and hotel how much are you expecting your would-be assassin to make?

It exists in organized crime but all the cases I've read about have that one thing in common: The killer worked for organized crime. And they were never fully unaligned either, always for the same families or groups that are loosely allied.

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

#512

Post by seydor »

littlecranky67 wrote: post #22
seydor wrote: post #5

Yep, far worse than cryptocurrency

Wait until they ban prediction markets, then they will re-appear, and you will have to use cryptocurrency :)

not easy because you d need a trusted central to settle the outcomes. So far, crypto has only solved the betting part

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

#513

Post by btilly »

Terr_ wrote: post #475
btilly wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_market for what an unregulated prediction market can do. Want someone dead? Create a market betting on when they die, and put a bunch of money in. Wait for someone to collect on the obvious profit opportunity for an assassination. The more anonymous the winner is relative to the action taken, the more that bad behavior is incentivized. Back when this was dreamed…

Or bribery: "I didn't pay anybody to dismiss the case against me. I just innocently hedged my personal risks by betting I'd be convicted. Now, if that judge or clerk just happened to be betting I'd go free, so that my million dollars is coincidentally in their pockets... well, that's just how things work out sometimes in prediction markets."

The one we're seeing more of is, "I just happened to buy a lot of the TRUMP meme coin that Donald Trump just happens to like selling. It's just a coincidence that I'm no longer in legal trouble." You know like the pardon for Changpeng Zhao (Binance CEO). Or the investigation into Justin Sun that got stopped.

See also the list of prominent people and companies that benefitted from executive action after investing in the Trump Presidential Library. You know like Amazon, Coinbase, Lockheed Martin, and Comcast. One wonders what exactly Qatar has gotten for deciding that the library needs a jumbo jet.

As I said, when the investigators have been fired, this kind of stuff can just happen in the open...

(To be fair, this happens on both sides. Granted, Trump has moved the Overton Window on corruption. But there is no guarantee that his successor, even if a Democrat, will want to move it back.)

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

#514

Post by yonixw »

bigyabai wrote: post #474
ntonozzi wrote: post #440

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps because he is a journalist whose job is to report reality, not avoid threats?

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 there, it turns out, they didn't shoot to save themselves by the skin of their teeth, but simply wanted to kill journalists.

Also, a quick search shows that "Mohammad Jarghoun" ("מוחמד ג'רגון") was not a journalist at all, but a media worker, that according to the CPJ [1], during wartime he receives journalistic status. (Also not mentioned in AJ [2]. what a surprise...)

Another comment to the pantheon of "the most logical failures, in the fewest words". And then no one understands why the ICC will never consider such reports..

[1]: https://www.the7eye.org.il/501320

[2]: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/10/at-least-six-pales...

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

#515

Post by HWR_14 »

thayne wrote: post #461
Balgair wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Friend of a friend does announcing online. Like, you pay him a little ( So, he got a gig to announce the opening of loot boxes at some show. I think it was Fortnite loot boxes. I guess it gives you the total value of the loot box spree you opened. So, 2 people buy a bunch of loot boxes, then open them up, then whoever has the higher value wins and takes both of the people's total haul. Sounds like a strange thing to…

> It is the most Degenerate form of gambling out there. I don't think so. At least you have a 50% chance of winning. Unlike say a lottery or a slot machine.

50% chance of winning, but there is a rake from the site.

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

#516

Post by nusl »

tootie wrote: post #380
nusl wrote: post #374

Polymarket and similar platforms are a cancer and need to be shut down. This is an early symptom of something that will become much, much worse in an increasing manner. Stories like these make more people aware of the platform, adding users and further degrading humanity.

It's gambling which has been a bane forever. It poisoned the NBA even before the internet.

People are getting death threats for writing news articles as part of their job. How is this comparable?

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

#517

Post by NickC25 »

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)

Still happens at all levels of professional sport. Even the top women get messages on their IG accounts all the time by degenerate gamblers pissed off after a loss.

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

#518

Post by danny_codes »

Enginerrrd wrote: post #502
emsign wrote: post #445

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They WANT to think in absolutes which is a red flag in a person.

That's not been my observation at all. Rationalists are some of the only people to really embrace fuzzy and probabilistic thinking. Am I missing something?

Maybe rationalists aren’t homogeneous? Unfortunately there are a rather concerning amount of news articles detailing cases where some subset of the rationalist community has gone off the deep end.

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

#519

Post by rkomorn »

astura wrote: post #180
amarcheschi wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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)

Getting death threats from aggrieved gamblers, MLB players starting to fear for their safety https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/mlb/columnist/bob-nigh...

Doesn't help when some MLB players also apparently participate in the gambling outcomes, too.

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/46906636/guardians-emman...

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

#520

Post by eloisant »

thayne wrote: post #461
Balgair wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Friend of a friend does announcing online. Like, you pay him a little ( So, he got a gig to announce the opening of loot boxes at some show. I think it was Fortnite loot boxes. I guess it gives you the total value of the loot box spree you opened. So, 2 people buy a bunch of loot boxes, then open them up, then whoever has the higher value wins and takes both of the people's total haul. Sounds like a strange thing to…

> It is the most Degenerate form of gambling out there. I don't think so. At least you have a 50% chance of winning. Unlike say a lottery or a slot machine.

It's not the chance of winning that matters, it's the mean expected value.

If you have a 50% chance of losing $2 or gaining $1, you have a negative expected value and that's bad.

If you have a 10% chance of gaining 100$ and 90% chance of losing $1, that's an expected value of $9 and it's a great deal.

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