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cj 6 hours ago [-]
I finally gave in to my curiosity and downloaded Kalshi last week to place a few bets on the World Cup.
I was blown away how easy it was. I placed a bet with real money within 5 minutes of downloading the app.
They allow instant deposits with credit card, and ID verification was real time.
I can’t imagine that the extreme accessibility and the typical dark patterns deployed by every popular app won’t eventually end badly.
(I was also shocked that when looking at my credit card bill online, next to the Kalshi deposit line item it showed a promo “would you like to split this payment over 12 month?” and seemingly was only available for that one transaction. So I could have deposited $1000 via CC into Kalshi and paid it back $83/mo over 12 months.)
This industry is wild.
rightbyte 1 hours ago [-]
Well try to make a withdrawal and see how convinient that might be. Internet casinos are usually easy to get money into but hard to get money out of.
Lucasoato 35 seconds ago [-]
If everything goes as planned, you won’t have to get anything out.
kortilla 22 minutes ago [-]
It works just fine. It’s not a casino in the regular sense because you’re betting against other people, not the house.
tills13 3 hours ago [-]
Instant deposit via credit card? Is that not considered a cash advance?
LPisGood 3 hours ago [-]
It is, and I know someone who found that out the hard way during the Super Bowl.
herpderperator 2 hours ago [-]
A cash advance is taking physical cash out with your credit card at an ATM or bank teller. Making an online purchase (which depositing money into your Kalshi account is) is therefore not a cash advance.
Arainach 2 hours ago [-]
There are many kinds of "cash advance". You can't buy lottery tickets on a credit card (or in jurisdictions where you can, it's a cash advance). Credit cards also treat things such as buying dollar coins online from the US Mint different from a normal transaction.
There is a whole lot of merchant categories that is treated like withdrawing money from an ATM. I believe the term is “quasicash”.
jamesfinlayson 2 hours ago [-]
In Australia any sort of gambling payment on a credit card is treated as a cash advance. If you use PayPal on top of your credit card, the credit card company still manages to introspect it and apply a cash advance fee.
YeahThisIsMe 34 minutes ago [-]
But these are "prediction markets", an entirely different thing that is definitely not gambling!
brador 2 hours ago [-]
It’s a cash advance since you’re not purchasing goods or services with the card.
lxgr 17 minutes ago [-]
It’s really a cash advance whenever the issuing bank decides it is. There is no official definition.
embedding-shape 4 hours ago [-]
This was my experience trying out "traditional betting" for the first time with Betfair last Worldcup, and some other platform I tried out before as well. Not sure what Kalshi/others are doing that is so different?
maxbond 3 hours ago [-]
If you're going to gamble, it's probably for the best that your counterparty doesn't also control the platform. I'm not saying that justifies being able to gamble frictionlessly, but it is marginally less exploitative. Eg, back in the day bucket shops (which sold binary options, like prediction markets do) would increase the spread in proportion to their assessment of your skill such that you would lose even if you were more skilled. In a proper market the platform makes the same amount of money whoever wins.
So, not all that different, but marginally less exploitative. I've never looked at Polymarket but Kalshi and PredictIt slid steadily from things of at least plausible real economic value (a market where it was conceivable [if unlikely] someone would be hedging their insurance contract or something) into total nonsense with no non-gambling function like whether someone would tweet a certain word.
I think prediction markets could serve a similar to a futures markets and have a functional purpose in the economy. It could be useful to generate real time estimates of the probability of some events that no one can control and have real economic consequences, like a hurricane. But evidently that's not where the money is.
embedding-shape 12 minutes ago [-]
> it's probably for the best that your counterparty doesn't also control the platform
But doesn't Polymarket et al own their own platforms, just like Betfair owns their platform? There is no P2P going on, even if some markets seem to advertise themselves as such so again, seems like the same just minus gambling regulations?
maxbond 3 minutes ago [-]
As far as I know it is "P2P", a continuous double sided auction like any proper exchange.
They pretend they are "market" and not gambling to avoid regulations.
Ferret7446 5 minutes ago [-]
It is not pretend, it is technically correct (the best kind of correct). Redefining what gambling is, is a different problem.
owlninja 5 hours ago [-]
I read a book this year about sports gambling in the US [1], and it points out how nasty and predatory it is. I think "prediction markets" have even less regulation? I would talk to my sports fan buddies at work and they would say "oh, just how sportsbooks in Vegas operate already", but this is on-demand, in your face, constantly nudging you to bet with dark patterns and "comps". I used to want sports gambling legal in the US, but the way it has gone is incredibly disgusting and is starting to make watching sports almost annoying. The crawl on the bottom is no longer scores, but moneylines...
[1] "Everybody Loses: The Tumultuous Rise of American Sports Gambling" (2026) by Danny Funt
somenameforme 2 hours ago [-]
A bit of a tangent, but many like the moneylines isn't because of gambling but because it tells you who's the favorite/underdog and by what margin. It's like in the equivalent of a chess game of knowing the player's ratings, which itself can directly lead to a nominal moneyline, but in most sports there's no formal predictive rating system.
tbossanova 43 minutes ago [-]
It’s the kind of thing that would suck all enjoyment out of watching sports for me personally. I may well be in a minority though, possibly an old person thing too
TZubiri 3 hours ago [-]
Predictions markets are more regulated than sports betting, because the events being predicted are wider, so they will naturally touch on a whole lot more regulation.
For example, can someone place a bet on an event that X person will be shot? That question now touches on a whole range of laws regarding murder, life insurance, incitation to violence, free speech? That you just don't touch at all in sports betting.
niwtsol 3 hours ago [-]
I read your statement and my reaction is what you describe is less regulated than sports betting. For example, in sports betting there are laws by major leagues that players can not bet on games they are in. On prediction markets, if someone has insider knowledge, or can control whatever verification source is set for a bet, they can win (I believe there was an article posted earlier about some journalist reporting on a bomb that fell on an area and was pressured to change the wording to say it fell or was bombed). Additionally, as some of the prediction market wagers have weird grey areas, there are predictions that have additional sub text added after a market has been open/wages have been made which completely change the bet - that is just fast and loose and less regulation IMO
mcmcmc 3 hours ago [-]
So where are those regulations?
kennywinker 3 hours ago [-]
Lol. This is some quality sv psychosis content.
But ok, let’s follow your thought process. Couldn’t someone place a bet on a sporting event and then murder a key player? Wouldn’t all the same laws be triggered?
Laws against criminal activity aren’t regulations. Regulations are limitations and oversight requirements on business activities.
ph4rsikal 2 hours ago [-]
The on-ramp in crypto is incredibly well built out.
But then, once you are in the fake money world, you will notice that the off-ramp doesn't exist.
ShinyLeftPad 30 minutes ago [-]
Offramp exists it just depends how ugly it is by country. A friend of mine literally travels to another country to withdraw what he is paid in crypto.
22 minutes ago [-]
consensus1 2 hours ago [-]
I have taken money out of Polymarket and it is quick and easy.
xboxnolifes 2 hours ago [-]
The off-ramp of nearly all of my crypto endeavors has been very easy in my experience. Not always simple, because a lot of parts of moving money on various crypto chains is unintuitive and well in-need of improvement, but definitely easy once you know what to do.
The most annoying part, somewhat surprisingly, is always with regards to United States KYC restrictions. I've had a fair bit of annoyance trying to move crypto off of services that were once accessible to US customers and no longer are.
baobabKoodaa 2 hours ago [-]
Off-ramp does exist. Stop lying.
650REDHAIR 1 hours ago [-]
Until you’re flagged for some vague reason and support/fraud can’t help you.
citizenpaul 32 minutes ago [-]
I personally cant wait to start seeing sob stories of how people are having thier account permanently locked after making big wins. Thats what happens when you bgive money to unregulated casinos every tine and is the exact reason there are so many gambling laws and restrictions.
m00dy 2 hours ago [-]
on-ramp and off-ramp were the problems of the past. Thanks to Trump, both worlds have merged together now.
JoeMattie 3 hours ago [-]
You think that's wild, look into prop firms some time
manwithopinions 4 hours ago [-]
The U.S. is quite far behind the rest of the world on sports betting, which means you don’t even need to imagine, we know from other countries that it doesn’t end well. The most worrying aspect is, the current U.S. government has no interest in the regulations that have helped minimise the problems in other countries.
The U.K’s highest earner for a few years running was the founder of a U.K. betting site, she had something like a 500 million salary and there is an entire town’s economy supported by her business.
I personally never met her but Bet365 is one of the most protected sites on the internet when it comes to antibot protections. When I started my company in 2025, I had two customers from UK, they were very much interested in odds for horse races from bet365, mostly realtime. Bet365 knew I was coming for them.
TheCowboy 4 hours ago [-]
How were you able to use a credit card when it's not a payment they accept?
chasebank 3 hours ago [-]
They call it 'onramping'. Moonpay is a big one, coinbase has one, onramper is another. Basically Applepay / credit card -> ETH or SOL or USDC, etc, then lose away!
cj 27 minutes ago [-]
I just checked my account.
They accept Visa, Mastercard and Discover via Apple Pay for a 2% deposit fee.
But I also see it says they don’t accept credit card in their help docs. I’m not sure what that’s about.
holistio 6 hours ago [-]
Back in the good old days you needed a few more steps before you got into debt after gambling.
ElProlactin 5 hours ago [-]
Back in the good old days non-payment of gambling debt was a threat to your knee-caps. Today, you might get cut off from Klarna and have to extend your next auto loan to 256 months.
tyre 4 hours ago [-]
This was with their credit card. You're going to get demolished if you start bouncing gambling debt on a credit card.
I'm guessing that at some point, probably not very long from now, credit cards are going to cut down on this. They don't want to be held responsible for a bunch of debt from gamblers, when they've already paid the sites.
At some point, the fees won't be worth the combination of PR and actually losing money from bankruptcies / delinquencies.
nradov 3 hours ago [-]
Most of those gambling sites don't have merchant accounts and aren't able to accept credit card payments directly. Customers take out cash advances or buy cryptocurrency through various shady intermediaries, then transfer the assets.
TZubiri 3 hours ago [-]
Loan sharks that use threats still exist, non-bank personal lending funds use cold calling and connections with bankers and use non-staff third party callers to distance themselves from the consequences and reputation of threatening with violence.
So it's not like people need to go to shady lenders in the first place, they can be pipelined from normal credit card debt into less scrupulous debt collectors.
I think you missed the point entirely.
All of these "prediction market" gambling platforms are actively predatory to their users, with very little (if any) regulatory oversight.
dylan604 6 hours ago [-]
Based on the ad they are running during World Cup of the guy in the dentist office, they just don't care how/where money is spent as they just print money.
WalterBright 2 hours ago [-]
The WSJ ran an earlier article stating that unless you have access to a lot of data, computing power, and statisticians, you're going to lose on those bets.
FinnLobsien 7 minutes ago [-]
It’s gambling, and the house always wins.
tty456 3 hours ago [-]
Also, kids get scammed daily on YouTube on Pokemon card pulls with "loaded" packs and otherwise fake pulls for views.
Seems like it's just a game of whack-a-mole, nothing is really being done to stop scammers from making new accounts and continuing their scams.
intended 21 minutes ago [-]
This is the other side of the coin when it comes to the push for ID verification.
tty456 2 hours ago [-]
A lot of it is straight up sponsored by card makers too
andrepd 1 hours ago [-]
There are really only two businesses in the modern economy, fraud and gambling. Some are both.
globular-toast 1 hours ago [-]
Don't forget addiction.
abrookewood 1 hours ago [-]
Porn?
flowerthoughts 2 hours ago [-]
The alternative would be to ask both sides of the bets to record a video, and tell them to only post winning bids, but to pay out to both sides. Is that really better? Classic tactic by the bet picking gambler gurus and is impossible to confirm.
I guess Polymarket too will learn to be more subtle now.
aucisson_masque 1 hours ago [-]
> He compared the videos to fast-food commercials, where food can appear more appealing than it does in real life.
> “We’re depicting what actually happens,” he said.
The cope is real. They all know they are destroying lives by promoting gambling to young people and eventually some of them are going to overspend and get addicted. But yeah, it's just like an ad for a burger
All these gambling apps need regulation. And I fear they are buying politicians precisely so that doesn't happen.
If I were to have my way, I'd put a law in place that limits bets to $5 max and monthly bets to $150 per month. Letting them go higher encourages some of the worst aspects of society.
We will see crazy things like athletes being injured or murdered in order to win bets. We are already seeing crazy things like white house insiders placing bets on when wars will start.
One of the few ways to really solve this problem is reducing the possible amount of award so the individuals placing these bets don't feel like they have to take matters into their own hands to win.
ok_dad 5 hours ago [-]
We should just make gambling illegal online again, things were fine back when you couldn’t gamble online then, at least in the USA, the fucking supreme corpo guzzlers (formerly the Supreme Court) interpreted the laws according to their owners will and now we have gambling online.
dang 4 hours ago [-]
Could you please stop posting unsubstantive comments and flamebait? You've unfortunately been doing it repeatedly, and we've had to ask you many times not to. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for.
(p.s. Just to pre-empt the usual: no, this is not a defense of Big Gambling, just an attempted defense of HN thread quality.)
p1necone 4 hours ago [-]
Usually I agree with your calls on things being unsubstantive, but this one kinda seems fine? I don't think it's flame bait, just emotive language? And the substantive point being made is that online gambling should be illegal.
(apologies if arguing about mod decisions is frowned upon, I didn't see anything in the rules about it)
dang 4 hours ago [-]
If it were just the one comment I wouldn't have said anything; the issue is the pattern (note the word "repeatedly").
ok_dad 1 hours ago [-]
You haven’t said anything, or at least I haven’t seen it. There’s no inbox here and I don’t always read old comments. If you have pointed it out before I don’t care, I haven’t seen it. If you want to point something out, then maybe email me about it the just time you see it, otherwise I’m not trolling through my old threads that often so you’ll have to accept that this is the first I’ve seen you ask.
I’m respect your wishes but you can’t say you have told me anything if I didn’t see it here, sorry Dan but that’s only fair since there’s no way for me to see your message unless I randomly go back.
If you want to ensure people see these messages, then that’s a feature you’ll need to add. I’m fine with you using the email on my account for this purpose, too, but I’m not fine with getting a single message from you here and you expecting me to have seen anything else you’ve said in the past. As far as I’m concerned this is the first I’ve seen you ask me about this.
p1necone 3 hours ago [-]
Fair, the comment history does paint a different picture.
watwut 41 minutes ago [-]
The other point about supreme court is also factually correct.
650REDHAIR 1 hours ago [-]
Was the commenter wrong?
ok_dad 1 hours ago [-]
There’s no flame bait here just some swearing and rough language. I’ll cut back because you asked (once, I’ve not seen your responses other than this one), but I don’t think I’m out of line.
Also if people were downvoting my comments it’d be different but it’s just you for a frw recent ones down modding then, because before you get here they were up or even. Moderators should focus on those truly displaying bad behavior, I’m just swearing and saying relevant things.
I have a very long history of good comments here, arguing otherwise seems suspect, honestly.
I’ll back off like you say but I don’t agree at all. I’ve read the guidelines and tend to follow them.
Edit: I see like 3-4 questionable comments from me, two of who’ve are barely questionable. I get what you’re saying about the language but it’s really amazing you’ve targeted me here today, this us such low hanging fruit here, don’t you have better things to deal with? I’ll write better comments but I’m just really annoyed at your characterization of my behavior, it is very unfair in my eyes. I’ve done very good comments for ages and emotional language like this is rare for me. I expect better from mods here.
Drupon 4 hours ago [-]
This comment was unnecessary and very distracting from a far more interesting discussion in the replies to the commenter you are attempting to condescend.
root_axis 4 hours ago [-]
There is no censorship happening here - the comment remains visible, he simply asked them to refrain from the inflammatory language.
toasty228 33 minutes ago [-]
> There is no censorship happening here
Wait until your account is shadow banned and you post in the void for weeks/months before noticing
burnished 4 hours ago [-]
dang is the moderator
ipython 5 hours ago [-]
Exactly. Gambling in the real world involved friction. That plus a certain social stigma if you gambled outside of “mainstream” casinos.
And this helped weed out all but the most addicted gamblers. Now there is no friction, the platforms are free to create dark patterns to encourage problem gambling, and the vice has zero social cost.
duskwuff 2 hours ago [-]
The dark patterns aren't just in online gambling. Nowdays, a lot of brick-and-mortar casinos encourage, or even require, clients to create an account (often framed as a "members club" or "rewards card"), which is used to track the client's activity at the casino and target them with promotions tailored to their behavior. These can be used in some really troubling ways, e.g. by identifying clients who may have a gambling problem and targeting them with promotions to come back to the casino more often, to stay longer, and/or to start placing larger bets.
lokar 4 hours ago [-]
The court ruling was a good one, and anticipated. The federal government can either allow all gambling, or ban it all. They can’t pick and choose states where it may be allowed.
morkalork 3 hours ago [-]
Exactly. The corruption and rot is beyond the pale.
irishcoffee 5 hours ago [-]
Probation was a thing, too. How did that turn out?
nemomarx 5 hours ago [-]
There wasn't some mass movement of people doing online gambling that led to the dam bursting and it getting legalized, though. Courts just made a different decision and opened it up one day and as far as I know there wasn't even mass lobbying about it?
jmcgough 3 hours ago [-]
fanduel and draftkings poured massive amount of money into advertising, pumping their numbers to make it seem like gambling was too big to stop.
lotsofpulp 5 hours ago [-]
There was mass lobbying, specificially by the taxpayers of the state of New Jersey, via their elected representatives.
>The Court announced a 7–2 judgment in favor of Murphy on May 14, 2018, reversing the Third Circuit.[25] Justice Samuel Alito wrote the majority opinion, joined by Justices John Roberts, Anthony Kennedy, Clarence Thomas, Elena Kagan, and Neil Gorsuch and in part by Justice Stephen Breyer.[26][27][28] The majority opinion agreed that §§ 3701(1) of PASPA commandeered power from the states to regulate their own gambling industries and thus was unconstitutional. It followed New York v. United States and reversed the Third Circuit decision.
geoduck14 5 hours ago [-]
Prohibition was incredibly successful at reducing the amount of alcohol people drank
_carbyau_ 3 hours ago [-]
And increasing tunneling skills!
And increasing car racing! (Though I still don't get oval racing.)
Prohibition had some unintended consequences.
DonHopkins 4 hours ago [-]
You'll have to ask your probation officer.
ok_dad 5 hours ago [-]
You can’t download drugs and alcohol digitally.
Frankly, being able to buy drugs and alcohol online is probably a mistake, too.
JumpCrisscross 4 hours ago [-]
> You can’t download drugs and alcohol digitally
It was almost certainly easier for most people to buy drugs than gamble illegally when both were illegal.
jmcgough 3 hours ago [-]
Most states had lotteries before this though. At least those brought in tax money and were designed to be relatively fair. Online gambling can shut down your account and refuse to pay if you get too big of a payout, and their money isn't going towards public schools.
parpfish 2 hours ago [-]
for a while i was using the sports gambling apps to make lots of little bets.
it was fun to put $0.50 on a game I normally wouldn't watch and tune in with a real rooting interest. i never bet more that $1 on a game because I knew that I would really dislike losing 'real money'.
the fact was that the stakes were completely irrelevant to me. the value came from definitively and publicly taking a side. if you're the fan of a team, you do this in every game. but with these little bets it's a way to sign-on for a little slice of being a fan in every game.
and that got me thinking that there's potentially a different type of gambling app that ignores the money and is more of a social/prediction-making platform. people love chasing worthless internet points (reddit upvotes, HN karma, etc), so why not build a platform that gives you points for betting?
you could let a chunk of the population scratch the itch they get to gamble without creating financial risk. they can still brag about their wins.
bojan 2 hours ago [-]
> and that got me thinking that there's potentially a different type of gambling app that ignores the money and is more of a social/prediction-making platform
We have that in the Netherlands and we do it massively for every World Cup and Euro. The app my friend groups are on, Scorito, has 1.5 million competitors for the current WC, in the country of 18 million, and that's not the only app.
Normally a group would make a small buy in, like €5, where the winner takes all, but this year the legal department at work forbade that, se that sort of gambling Is actual illegal.
somenameforme 2 hours ago [-]
I'd do something fairly similarly, but in a sort of emotional hedge. If in a fight I was really rooting for one guy, I'd put a relatively small amount of money on the other. Ok 'my guy' lost, but hey - dinner's free tonight! It's also quite remarkable how often arbitrage opportunities come up where you can put bets on both sides with a guaranteed win. You'd think they'd all get eaten up by bots, but that's not at all the case.
ExpertAdvisor01 4 hours ago [-]
This would just push everyone to unlicensed casinos/bookmakers .
Means no tax revenue + even worse player protection.
bdangubic 4 hours ago [-]
make this severely illegal with minimum two decades behind bars and what how they disappear… this is a very solvable problem which no one wants to solve
ExpertAdvisor01 3 hours ago [-]
Good luck with cross-border enforcement.
Also the operator is completely legal/compliant with it's jurisdictions laws as they allow us players (many now blacklist the us, but some not )
So they won't accept any foreign judgement .
That's why most countries rather target their infrastructure (psps/banking etc ..)
Even Eu countries had/have severe problems with Malta (due e.g Article 56A of the malta gaming act, which shields the operator from foreign judgements)
2 hours ago [-]
what 3 hours ago [-]
>gambling sites
I think I’d probably go farther. Next time you’re in a corner store or gas station, pay attention to who is wasting their money on scratchers or other lotto tickets.
You shouldn’t be allowed to gamble unless you can prove it’s disposable income.
parpfish 3 hours ago [-]
we prevent people from gambling on early stage startups and risky investments by limiting investment to "accredited investors". same thing should apply to gambling.
FireBeyond 2 hours ago [-]
I believe some countries/casinos in Southeast Asia have policies that you either have to show a foreign passport, or put a deposit of $500-1000 down to enter the casino, that you get back when you leave, with the theory (easily exploitable, I'm sure) being that you can't leave the casino penniless.
4 hours ago [-]
csomar 2 hours ago [-]
That will make things worse unless you reign in crypto. If you regulate Kalshi, people will use the unregulated polymarket which is already illegal in the united states.
DANmode 4 hours ago [-]
The regulation has gone the opposite direction, recently.
It was regulated.
j16sdiz 5 hours ago [-]
Most of their practice are illegal already. The problem is lack of enforcement.
We are not suing polymarket.
We are not suing the marketing company.
And we don't want online censorship.
IMO, the marketing company / media company should be sued. -- They are (relatively) easier target to sue. Many are US based and not going anywhere. With enough luck, this might give us a better internet with less SEO bullshit.
aaron695 5 hours ago [-]
[dead]
EA-3167 5 hours ago [-]
Just another hearty dividend thanks to corporate personhood and Citizen's United. Rarely has a single decision so thoroughly broken our system, but the regulatory capture is plain to see these days.
BrenBarn 3 hours ago [-]
Citizens United gets a lot of flak, and it wasn't good, but it's far from the only factor here. We can at least go back to Buckley v. Valeo which gave us the idea that "money is speech". Corporations are a problem, but money is a bigger problem.
october8140 6 hours ago [-]
Is this fraud?
jcgrillo 6 hours ago [-]
Isn't everything these days? It's all gotten so gross.
aucisson_masque 1 hours ago [-]
No. There are still people and companies being proud of their work and not doing it only for the money side. I know, shocking..
matheusmoreira 5 hours ago [-]
Yeah. It's so demoralizing, seeing all these people make fortunes while honest people scrape by. It feels like getting in on the grift is the only way to make it.
m00dy 2 hours ago [-]
you may be confusing it with deregulation.
idle_zealot 6 hours ago [-]
Would it matter if the bets were real and they picked the 0.00001% big winners to feature in the ad? Would that be less fraudulent in any meaningful sense, would it have a different impact on the world?
Is the real crime here that they were too lazy to lie with selective facts?
jmilloy 4 hours ago [-]
In the US, the FTC is very clear that faking or purchasing testimonials is illegal. Fabricating, purchasing, or misrepresenting customer experience is deceptive advertising and is a form of fraud. On the other hand, selecting and advertising specific real testimonials is fine. A customer described their actual experience that way, and presumably the consumers understand that advertisers will select especially positive individual testimonials for their advertisements. I can't believe I'm actually trying to explain this, but fake testimonials are illegal because the consumer has no way to know that they are made up. Real testimonials are not "lying with statistics", they're not statistics at all, and are legal because consumers can understand that it's not the median customer experience.
If picking real winners and real winnings to feature in the ad was just as good, they could do that. If not, then yes, it makes an impact on the world to mislead people with that marketing.
Somehow there's a difference between things that happened and didn't happen, and that's a good place to draw a line in the sand of what you're allowed to advertise and not.
what 3 hours ago [-]
> Fabricating, purchasing, or misrepresenting customer experience is deceptive advertising and is a form of fraud.
Doesn’t this make every ad fraud? It’s an actor pretending to enjoy drinking Coca Cola, every ad is the same.
SJC_Hacker 3 hours ago [-]
How do you know the actor is merely pretending ? Maybe they actually it?
Is this even a question? Yes, it would be less fraudulent.
idle_zealot 6 hours ago [-]
I question your definitions. In what sense is it legally or morally useful to discriminate between lying with statistics and lying without them? It's an academically useful distinction, but why does it matter in practice? People are misled, the misleading is intentional, but if you hire a statistician to do it for you instead of an actor then you're A-Okay?
It's useful because honesty and dishonesty are strongly self-correlated. Someone who works hard to ensure their advertising is technically true will likely work hard towards technically satisfying other goals and rules we set for them; someone who's comfortable outright lying in their ads will likely also lie about other things.
baobabKoodaa 2 hours ago [-]
Is fraud "more fraudulent" than non-fraud? Yes. Wtf man?
ggm 6 hours ago [-]
Would a prosecution have high chance of succeeding?
realJared54 6 hours ago [-]
Yes, it is 100% a misrepresentation of reality to fool the general public into joining a platform that condones deceptive user acquisition strategies.
jordanb 6 hours ago [-]
I was listening to a podcast and heard an ad for supplements (I think it was collegian). The thing that struck me was the specificity of the health claims they were making in the ad.
There was no "promotes healthy whatever" it was like "this will make your skin younger and eliminate/prevent wrinkles and other signs of aging."
Then the quiet fast-talking guy said that none of their health claims have been reviewed by the FDA.
So that's where we are now. Everything is scams and nobody will do anything about it.
pesus 6 hours ago [-]
I agree with your point in general, but doesn't that disclaimer apply to any kind of supplement? As far as I know that sort of thing has been allowed for quite some time. For whatever reason the FDA allows for an almost completely unregulated vitamin/supplement industry.
jordanb 5 hours ago [-]
They used to be vague and not make specific claims because that wasn't allowed. They'd say "Vitamin K helps promote healthy eyes." They can't say "our chewable will cure your glaucoma. (claimhasnotbeenreviewedbytheFDA)"
But apparently they can do that now, or at least they are doing it.
qlte 5 hours ago [-]
It's not up to the FDA, their hands are tied thanks to the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994, sponsored by Senator Orrin Hatch from Utah on behalf of the supplement lobby.
I don't see an end to any of it when the Grifter-in-chief is in office.
ok_dad 5 hours ago [-]
[flagged]
recursive 5 hours ago [-]
I mean maybe Trump also caused it but there's no way he's just an innocent bystander here.
ok_dad 5 hours ago [-]
Yes I already said that he’s bad, don’t roast me, I’m trying to use nuance here like we’re supposed to.
Mobius01 5 hours ago [-]
I remember in 2006 when online sports gambling was banned, and witnessed first hand some sleaze bags flee to Costa Rica where many of the actual operations were located. What I witnessed regarding addiction and exploitation put me off sports for a long time. Now here we are, with the tech industry and political capital behind it, this time engineered to engulf the entire population. It's repulsive.
sooheon 3 hours ago [-]
Nobody is forcing anyone to place bets they can't back, isn't this a personal responsibility issue?
edit: to be clear, if companies are committing fraud in their marketing, that should be prosecuted or if regulations around misleading marketing are weak, that should be legislated of course.
fl4regun 2 hours ago [-]
Personal responsibility is an excuse for lazy regulation. These things are designed to be harmful, for the express purpose of squeezing money out of people, as efficiently as possible. We know that some people are psychologically and genetically more prone to addiction than others, and that people like that will be extremely likely to form addictions with gambling or drugs when we make those things easy to access.
What would you rather have? More regulated gambling and less addicts, or unregulated gambling and more addicts? Personally, I prefer the former.
handoflixue 3 hours ago [-]
> Nobody is forcing anyone to place bets they can't back, isn't this a personal responsibility issue?
Honestly, calling it "personal responsibility" when a powerful group is actively working to exploit that flaw seems a little weird. But even accepting that, we outlaw plenty of things because we think society isn't currently responsible enough to handle them.
aucisson_masque 56 minutes ago [-]
You are promoting gambling to young people, easily manipulated.
That's why you see so many college boy on their marketing video.
It's completely fine when you're old enough to be responsible, and to know that gambling is a degenerate behavior that you can allow yourself sometimes to release the steam, but these companies don't make money from us.
They make money from the kids overspending because they are convinced they are going to get rich doing that. That's manipulation.
It would be like showing McDonald ads to starving African kids, of course they are going to make the wrong choice when offered food. They can't think rationally in that state.
watwut 32 minutes ago [-]
Personal responsibility: a way to avoid talking about responsibility and behavior of large rich actors.
Yes online gambling and sports management actions are their personal responsibility. And we should blame them for harm they knowingly cause.
rcxdude 2 days ago [-]
Seems to be a popular means for marketing gambling. There was a scandal of a bunch of twitch streamers doing the same thing for skin gambling websites.
gregjw 2 hours ago [-]
a complete surprise to nobody
lobito25 2 days ago [-]
Bait from polymarket to get new users, They should get sued.
ekjhgkejhgk 1 days ago [-]
Seems like a weird mistake to make. If they're going to bait new users, why not just use bets that did exist? Better yet, why not use users who did make a lot of money?
AIorNot 4 hours ago [-]
Good luck - polymarket sponsored trumps White House UFC Extravaganza
God I cant believe I wrote that
csomar 2 hours ago [-]
I made an article a day back how Polymarket is not exactly fair when it comes to market resolution (https://omarabid.com/polymarket-bet/) They actually don’t decide on market outcomes, they outsource that to UMA which is as opaque as it can get.
Consider the probabilities in polymarket as the prob. of the polymarket market itself outcomes rather than reality.
arjie 4 hours ago [-]
They are transparently marketing using outrage and bullshit. Pretty good tactic for the market.
pulkas 42 minutes ago [-]
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cindyllm 3 hours ago [-]
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thenayr 5 hours ago [-]
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realJared54 6 hours ago [-]
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AznHisoka 4 hours ago [-]
Little Bobby Tables. That you?
5 hours ago [-]
N_Lens 6 hours ago [-]
Are you for real-real, Jared? Tell me so!
mvdtnz 6 hours ago [-]
I honestly can't tell if this is a joke or not.
jcgrillo 6 hours ago [-]
undefined
maxbond 5 hours ago [-]
JavaScript can be tricky.
trel1100 6 hours ago [-]
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BobbyTables2 5 hours ago [-]
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polnurfer 5 hours ago [-]
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charcircuit 5 hours ago [-]
Every ad is staged like this. The whole point is to make as good of an ad for the product as possible.
Do you think in a food commercial the people eating the product are showing their genuine emotion? It's all acting.
advisedwang 3 hours ago [-]
OK but you know that you're seeing an ad. These are ads that are pretending to be users just posting their experiences.
uberex 2 hours ago [-]
I think ads for addictive things like gambling, alcohol, tobacco need to be held to a very high standard, if allowed at all.
Zambyte 5 hours ago [-]
This is like a food commercial where someone shows an extreme reaction to food that isn't the product they're selling, or acting like they're eating something that isn't food at all. There are laws regarding food advertising that require it to present the real food (though the presentation of it is usually way better).
N_Lens 2 hours ago [-]
McDonalds should show people who choked on a Big Mac in their ads /s
cm2187 4 hours ago [-]
I have news for you. That burger is the McDonald's commercial? It's most likely made out of plastic. That happy lottery winner? Probably a stock photo from one of the major visuals providers. And I am ready to bet my bankers don't have this hollywood white teeth looking of banks commercials. Since when is advertising real?
wodenokoto 3 hours ago [-]
While the dressed burgers aren’t exactly edible, they are a far cry from being plastic.
McDonald’s Canada famously gave a candid behind the scenes of dressing a burger:
“The truth is most of what you see in food photographs is real. FTC laws state that whatever you’re selling with a photo must be real in the image. To use a familiar example, if you’re selling corn flakes the flakes must be real. But then it gets interesting. You can use white glue instead of milk in your bowl of flakes because you’re not selling the milk, only the corn flakes.”
I was blown away how easy it was. I placed a bet with real money within 5 minutes of downloading the app.
They allow instant deposits with credit card, and ID verification was real time.
I can’t imagine that the extreme accessibility and the typical dark patterns deployed by every popular app won’t eventually end badly.
(I was also shocked that when looking at my credit card bill online, next to the Kalshi deposit line item it showed a promo “would you like to split this payment over 12 month?” and seemingly was only available for that one transaction. So I could have deposited $1000 via CC into Kalshi and paid it back $83/mo over 12 months.)
This industry is wild.
https://gosunward.org/articles/cash-advance-on-a-credit-card...
So, not all that different, but marginally less exploitative. I've never looked at Polymarket but Kalshi and PredictIt slid steadily from things of at least plausible real economic value (a market where it was conceivable [if unlikely] someone would be hedging their insurance contract or something) into total nonsense with no non-gambling function like whether someone would tweet a certain word.
I think prediction markets could serve a similar to a futures markets and have a functional purpose in the economy. It could be useful to generate real time estimates of the probability of some events that no one can control and have real economic consequences, like a hurricane. But evidently that's not where the money is.
But doesn't Polymarket et al own their own platforms, just like Betfair owns their platform? There is no P2P going on, even if some markets seem to advertise themselves as such so again, seems like the same just minus gambling regulations?
https://docs.polymarket.com/concepts/prices-orderbook
https://help.kalshi.com/en/articles/13823828-the-orderbook
[1] "Everybody Loses: The Tumultuous Rise of American Sports Gambling" (2026) by Danny Funt
For example, can someone place a bet on an event that X person will be shot? That question now touches on a whole range of laws regarding murder, life insurance, incitation to violence, free speech? That you just don't touch at all in sports betting.
But ok, let’s follow your thought process. Couldn’t someone place a bet on a sporting event and then murder a key player? Wouldn’t all the same laws be triggered?
Laws against criminal activity aren’t regulations. Regulations are limitations and oversight requirements on business activities.
The most annoying part, somewhat surprisingly, is always with regards to United States KYC restrictions. I've had a fair bit of annoyance trying to move crypto off of services that were once accessible to US customers and no longer are.
The U.K’s highest earner for a few years running was the founder of a U.K. betting site, she had something like a 500 million salary and there is an entire town’s economy supported by her business.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bet365
They accept Visa, Mastercard and Discover via Apple Pay for a 2% deposit fee.
But I also see it says they don’t accept credit card in their help docs. I’m not sure what that’s about.
I'm guessing that at some point, probably not very long from now, credit cards are going to cut down on this. They don't want to be held responsible for a bunch of debt from gamblers, when they've already paid the sites.
At some point, the fees won't be worth the combination of PR and actually losing money from bankruptcies / delinquencies.
So it's not like people need to go to shady lenders in the first place, they can be pipelined from normal credit card debt into less scrupulous debt collectors.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMntLU1bNE0
Seems like it's just a game of whack-a-mole, nothing is really being done to stop scammers from making new accounts and continuing their scams.
I guess Polymarket too will learn to be more subtle now.
> “We’re depicting what actually happens,” he said.
The cope is real. They all know they are destroying lives by promoting gambling to young people and eventually some of them are going to overspend and get addicted. But yeah, it's just like an ad for a burger
If I were to have my way, I'd put a law in place that limits bets to $5 max and monthly bets to $150 per month. Letting them go higher encourages some of the worst aspects of society.
We will see crazy things like athletes being injured or murdered in order to win bets. We are already seeing crazy things like white house insiders placing bets on when wars will start.
One of the few ways to really solve this problem is reducing the possible amount of award so the individuals placing these bets don't feel like they have to take matters into their own hands to win.
If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.
(p.s. Just to pre-empt the usual: no, this is not a defense of Big Gambling, just an attempted defense of HN thread quality.)
(apologies if arguing about mod decisions is frowned upon, I didn't see anything in the rules about it)
I’m respect your wishes but you can’t say you have told me anything if I didn’t see it here, sorry Dan but that’s only fair since there’s no way for me to see your message unless I randomly go back.
If you want to ensure people see these messages, then that’s a feature you’ll need to add. I’m fine with you using the email on my account for this purpose, too, but I’m not fine with getting a single message from you here and you expecting me to have seen anything else you’ve said in the past. As far as I’m concerned this is the first I’ve seen you ask me about this.
Also if people were downvoting my comments it’d be different but it’s just you for a frw recent ones down modding then, because before you get here they were up or even. Moderators should focus on those truly displaying bad behavior, I’m just swearing and saying relevant things.
I have a very long history of good comments here, arguing otherwise seems suspect, honestly.
I’ll back off like you say but I don’t agree at all. I’ve read the guidelines and tend to follow them.
Edit: I see like 3-4 questionable comments from me, two of who’ve are barely questionable. I get what you’re saying about the language but it’s really amazing you’ve targeted me here today, this us such low hanging fruit here, don’t you have better things to deal with? I’ll write better comments but I’m just really annoyed at your characterization of my behavior, it is very unfair in my eyes. I’ve done very good comments for ages and emotional language like this is rare for me. I expect better from mods here.
Wait until your account is shadow banned and you post in the void for weeks/months before noticing
And this helped weed out all but the most addicted gamblers. Now there is no friction, the platforms are free to create dark patterns to encourage problem gambling, and the vice has zero social cost.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murphy_v._National_Collegiate_...
Note that it was not a close decision:
> Opinion of the Court
>The Court announced a 7–2 judgment in favor of Murphy on May 14, 2018, reversing the Third Circuit.[25] Justice Samuel Alito wrote the majority opinion, joined by Justices John Roberts, Anthony Kennedy, Clarence Thomas, Elena Kagan, and Neil Gorsuch and in part by Justice Stephen Breyer.[26][27][28] The majority opinion agreed that §§ 3701(1) of PASPA commandeered power from the states to regulate their own gambling industries and thus was unconstitutional. It followed New York v. United States and reversed the Third Circuit decision.
Prohibition had some unintended consequences.
Frankly, being able to buy drugs and alcohol online is probably a mistake, too.
It was almost certainly easier for most people to buy drugs than gamble illegally when both were illegal.
it was fun to put $0.50 on a game I normally wouldn't watch and tune in with a real rooting interest. i never bet more that $1 on a game because I knew that I would really dislike losing 'real money'.
the fact was that the stakes were completely irrelevant to me. the value came from definitively and publicly taking a side. if you're the fan of a team, you do this in every game. but with these little bets it's a way to sign-on for a little slice of being a fan in every game.
and that got me thinking that there's potentially a different type of gambling app that ignores the money and is more of a social/prediction-making platform. people love chasing worthless internet points (reddit upvotes, HN karma, etc), so why not build a platform that gives you points for betting?
you could let a chunk of the population scratch the itch they get to gamble without creating financial risk. they can still brag about their wins.
We have that in the Netherlands and we do it massively for every World Cup and Euro. The app my friend groups are on, Scorito, has 1.5 million competitors for the current WC, in the country of 18 million, and that's not the only app.
Normally a group would make a small buy in, like €5, where the winner takes all, but this year the legal department at work forbade that, se that sort of gambling Is actual illegal.
Also the operator is completely legal/compliant with it's jurisdictions laws as they allow us players (many now blacklist the us, but some not )
So they won't accept any foreign judgement . That's why most countries rather target their infrastructure (psps/banking etc ..)
Even Eu countries had/have severe problems with Malta (due e.g Article 56A of the malta gaming act, which shields the operator from foreign judgements)
I think I’d probably go farther. Next time you’re in a corner store or gas station, pay attention to who is wasting their money on scratchers or other lotto tickets.
You shouldn’t be allowed to gamble unless you can prove it’s disposable income.
It was regulated.
We are not suing polymarket. We are not suing the marketing company. And we don't want online censorship.
IMO, the marketing company / media company should be sued. -- They are (relatively) easier target to sue. Many are US based and not going anywhere. With enough luck, this might give us a better internet with less SEO bullshit.
Is the real crime here that they were too lazy to lie with selective facts?
If picking real winners and real winnings to feature in the ad was just as good, they could do that. If not, then yes, it makes an impact on the world to mislead people with that marketing.
Somehow there's a difference between things that happened and didn't happen, and that's a good place to draw a line in the sand of what you're allowed to advertise and not.
Doesn’t this make every ad fraud? It’s an actor pretending to enjoy drinking Coca Cola, every ad is the same.
First result with a summary of 16 CFR Part 465: Trade Regulation Rule on the Use of Consumer Reviews and Testimonials: https://www.goodwinlaw.com/en/insights/publications/2024/09/...
Is this even a question? Yes, it would be less fraudulent.
"Celebrity X won" was not.
I am not a fan of gambling, nor gambling advertisements, but this was outright fraud, and a violation of FTC rules (https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/resources/ftcs-endorse...) on disclosure.
There was no "promotes healthy whatever" it was like "this will make your skin younger and eliminate/prevent wrinkles and other signs of aging."
Then the quiet fast-talking guy said that none of their health claims have been reviewed by the FDA.
So that's where we are now. Everything is scams and nobody will do anything about it.
But apparently they can do that now, or at least they are doing it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dietary_Supplement_Health_and_...
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/12/31/6738513...
edit: to be clear, if companies are committing fraud in their marketing, that should be prosecuted or if regulations around misleading marketing are weak, that should be legislated of course.
What would you rather have? More regulated gambling and less addicts, or unregulated gambling and more addicts? Personally, I prefer the former.
Honestly, calling it "personal responsibility" when a powerful group is actively working to exploit that flaw seems a little weird. But even accepting that, we outlaw plenty of things because we think society isn't currently responsible enough to handle them.
That's why you see so many college boy on their marketing video.
It's completely fine when you're old enough to be responsible, and to know that gambling is a degenerate behavior that you can allow yourself sometimes to release the steam, but these companies don't make money from us.
They make money from the kids overspending because they are convinced they are going to get rich doing that. That's manipulation.
It would be like showing McDonald ads to starving African kids, of course they are going to make the wrong choice when offered food. They can't think rationally in that state.
Yes online gambling and sports management actions are their personal responsibility. And we should blame them for harm they knowingly cause.
God I cant believe I wrote that
Consider the probabilities in polymarket as the prob. of the polymarket market itself outcomes rather than reality.
Do you think in a food commercial the people eating the product are showing their genuine emotion? It's all acting.
McDonald’s Canada famously gave a candid behind the scenes of dressing a burger:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=Pbh1UAWLOgU&ra=m