Topic: Bit-Syndicate - A Bitcoin Lottery Syndicate [Restarted!!!!!] (Read 4581 times)

For those that want to play Bitlotto Jr you have around 5 hours to get you syndicate payments in.

Turns out the syndicate did not win the monthly BitLotto Draw 

However! the syndicates for next weeks BitLotto Jr and next months BitLotto Main draws are now up!
You can start buying tickets by using the addresses on the website

Not yet sadly. Still waiting for the results. The BitLotto Jr syndicate will be restarted tomorrow, and obviously the next main draw syndicate... it seemed when the organiser of BitLotto had to leave for a while people stopped playing Jr.

Fingers crossed! Stupidly I never bought a ticket myself, so if the syndicate wins I'll be kicking myself lol

The big day's tomorrow! Got any news for us, Noviz?

I think it turns out I was wrong... I didn't add a 0 where I should have done. Sorry but we did NOT win the 17th August draw. :\

There is one week left to join the BitLotto main draw syndicate! We currently have around 1/10 chance of winning

Oh and there won't be a BitLotto Jr syndicate this week as I am away for a few days so I wouldn't really be able to process tickets... Sorry for the inconvinience.

Starting to buy the BitLotto tickets.
We have 10 in total at the moment meaning we have around a 1/8.7 chance of winning
If anyone wants to join in there is still time! See the website for details

I'll be opening up the BitLotto Jr syndicate tomorrow... lets hope we get some tickets this time! Last week we had 0 meaning we couldn't win it for a 3RD TIME IN A ROW!

Ok as per usual I've stopped taking syndicate tickets for the BitLotto Jr draw 24 hours before it.
Sadly no one seemed to enter with the syndicate so we have no tickets to enter.
Hopefully next week will be more successful!

Just to note, we still have 100 shares (10 tickets) for the main draw.... still plenty of time to join in!

Last 12 hours to buy BitLotto Jr tickets for this weeks draw!
See the website for details

Just an update:

We have 100 shares pooled for the main BitLotto draw
and 0 for the BitLotto Jr draw.

Yeah I hope my workings were correct also... I was abit reluctant to say whether or not we had won incase I was wrong but I'm sure we did do

Just to let everyone know, the BitLotto Jr syndicate for next weeks draw is now open
And we also have pooled 100 shares equivalent to 10 tickets for the main BitLotto draw.

If your calculations are correct then I won a little over 1BTC. I hope you are right

A little bit over 1BTC, on top of what I invested that is

Thanks for joining in on the main draw:)

As you may have seen there was a request by the BitLotto organiser for people to work out the results while he is gone. I have just finished working it out... and as far as I can tell it is correct. The good news is, from my calculations, the syndicate has won BitLotto Jr for the second time in a row! Don't get too excited because I may be wrong but I'm 99% sure I'm not.

The prize pool was, afaik, 2.90 BTC. We had 27 tickets pooled. Therefore each ticket has a winning value of 0.1074.

If in fact we have won, please be patient when waiting for your winnings as we will have to wait till the BitLotto organiser comes back at the end of the month.

I'll be opening the next BitLotto Jr syndicate shortly.

I just got 7 tix in the standard BitLotto draw... I hope we win Jr. today

Ah I see what you mean; and yes you are correct. What I meant to say was 10 shares equals one ticket, therefore you technically own a ticket... but yes you are still sharing with the other people. I'll change the wording asap.

Also thanks for buying in A few other people said they were going to join the main syndicate but seem to have dissapeared; lets hope they come back lol If you know of anyone that would be interested in joining it would be great if you could send them to the site.

Really like that Noviz went with the share system. I just bought 30 shares for the main draw.

Just one thing, I think its false if you say that if you buy less than 10 shares you "share a ticket with someone" as EVERY share always shares all tickets with everybody in the syndicate. So no matter if you have 1 share or 30, you have the same chance of winning, its just that the guy with the 30 shares will win 30 times as much as you do!

Really like the syndicate as it does open up the main lottery draw to a wider audience. Thanks to the syndicate you can have a go at the main jackpot with as little as 0.026 BTC.

As usual the Jr syndicate is now closed as it is 24 hours before the draw.
Thanks to everyone that took part!

As the BitLotto organiser is away we may not recieve winnings (if we do win) for a few weeks; so please be patient for your winnings (again if we do win).

The main BitLotto syndicate is still open as usual.

I'll be opening the next Jr syndicate up the day after this weeks draw.

Thanks.

Just an update on what tickets we have pooled:

27 for BitLotto Jr.
0 for BitLotto main.

For BitLotto Jr it is 0.05 per ticket + a 0.01 processing fee... only the main BitLotto syndicate uses the shares system so people who can't normally afford to play it can do so by sharing a ticket with others.

Yes, you are correct if you won on your own you would win more money...
However with a syndicate you might win numerous times, while you may only ever win once or never at all without one.

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Lets look at this scenario:

40 tickets purchased in the Jr Lottery.

If you bought one ticket on your own, without a syndicate, you would have a 1/40 chance of winning.

However if you joined a syndicate with 9 other tickets it would increase your chances of winning to 1/4.

As you can see the chances of winning is greatly increased although obviously you would have to share the prize.

Currently, in this weeks Jr draw, we have around a 1/1.5 chance of winning.

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Syndicates aren't for everyone... not everyone likes to join them. Some would rather try to win the prize on their own at the cost of a higher chance of winning. But others like to have an increased chance of winning at the cost of big prize funds... and for them it is more fun because you might win a numerous times rather than once. On top of this you get the fun of playing with other people.

I hope that answers your concerns. As I said, its a matter of taste.

At the end we all share the pot I put in .06 and got out .20 something I believe (around there)

If any of you have noticed this: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/make-03-btc-for-calculating-the-bitlotto-jr-draw-while-im-away-36777
The BitLotto organiser has had to go on a short notice trip to see his family.
This will not affect our syndicate as the draws are still going to take place... it just means that he will not be able to send winning payments out until he gets back at the end of the month.

So as I said, all syndicates are still operational, but please don't worry if there is a delay in payment if we win.
As I always say, feel free to contact me on here or via the other options on the bit-syndicate website.

I have a question. What will you do about leftover partial shares. For example. 29 partial shares are purchased. That is 2 tickets & 9/10ths of 1. What will be done about the additional share? Will you just cover the cost of it & enter into the drawing and take the equivalent of the remaining shares. Or will you just return the shares to those who submitted them? Either way great stuff

 
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Oh bum! I knew i forgot to mention something lol.
Basically i'll make up the difference. I usually enter myself. So what will happen is I will wait to enter until the syndicate closes then make up the shares needed for a full ticket.

Of course that may change if it turns out I can't afford it... but for now ill buy the remaining shares.

If you have any questions, ask here or via the other contact methods on the site.
[/quote]

I have a question. What will you do about leftover partial shares. For example. 29 partial shares are purchased. That is 2 tickets & 9/10ths of 1. What will be done about the additional share? Will you just cover the cost of it & enter into the drawing and take the equivalent of the remaining shares. Or will you just return the shares to those who submitted them? Either way great stuff

 

Bitcoin main draw syndicate is now open!

http://bitcoinsreview.com/bit-syndicate/syn_bitlotto.php

Please make sure you read the 'Important, Please Read' on the page as this will explain the 'shares' process for this draw.


If you have any questions, ask here or via the other contact methods on the site.

Just processed the first batch of tickets... totally to 27 pooled tickets!

Just took another 10. So im 20 in now. Soon as you get lotto up I'll take 20 of those too

-FaerO-

Ok, some good news and some bad (for me anyway).

The bad news is that the festival I was going to has been cancelled because British weather is f**king stupid and it has totally flooded the fields.
The good news is that I can now monitor the syndicate over the weekend and also get the main BitLotto syndicate up and running quicker

Just to let you know we already have 17 tickets pooled! I'l be processing these shortly.

Yeah in the event that the syndicate wins the coins are sent to the address that purchased the ticket.

Awesome.. count me in for 20+ shares!

I just bought in on 10. I never got an option to enter a receiving address. Im guessing you just shoot the winnings back to the address they came from? Can someone clarify this for me

Ok the new BitLotto Jr syndicate address for the draw of 17th August is now up. Please check the website for details.
I'm using a brand new wallet this time so it shouldn't be as confusing to track transactions.

I'll be opening the main BitLotto draw syndicate up next week now because of this festival I'm going to. I'm pretty sure I'll be using the 1/10th share method that was suggested. Check this space or the website for more details next week.

Congratulations again for everyone who won with the syndicate this week!

Fantastic news!
I'm processing the winnings now They should be in participants wallets shortly.
Once that is done I'll open up for next week BitLotto Jr's draw.

In total we won 2.717 coins.
There were 13 tickets bought in the syndicate so this equates to 0.209 per ticket!

This looks promising. As soon as you come back saying youre accepting payments for the next drawing Im in. I'll take 5 off the top

-FaerO-

Huzzah!

Yea!!!

Congratulations! Your syndicate won!!! Payment sent to address listed at bitlotto.com/jr.php 

Alright guys I've stopped accepting syndicate tickets now to make sure that all the tickets can get purchased on BitLotto Jr.

On an important note...
I'm going to a festival this week, from Thursday to Monday morning so please don't be alarmed if I don't reply for a few days... especially if we win I haven't run off I'll just be sitting in a muddy field lol.

I will still run the BitLotto Jr syndicate for next weeks draw, however again don't be alarmed if I don't process the tickets till the Monday of my return. Everything should go swimmingly as Monday will allow me to purchase the syndicate tickets in time. So if you are thinking of joining in the syndicate for the next BitLotto Jr draw, don't be afraid to do so.
I will try and keep up to date using my mobile however that has limited battery.

I am probably going to use the 'shares' idea that has been suggested, especially for the main BitLotto draw anyway. However, this will have to wait until after next weeks draw as I won't be around to sort any issues out.

Anyways, everyone keep their fingers crossed and hope we win

Looks like you got a few for BitLotto Jr. It will be interesting to see how many will pay for BitLotto. This weeks results should be interesting!!!!

Ok we have about 12 hours to buy syndicate tickets until I close it off until the draw.

Just an update:
Got another single ticket purchase this morning.

No I definitely wouldn't change it mid-round. To be honest I can't see any real benefit of having an 'equal' payout method.

Hey there. I just need some confirmation that you would never change the payout method(currently proportional) in the middle of a round. I put in my bets in under the condition that payout is proportional. Thanks!

Why didn't I think of this!! Good idea!

Another possibility:

You publish an address for the syndicate. Everyone pays whatever they want. Even tiny amounts. Then whenever you get enough BTC to buy tickets you buy them throughout the month. Fees just come out of the wallet used for the account. Waiting till the very end could be risky if the network gets really busy. Remember that late payments will be returned but you wouldn't want ALL the tickets to be returned. If the syndicate wins you could then look at every deposit made. Calculate the % of total funds deposited for each payment and pay the winnings based on the % minus a small fee for each. Late returned payments could be divided up in this way too. If you over guess the fee amount you could just put the remainder into the next months draw.

Ah I really really like the share idea. I had to read it a few times to fully get it but I suppose it is 2:30 am here lol. I guess I'd probably 'swallow' the risk as you put it as the alternative would be kind of annoying to manage. At first I thought the math would be harder to work out what each share was worth if the syndicate won but it's just as easy as if it was per ticket. I'll have a good hard think about that... but I really do like the idea as it'll allow those that can only afford to play BitLotto Jr to get involved with the main BitLotto.
The deadline is actually 24 hours before the draw takes place. It does say that on the site, not put it on here though.

No you where quite right in doing it proportionally. Every ticket sold increases the chance of the syndicate to win. If you buy 5 shares you should get 5 parts of the win, similarly to the lottery overall.

The charge is fair, you should however make it clear that this is the only cut you take, as its actually rather low. Considering that from the 0.01 you pay 0.0005 per ticket to actually purchase the lottery ticket.

I would NOT run a second syndicate as this would further complicate things. For example taking the big lottery you could simply divide it in shares. A ticket costs 0.25 BTC which is a barrier of entry for some newer players. You with the syndicate are in the perfect spot to enable low rollers to take part in it. Set a fixed ratio of for example 1/10. So each share costs 0.025 BTC + 0.01 in fee's (that might be much as price is so low but would encourage to buy more shares at once so less work for you). Then offer to sell any number of shares. If I would buy 20 shares for example I would actually be paying for two full tickets, its just written differently.

The risk you then have is that in the end you might end up having sold for example 101 shares, enough for 10 tickets but you are lacking 9 shares or 90% of the last ticket price. This is the worst case scenario. Either invalidate the share bought last (you have to be up front about it) or "swallow" the risk and force yourself to buy the last 9 shares for yourself which likely you wont mind as you want to part take anyway (which I think is not a problem at all).

Also you should set a deadline x hours before the draw to ensure you have time to actually purchase all tickets (as you do it manually) and for the tickets to make it into blocks in time.

Ah yes that is why I made it proportional in the first place.

It may well turn out that the winnings from the BitLotto Jr may be quite small... however the chances of winning it multiple times will be quite high so in some respects it all balances out.
I'm definitely making sure that as a syndicate we don't dominate ticket sales as that would mean the winnings per ticket would be tiny. So it may end up that the syndicates may close early if we have bought too many... then open again as our percentage of the overall ticket sales decreases. It'll just take a little extra management on my end... it shouldn't be a problem though, especially for the big BitLotto draw.

I believe that a proportional system would be better in the main BitLotto, because with the large jackpot, it wouldn't be fair if someone who bought one ticket got the same amount as someone who bought ten tickets.

It is proportional at the moment. I doubt it will be changing unless I find that one player is buying loads of tickets making single ticket players worthless.
Feel free to join in

As a side note I'll be starting the main BitLotto draw syndicate next week. I just want to finish the first BitLotto Jr draw first to iron everything out.

I may join but it would have to be proportional.

The winnings at the moment are divided proportionally. I may change this if it turns out one user is simply buying 10's of tickets making it worthless to other players. Or, depending on the amount of people playing, I might have a proportional syndicate and a equal syndicate for those that can only afford one ticket. The issue with the 'equal' payment is that it would be really difficult to 'police' as a one player could simply buy tickets from different wallets.

Do you think splitting equally would be better?

How are you planning on dividing up the winnings from the lottery? Will they be split equally, or proportionally depending on the number of tickets a person has purchased?

Basically my cut is the 0.01 per order. This might be slightly bigger or 0.01 per ticket for the main BitLotto game; I'm not really sure yet. Or maybe it could increase slightly with the amount of tickets ordered... maybe like 0.01 per two tickets.
My main profit from this essentially comes from the fact that I'll be part of the syndicate myself from time to time. I bought three tickets myself for this round.
It's all a work in progress though. Prices may change or whatever, but I want to keep it as close to the price of buying a regular ticket as possible. I doubt I'll be changing the price for BitLotto Jr because the prize pots are generally quite small so if I increase the processing fee it becomes pointless for the player. Plus its fun for me just as much as the other players... I never envisaged this as hugely profitable for myself.

To your second point...
Currently each single ticket is counted as such. So lets say person A has 3 tickets in the syndicate and person B has 7. If the lottery winnings is 10 bitcoins then person A recieves 3 and person B recieves 7... obviously because one ticket is worth 1 bitcoin.
For the big lottery I might consider running a side syndicate for a single ticket orders to accomodate those that can only afford one ticket... so each player can only buy one ticket thus giving a higher share of the prize for those who cannot afford many tickets. That might be somewhat difficult to 'police' though... So we'd basically have a Single ticket syndicate and a Multi ticket syndicate. Obviously the multi one would generally have a higher chance of winning but would result in a smaller ticket value. Single ticket syndicates would result in a smaller chance of winning but a higher share of the prize.

Thank you for the advice and suggestions. As I have said many times this is a work in progress and I love user feedback.
I expect I'll be using the seperate wallet idea in the next draw... in fact I've already set it up on my end. I'll have a look into automation of ticket purchasing although it's not really been that bad to do it manually so far... I guess I'll see how many players we can get. Of course if I end up having to process 100+ tickets, the manual way might become a problem.
Hope to see you joining the syndicate soon

I do like the idea, however you should make clear if and how much of a cut you take for running the syndicate. Currently you say + 0.01 per order, is that all you take? (Would leave you with the difference of cost of purchasing ticket transaction fees of 0.005 x tickets sold, not a lot of "profit" for you).

In addition for "bigger" lotteries you should consider shares in single tickets. This would enable low rollers to take part in the big jackpots.

Wish you good luck with the syndicate. Actually I might purchase a few tickets trough it soon. Long term you might want to automate the ticket purchasing to reduce effort required by you. Also using a specific wallet / hash to purchase tickets from is a great idea by bitlotto.

Great!

I want more people to invest, so I will match the number of tickets the next guy buys, as long as they buy in the next 24 hours.

lol awesome
I've processed the new 6 tickets already.

Now if my maths are correct...

We now have a 12/32 chance of winning... which is around a 1/2.66 chance.



Sorry again about the cock up with the wallets. This is the first go so I expected a few teething issues. I'll be using stand alone wallets for the next draw.

Alright Noviz, I see you've matched me.

Forgive me, but I'll have to one-up you. I've just doubled your match. Just bought six more tickets.

Just bought the first lot of tickets (6 in total).



Annoyingly what I have now realised is that I should have used a special wallet as the coins have come from a few different addresses.
I'll get this sorted for next time as it will be easy for the syndicate players to track the payments... I'm very sorry for the inconvinience although I did expect some minor hiccups in the first run.

Just to show the power of a syndicate...

Currently there have been 26 tickets sold for the BitLotto Jr draw.
So if you bought one ticket you would have 1/26 chance of winning.
As a group we have 6 tickets... so 6/26
So our chances of winning have increased to around the region of 1/4.33!

Ha I matched Cory's payment thinking that was for two tickets but instead it was three. Oh well! 

Thanks for the advice. Yeah I'm in two minds about buying the tickets all at once or buying them when a new syndicate member sends their coins to me. This is a test run so I guess I'll see which will be the best way after this weeks draw.

On a side note:

Because this is the first draw I am purchasing two tickets myself to increase our syndicate members chances of winning!

For BitLotto Jr (and the main one) make sure you don't send it all at once. (I think you know that though) Each ticket has to be a separate payment. Oh, and don't wait till the very end in case the payments don't make it in a block in time! (I guess worst case they would just go to the next weeks draw) Something to consider would be making a payment of 0.050001 (or other unique amount) for each ticket. Yes, you are paying a very TINY amount more but when people see the BitLotto Jr site it will be really easy to pick out what ones are the syndicate ones. It would work until someone else decides to pay that amount too for some reason. Or just make them all at once and you can probably tell what ones are yours based off of the time you get your first confirmation. It will be the same time of the transaction in blockexplorer. Anyways, good luck with your project. If you need any help or advice feel free to PM me. 

Thanks for joining in
I have just seen the deposit to the address and have updated the website to show that fact.
I shall be purchasing the BitLotto Jr tickets soon.
As I have said on the site, the more we get involved the more chance we have of winning

Awesome! I love this idea. Pooled gambling.

I just bought three tickets. Hope we win!

I'm glad you are happy to let me run a syndicate. I was a little worried that you'd disapprove... although in reality it should bring more custom to your games so it's a win win situation I suppose.
Yes the idea of a special wallet is a good one. I'll keep this in mind after the trial run.
The deposit address will be the same address used to purchase the tickets so hopefully users will be able to keep track of it anyway. My intention was to buy the tickets all at once and take a screenshot of blockexplorer and ring the tickets purchased by the syndicate.

Good luck! Thanks for picking BitLotto!  I'd suggest using a special wallet only for this purpose. That way people can trace the transactions all the way to BitLotto to verify if their pool has won. Perhaps even listing what tickets are the ones you bought. I haven't read your website yet, but I'll check it out later. I wish your syndicate good luck!

Hi, I want to introduce everyone to a new venture of mine. Bit-Syndicate.
Basically this website gives users higher chances of winning in the various Bitcoin Lotteries.

What is Bit-Syndicate?

Simply put this website is a lottery syndicate for the various Bitcoin lotteries (BitLotto, etc).
(http://bitcoinsreview.com/bit-syndicate/)

So what is a Lottery Syndicate?

A lottery syndicate is a group of people who put their money into a pot to buy tickets. The winnings are then shared back to those who contributed.
These are seen in national lotteries all over the world, usually combining groups of friends or business employees.

So the chances of winning are higher?

Yes. Because you are compiling tickets, your chance of winning is higher. Obviously, however, because the winning ticket is shared by a group the prize is divided.

For example, if you enter a lottery with 100 sold tickets you would have 1/100 chance of winning if you bought one ticket yourself. However if you were in a syndicate of say 20 pooled tickets your chances would increase to 20/100 (1/5).

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Please visit the site for more information:
http://bitcoinsreview.com/bit-syndicate/

Feel free to ask any questions either on here or by using the contact options on the Bit-Syndicate site.

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I'll use this space to update everyone (otherwise go to the website)...

- 06/08/11
- I'm going to start the main BitLotto syndicate next week. I just want to finish the first BitLotto Jr draw first to iron everything out.

- 11/08/11
- We won BitLotto Jr! 2.717 bitcoins
- Main BitLotto syndicate start delayed... now coming next week.

- 13/08/11
- BitLotto main draw syndicate now open!

- 07/09/11
- Had some time off with BitLotto Jr but now we are back up and running