Topic: my version of a gambling website (work in progress) (Read 1047 times)
Just letting you know that I'm working hard on this. There is still a lot to do but a few hard things have been done now, including the event creation process (signing/verification and stuffs like that) and the current website gives a better idea of how it will work out once it's functional.
I could use some encouragements. So please feel free to express your interest in this project if you want.
You should already be able to register a public key and create an event if you want to test this part. But that's pretty much the only thing you can do right now.
Watching this.
Me too, curious to see where this is going.
I dont understand that 
Watching this.
1. Who arbitrates in cases where people bet on poorly worded propositions, or where the outcome either can't be confirmed or falls outside the decision space? Is there going to be a public vote on the result, or are disputed bets made void -- and if so, who decides which disputes qualify to void a bet? Stupid example: "It will rain in Paris tomorrow." 25 people bet each way. It doesn't officially rain, but of the people who said it would, 5 of them agree it drizzled over some neighborhood for a few minutes. The bet didn't specify it had to be according to the meteorological society's website. Will bets require an officially published source? Even if everyone votes down the person who started the bet, it doesn't solve the 50-person dispute now going on.
The creator of the proposition is in charge of arbitrating it.
In your example, the person who created the event "It will rain in Paris tomorrow" will be the only one who will be allowed to decide whether it rained or not.
So there is a reputation element in the event creator.
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2. How are you going to make money off this?
Me? I won't. If the service is usefull, I may make money by using it.
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3. What you're proposing, if I get it, is a kind of escrow service that uses the built-in features of Bitcoin to provide both anonymity and (by keeping keys secret) disbursement at the right moment. Why is a totally unmoderated prediction market necessarily a better thing to start this service with than, say, a sportsbook, a foreign exchange or shadow stock market, where the results can be computed automatically from publicly available sources? Choosing a particular market limits the number of things that can go wrong, and would probably help coalesce the critical mass you're looking for.
I don't want to moderate anything as I think it is too much work. I want a 100% automated website.
Actually, I'll use cookies to allow clients to ignore signatures they don't trust, or categories of events they don't want to hear about (tags can be added using a simple 'Tag: ....' syntax in the description). This is some kind of a custom moderation.
I think it's a good idea, if it can be made user-friendly enough. Part of the reason for wallets on sites is that it streamlines the process and provides clear accounting once the bets are in. What you're talking about sounds more like a concept than a website; without having an exchange to go along with it, you're relying on people taking more initiative to do this than you want to...especially if what you want is to create enough volume to make the bets interesting. This boils down to a critical mass issue. Having less than critical mass means it won't work. Bitcoin's already a pretty small gaming market (although admittedly, it's probably the only existing technology that could give rise to an idea as wild and decentralized as what you're suggesting). Couple questions -- maybe I missed the answers in the faq --
1. Who arbitrates in cases where people bet on poorly worded propositions, or where the outcome either can't be confirmed or falls outside the decision space? Is there going to be a public vote on the result, or are disputed bets made void -- and if so, who decides which disputes qualify to void a bet? Stupid example: "It will rain in Paris tomorrow." 25 people bet each way. It doesn't officially rain, but of the people who said it would, 5 of them agree it drizzled over some neighborhood for a few minutes. The bet didn't specify it had to be according to the meteorological society's website. Will bets require an officially published source? Even if everyone votes down the person who started the bet, it doesn't solve the 50-person dispute now going on.
2. How are you going to make money off this?
3. What you're proposing, if I get it, is a kind of escrow service that uses the built-in features of Bitcoin to provide both anonymity and (by keeping keys secret) disbursement at the right moment. Why is a totally unmoderated prediction market necessarily a better thing to start this service with than, say, a sportsbook, a foreign exchange or shadow stock market, where the results can be computed automatically from publicly available sources? Choosing a particular market limits the number of things that can go wrong, and would probably help coalesce the critical mass you're looking for.
1. Who arbitrates in cases where people bet on poorly worded propositions, or where the outcome either can't be confirmed or falls outside the decision space? Is there going to be a public vote on the result, or are disputed bets made void -- and if so, who decides which disputes qualify to void a bet? Stupid example: "It will rain in Paris tomorrow." 25 people bet each way. It doesn't officially rain, but of the people who said it would, 5 of them agree it drizzled over some neighborhood for a few minutes. The bet didn't specify it had to be according to the meteorological society's website. Will bets require an officially published source? Even if everyone votes down the person who started the bet, it doesn't solve the 50-person dispute now going on.
2. How are you going to make money off this?
3. What you're proposing, if I get it, is a kind of escrow service that uses the built-in features of Bitcoin to provide both anonymity and (by keeping keys secret) disbursement at the right moment. Why is a totally unmoderated prediction market necessarily a better thing to start this service with than, say, a sportsbook, a foreign exchange or shadow stock market, where the results can be computed automatically from publicly available sources? Choosing a particular market limits the number of things that can go wrong, and would probably help coalesce the critical mass you're looking for.
Hi,
I've been thinking a lot about gambling websites recently. Not really because I like gambling, but because I think it's quite an important market for the bitcoin economy. It's also pretty interesting morally/philosophically.
Anyway, I'm working on a basic gambling website. It's a work in progress, but the FAQ is already written, so I thought it might be a good idea to publish it already, in case someone is interested in implementing the same design, and would like to help.
http://s0.barwen.ch/~grondilu/cgi-bin/betting?faq
The main difference with other gambling websites is that I don't maintain any kind of bitcoin balance per user. Instead, I issue "prediction tickets" which are some kind of conditionnal bonds, that can be sold/purchased anywhere on internet (on a forum, IRC, biddingpond, bitcoin-otc, whatever).
Anxious to here your comments.
I've been thinking a lot about gambling websites recently. Not really because I like gambling, but because I think it's quite an important market for the bitcoin economy. It's also pretty interesting morally/philosophically.
Anyway, I'm working on a basic gambling website. It's a work in progress, but the FAQ is already written, so I thought it might be a good idea to publish it already, in case someone is interested in implementing the same design, and would like to help.
http://s0.barwen.ch/~grondilu/cgi-bin/betting?faq
The main difference with other gambling websites is that I don't maintain any kind of bitcoin balance per user. Instead, I issue "prediction tickets" which are some kind of conditionnal bonds, that can be sold/purchased anywhere on internet (on a forum, IRC, biddingpond, bitcoin-otc, whatever).
Anxious to here your comments.
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