Same thing they did with alcholics, drug addicts, etc. Cause a bunch of harm for profit, then demonize the very people you harmed and who created that profit for you. Sick sick greedy awful people

That’s where I’m at too.

I can call them degenerate or whatever but ultimately it’s the companies fault for their relentless lack of care for the general population, our politicians fault for taking loads of special interest money and allowing these companies to dictate how they are regulated, and in the nbas case, player advocates like antetokalshi and poLeMarket the whore for shamelessly taking money from these companies, while knowing full well they wouldn’t let their children use these services

This is true, but this is also not just american. The premier league for example has absolutely tons of gambling sponsors.

You can call that the American ethos but the only reason we’re there is because of totally separate culture wars. 50 years ago our government and voting populace was much more willing and able to regulate and rein in big corporations. Then we got the war on drugs, gay marriage, me too, trans rights movement, etc.

Notice how the latter is all Republican attack ads are talking about?

Because this “screw you I got mine” is not the American ethos, it’s the Republican politician ethos. But even their voters don’t believe it whole heartedly otherwise all their political ads would be about that and not anti gay or anti trans or religion or some other culture war BS.

Betting culture has been way more widespread in Europe than USA. USA and Canada by extension are catching up very quick tho.

They’re like Tony soprano talking to his kid about how she got her new car.

“You see, this man had a gambling problem, he made a wager and he lost. Real men respect their debts.”

Fucking sleazeballs man lol

American ethos? Lmao that’s just the way the world operates. People love pushing this American greed idea like that’s not how every country operates.

They’ve managed to convince everyone to blame the gamblers and not the companies spending billions to psychologically manipulate people

EXACTLY. Anytime somebody tried saying “at the end of the day they’re adults who make their own decisions and Lebron isn’t to blame” I ask them, “if that’s true then why is he making over 20 million a year on this? Surely if they’re adults who make their own decisions then this partnership with him is NOT worth a mansion’s worth of salary every year just to convince people who were going to decide to gamble anyway”. Never get an answer on that.

These are companies that are experts at making billions. If their numbers weren’t telling them that these partnerships make a difference in amount of people gambling, they’d obviously not be wasting 20+ million a year on them.

But nah, let’s blame the gamblers and not the wealthy, as per usual.

Usa don’t give a shit about the social ramifications till it cause enough death and misery. Look at social media, data centers, opioids, health insurance, cigs. It takes a decade for any legislation to pass and even then it pales in comparison the profit that’s been made.

“screw you I’ve got mine” and “anyone who has a problem in their life is weak and deserves it”

I know this ethos existed prior to 2020 but I swear after COVID the world turned very, very mean.

Move fast and break shit (while making Billions). Societies can pickup and repair (loses must be socialized)

i understand the idea of personal freedom but allowing someone to profit off of a rigged game has always been strange to me. And no im not saying sports are rigged, but that betting and casino games are literally rigged to be in the favor of the house. And also their main audience they target is young men. Which just shows more or less they are exploitative.

Sports gambling ❌️

Prediction markets✔️

There’s gonna be an insane amount of documentaries on the rise of gambling addictions and these leagues will do EVERYTHING to shift blame on the people and the companies and do everything to get the blame off of them

The law definitely hasn’t decided that yet. The circuits are split.

The law has decided that it’s gambling, but the courts at this point are divided on whether or not it’s legal gambling. Courts have ruled about ⁸⁰⁄₂₀ against Kalshi (a lot of those decisions get appealed so they don’t get shut down), but of that 20% that rules in their favor, none of them say it’s not gambling. Their legal argument isn’t really about not being gambling at all, which imo makes it worse that then their marketing claims they’re not gambling.

If you are a billion dollar company, you have every incentive to skert the law. Those that follows them usually get screw out of market value which then incentives to use the same loophole.

We can only hope that this prediction market shit gets sued to oblivion in courts - I fear that the immense amount of money it brings in will protect it from getting the hammer smashed down on it though…

Why is that wild? This country has been in a Republican stranglehold for decades now.

It’s not lootbox, it’s surprise mechanics

Or if the victims are rich and powerful, like how they threw SBF under the jail relatively speaking in terms of financial crimes

It’s not gambling, it’s ✨predicting✨

classy if rich, trashy if poor

If George Carlin were still alive he’d have a field day with these dumb linguistic games. I’d love to hear him do a bit on “predication markets”: “you’re not trading, you’re fucking gambling!”

Absolutely insane comment

Of course you see that as a problem, because you have even a tiny shred of empathy in your body.

But I’ve got bad news for you about the overwhelming majority of humans.

Actually my takeaway from cigarette ads is to be sad about how useless our government is now

I think about it and I am pretty sure our modern government would never be able to ban cigarette ads if the whole thing went down today.

Government has always had its problems but until Newt Gingrich nuked the idea of bipartisanship in the 90s they could still get cool things done sometimes

The messed up part is we have already been through the realization that sports gambling is bad for society but we are just repeating the same thing cause we didn’t learn from history

“Get medication for your insecurities delivered right to your door with no meaningful medical input!”

We wanted to buy a home sauna and I saw one that was HSA eligible. The website told me that I’d be redirected to a site where I would undergo a medical evaluation to determine whether or not I qualified. I was redirected to a form with a list of medical conditions, and was instructed to check off any that apply and then hit submit. I did, and was immediately approved, then an hour later I got a PDF signed by a doctor saying that in her opinion, this purchase was medically necessary.

I just laughed at how pathetic the whole charade was.

“I’d buy that for a dollar!”

Don’t forget the ED commercials using phrases like “you NEED this to be a man”

Has anyone called that number? I’m just curious what AI agent is waiting on the other end.

And sometimes “value” has to be invented where none apparently remain. AI companies are supposedly worth billions (maybe trillions) despite having never turned a profit and only surviving on additional investments from people expecting it to eventually Turn a Profit.

NVIDIA invests into those same companies with the expectation they’ll purchase more GPUs from NVIDIA, which pumps up the “value” of both sides, which leads investors to assume there’s tremendous value despite billions in losses.

“Just a few hundred million more and it’ll Turn a Profit, bro. Trust us bro.”

Meanwhile, 401Ks are now partly or majorly invested in those AI companies, so you are indeed right that regular people are being drained once the bubble inevitably bursts (or we succeed and make true AI. Either way us regular folks don’t benefit much, if at all.)

Huh, America is drowning in social programs, we are not even close to late stage capitalism.

There’s nothing “late stage” or inherently capitalistic about the prediction market, as people have doing this since before capitalism. People used to bet on how long a siege of a notable city would last or whether the siege would succeed, for example.

This happened during the 1691 siege of Limerick (about a century before Adam Smith wrote the Wealth of Nations) and to an extent during the Crusades, for example.

Not here to say people shouldn’t be aloud to gamble. I do think however that the current gambling landscape is being pushed in such a way that it’s creating real gambling problems in younger and younger people that’ll fuck up their lives and futures.

i cant consume 10,000 calories of Mcdonalds instantly with a few clicks, but i can definitely bet my mortgage payment on the Bulls in the time it takes me to use the toilet.

Especially when the floor of the game itself is reminding me of the app and the tv gives me promo codes that are just “too good” to pass up. And I’ve already been conditioned to gamble as a kid via game loot boxes and ripping pokemon card packs

NBA should start advertising domestic violence then

There’s been no headline, but there should be. The President is asserting that he alone can regulate these sportsbooks that his family is invested in. So he’s running casinos again, but as the Gaming Commission.

No, regular people aren’t okay with it. Boston is inundated with draft kings crap everywhere and people I talked to were over it.

Get out and vote for people who feel the same way you do!

I mean I enjoy gambling and lose like $5-10 a year. Sucks for the addicts but I dont want to lose that entertainment. Way more affordable than going to a game

my guess is that they are not long for the world.

I wish I had as much faith in the democrats as you do. It’s hard to not view them as either grossly incompetent or actively complicit at this point in the game. (I say this as a very liberal person)

That’s silly. They’ll just payoff the next president, no matter who it is.

Thats a strange question. Its not a secret, comapnies boards are a part of the public record.

Google: DT junior kalshi. very easy.

Just google Kalshi board members

https://www.wsj.com/finance/investing/donald-trump-jr-s-fund-boosts-polymarket-investment-by-around-300-million-45270bba

https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/options/articles/kalshi-reportedly-gave-trump-jr-210000460.html

he’s advising both and given money to both

We have this weird obsession with profit maximizing in America. Could we have a good product, pay janitors, and still make obscene money? Of course. But could we make the product suck and be evil for a few dollars more? Fuck yes we must.

It’s even worse because there are literal ongoing federal investigations with active players who cooked their stats for gambling. Like, the call is coming from inside the fucking house already.

Probably a lot of pressure from the owners once these betting sites got big enough to start putting their name on arenas.

Profit is the main driver and there’s no evidence viewership is hurting for it. The league’s other argument is that working directly with these companies they can control what is being bet on, to limit insider abuse. It’s easier to prevent the betting company from having certain Jontay Porter bets available than it is to control the Jontay Porters from gambling on the side. They already announced some of that recently I think.

Unless there’s a change in the laws these companies aren’t going away, and viewers don’t care on average, so this is sadly the new normal.

For one, money. And secondly, they can frame this as the NBA getting in front of the issue since supposedly they’re going to limit the type of bets that can appear on the sites. Also, nothing has indicated that the ties to gambling have caused a fall in people paying attention to sports or the NBA, so why would they care?

Silver was asked about it in an interview and flatout said that people are more likely to watch when they have money at stake. That means the league has an incentive to support these gambling platforms.

Nah there is a grand conspiracy IE Luka trade into mavs 1st overall pick

What incentive would Kalshi have to manipulate? They don’t operate like a sportsbook. I’m very anti prediction markets but they don’t “win” by manipulation, they win by people trading with one another on their platform.

What incentive would Kalshi have to fix games? They don’t operate like a sportsbook. I’m very anti prediction markets but they don’t “win” by fixing anything, they win by people trading with one another on their platform.

They absolute prey on addicts and they absolutely have the ill effect that sportsbooks do. But I don’t see why everyone is acting like Kalshi benefits when someone loses a bet on there.

ruins the integrity

The already VERY questionable integrity of the league

They’ve designed it for people in general. When I have access to your phone, I can design it for you specifically. So I can target you when you’re home, lonely, or just got paid. I can target you on your day off, etc, etc, etc. Once companies have access to your phone data, they basically have your whole life laid out in front of them. Combine that with modern data science and you can construct a money taking machine pretty easily.

At least Balmer owns companies that actually do things and employ a large amount of people. Kalshi and Polymarket are just money sinks.

Ontario government literally buried reports about how bad gambling is for the population, because the premier has money in it.

We’ve had it for a long time in the UK, and numerous studies have shown the impact and it’s devastating. We have millions of people who are problem gamblers, and it has led to a staggering amount of suicides especially in young men.

I don’t think we might understand how bad it is, but there’s a difference between gambling of the past like going to a casino or doing sports picks at a gas station before a game vs having a machine in your pocket where you can do it + having it pushed constantly (watch sports with a timer and see how long it takes for a gambling ad or a segment during the intermission) it is constant and combined with the accessibility I think it will lead to consequences the general public does not fully understand.

We 100% understand how dangerous gambling is, the government doesn’t care lol

I mean you can say the same thing about alcohol, but nobody cares.

Because they’re making bank on prediction markets

“the government doesn’t care”

The government is reflecting the will of the people. Unlike on reddit, legalizing gambling is a widely popular position

Not on this grand of a scale we don’t. We’re in totally uncharted territory rn

That’s a reasonable take. Maybe it’s optimism on my part? We eventually learned and smoking has become much less normalized and I am hoping the same happens with gambling. But I definitely see your point and think it has merit, I just hope it doesn’t.

Alcohol has been around for 10,000 years and for 9,000 of those years it was the safest way to drink a liquid without shitting your brains out.

The whole thing about drunken sailors is because they carried alcohol on board ships to have safe drinking water when at sea.

Alcohol has historical precedence. Humanity would be a lot different without it.

Tobacco wasn’t a thing until Europeans came to north America 400 years ago. And even then it wasn’t the same as it is now through years of genetic breeding. And evil corporations trying to drive up addiction rates.

Fair take but soon you won’t be able to get a mortgage or certain types of loans with sports betting in your history - if not already. It will take time to let certain aspects counter the damage though.

we don’t treat gambling the way we treat lots of other vices though. smoking ads are banned, for example, but broadcasters are spouting lines and odds are scrolling at the bottom of every ticker while leagues themselves partner with sportsbooks.

and the gambling on sports is one thing while the kalshi/polymarket stuff is waaaaay different and way worse for society.

I’m not saying we should eliminate gambling entirely, I agree grown adults should be able to do what they want. I just think similarly to how you don’t see ads for cigarettes everywhere that gambling should not be pushed like it is.

only two!!!

While my pessimism shows, I do hope you’re right. Now more than ever does seem to be the best time to apply pressure on all fronts anyhow.

Even if in a loss, I would love to see Utah actually stand up to this. Not only as a means to further scatter an already wavering manpower up top, but in the chance of this administration pissing off yet another conservative base.

Today you learned conservatives were never about state’s rights. That was always a lie.

They may not be satisfactory regulations, but they are in fact regulating Kalshi

I don’t know if they hate anything as much as they love money.

and addicts. GAMBLE GAMBLE GAMBLE GAMBLE please gamble responsibly GAMBLE GAMBLE GAMBLE GAMBLE

Nah. there was a brief moment in american history where laws and programs were implemented to reign in the rich and help the middle and lower classes. But obviously the Elite couldn’t stand for it so throw in a Citizens United and buy off a few supreme court justices and news networks and here we are

Same as it ever was.

Luke Kornet a hoe

Because it’s not some underground thing that was seeked out, they’re just trying to watch sports and it’s in your face ²⁴⁄₇. They give you so many incentives and a taste to start and make it sound like they’re giving out free money. I’d agree with you more if that wasn’t the case. But also if that’s your feeling, why should you feel bad about any vice/addiction.

I tend to agree, but would argue heavily that like with drugs it should be illegal to advertise.

If its someone’s choice then thats fine by me, but when people are pressured and inundated with gambling ads in every facet of their life, I can feel bad about why they got to that point.

Im for your freedom to do what you want with your life, but there are other ways of reigning it in than just making it illegal (which really doesnt work)

People dont always realize the consequences of their mistakes right away. And thats not just with gambling and / or addiction, it could be with anything.

I think its quite grey and some people certainly deserve sympathy.

spoken like someone who’s never had someone they love fall into addiction.

Possibly. Yes the owners want to make as much money as possible and might even put short-sighted pressure on the commissioner. But if the end result is that the league loses, say, half its viewership and ticket sales, then they’d be pissed about that. It’s the commissioner’s job to consider the health of the league/product and weigh that against owner desires.

What incentive would Kalshi have to manipulate?

So every league is doing this except for the ones that aren’t?

Saquon just said the NFL forced him to divest from Polymarket. If there’s one good thing you can say about Roger it’s that he doesn’t fuck around with gambling.

Showed up with Cathy Englebert apparently

He works for the team owners, and if he makes them money he doesn’t go anywhere

I guess it depends on what benchmark you’re using to judge him by.

To me the NBA product is the worst it’s been since the deadball era of the late 90’s to late 2000’s. He can’t solve the load management or tanking problems. 20% of his players are currently injured. Some, not all, of the basketball is downright horrid to watch.He’s in bed with the prediction markets.His players and head coaches are getting busted by the Feds.

You can love basketball and I do while still thinking there are serious and potentially fatal issues taking shape.

Besides Manfred’s comments about calling the World Series trophy “a piece of metal”, he has increased engagement and enhanced the game of Baseball with rules that have benefited the league tremendously. Both in terms of quality of play and overall entertainment. The sport itself was dying before he came around.

Silver meanwhile has only brought in lower viewership numbers, created rules that have been slowly destroying the integrity of the sport as the years go by, increased injuries, rules to inflate scoring, sponsors on jerseys, jersey partnership with Nike creating the worst jerseys both from an aesthetic standpoint and quality of said jerseys being garbage. Not to mention Silver’s own ridiculous comments, calling the NBA a “highlight sport”.

This doesn’t even touch other garbage Silver has infested the league with like these gambling partnerships, CBA rules that prevent teams from essentially keeping the players they drafted to create a false sense of parity around the league, etc.

He has been nothing but a cancer commissioner to this once great sport. David Stern was a horrible human being and not exactly a wonderful commissioner himself, but he was tiers above Silver and it’s not even close. Silver is quite frankly DESTROYING this league.

Not all vampires are bad.

In a nutshell, fair to say it’s just P2P gambling? Because to me the behavioral mechanics, risks, and potential for addiction mirror traditional gambling.

Which brings me back to.. this just feels like fuckery with wording and some loose definitions to give plausible deniability.

I’m sure despite the US being a mess for regulating heinous things, there are probably international examples where it’s treated as gambling is?