I actually played FanDuel fantasy hockey last season and made over $100+. If you know enough about the sport, it's basically free money. Much much better odds than casino games. Plenty of doofuses out there paying into the games, and that money ends up in your pocket (and the pocket of the people running it).
Ok, so it's actual gambling? I am not familiar with how those two actually work. If you're taking money from other people, then yeah.
It doesn't currently qualify as gambling because the owners argue it requires skill to be successful. That's how they get around internet gambling laws.
I actually played FanDuel fantasy hockey last season and made over $100+. If you know enough about the sport, it's basically free money. Much much better odds than casino games. Plenty of doofuses out there paying into the games, and that money ends up in your pocket (and the pocket of the people running it).
I'm glad to see your view has evolved into a more correct one. Earlier in this very thread you'd dismissed fantasy sports as pure luck. :-D
Ok, so it's actual gambling? I am not familiar with how those two actually work. If you're taking money from other people, then yeah.
It doesn't currently qualify as gambling because the owners argue it requires skill to be successful. That's how they get around internet gambling laws.
That's not quite true.
Under old existing laws it has always been legal in the US to bet on games of skill. At least as long as it was your own skills you were betting on.
If I were to bet that I could jump higher than you, and you bet you could jump higher than me, that's totally legal.
What isn't legal is if Rym bets that Andrew can jump higher than me. It's also not legal to bet on anything based on luck. That's gambling.
Now, you could argue that fantasy sports games were already legal because they are games of skill. I agree that some are. But they completely avoided ever needing to have that argument heard in a court of law because the UIGEA makes a specific exemption for fantasy sports games.
Original fantasy sports games were such that you would manage a team over the course of a season. This may not be skill based, but it's knowledge and effort based. The more you know about the sport, the greater your odds are. It certainly isn't a game of luck the way that roulette is.
However, things like Draft Kings and FanDuel are daily fantasy games. You build a fantasy team for just one day of sports. Make a hockey team out of players who are playing tonight and try to score more points than anyone else who made a team for tonight.
This is still somewhat based on knowledge, but it is much much more luck based. Sure, you know that my man OBJ is going to make a few big plays on long throws from Eli. But this could be a bad day for him, or for Eli. It could also be a good day for the opposing defense. Over the course of an entire season that kind of luck evens out. But on any given Sunday, you might as well roll some fucking dice.
But because the law has an exemption for fantasy sports, you can make a fantasy sports game that amounts to nothing more than gambling, and it is explicitly legal in the USA.
And now there are people who are insider trading on these games. People who work for teams have information about players not available to the public. People working for the fantasy sports companies themselves have access to data that gamblers do not have. And they are playing these games because they are completely unregulated.
It doesn't currently qualify as gambling because the owners argue it requires skill to be successful. That's how they get around internet gambling laws.
I meant in real life, not what the law says. Does anybody believe for a second it's not gambling IRL?
Those Draft Kings commercials are fucking everywhere...
When you make a lot of money you can afford to buy a lot of ads. In places where sports betting is legal, ads for sports gambling are among the most common during sporting events. Try watching some soccer on European tv.
Still, can't say it wasn't a nice change at first from Audible/Casper/Naturebox who seem to sponsor basically every podcast ever. YES WE KNOW YOU HAVE CRUNCHY PEANUT CLUSTERS WE'VE HEARD ABOUT IT ON SIX OTHER SHOWS THIS WEEK.
Still, can't say it wasn't a nice change at first from Audible/Casper/Naturebox who seem to sponsor basically every podcast ever. YES WE KNOW YOU HAVE CRUNCHY PEANUT CLUSTERS WE'VE HEARD ABOUT IT ON SIX OTHER SHOWS THIS WEEK.
Those Draft Kings commercials are fucking everywhere...
When you make a lot of money you can afford to buy a lot of ads. In places where sports betting is legal, ads for sports gambling are among the most common during sporting events. Try watching some soccer on European tv.
I'd say most of the ads I saw in Sydney were for TAB.
It doesn't currently qualify as gambling because the owners argue it requires skill to be successful. That's how they get around internet gambling laws.
I meant in real life, not what the law says. Does anybody believe for a second it's not gambling IRL?
Yes, it's clearly gambling, although one could dispute it depending upon how exactly we're defining "gambling".
That said, I think the legal questions on what counts as "gambling" are actually of interest here. The "skill vs chance" issue is relevant due to the dominant factor test, which is used by many jurisdictions and states that whether something counts as gambling comes down to whether skill or luck predominates.
The issue is that, from a statistical perspective, whether skill or chance dominates is not an inherent aspect of the game itself, but also depends on the sample size you take. In fact, any game with a non-zero element of skill can become skill-dominant when given a sufficiently long timescale.
However, as Scott has said, the reason that fantasy sports get a pass is not because they've been judged to be dominated by skill, but rather because they are specifically exempt by law. The same can be said of, for example, stock trading---it doesn't count as gambling because the laws specifically exclude it.
Those Draft Kings commercials are fucking everywhere...
When you make a lot of money you can afford to buy a lot of ads. In places where sports betting is legal, ads for sports gambling are among the most common during sporting events. Try watching some soccer on European tv.
I'd say most of the ads I saw in Sydney were for TAB.
Fun facts - while almost entirely private now, TAB (Totalisator Agency Board) was originally and for most of it's existence a government-run monopoly on sport bets.
Those Draft Kings commercials are fucking everywhere...
When you make a lot of money you can afford to buy a lot of ads. In places where sports betting is legal, ads for sports gambling are among the most common during sporting events. Try watching some soccer on European tv.
I'd say most of the ads I saw in Sydney were for TAB.
Fun facts - while almost entirely private now, TAB (Totalisator Agency Board) was originally and for most of it's existence a government-run monopoly on sport bets.
What was the one I saw everywhere with the logo of the guy with the hat? I just remember the hat guy, but not the name.
If it was a guy with a cowboy hat, usually kind of a line drawing, that's Tattslotto. Just your bog-standard lottery. It's run by the Tatts Group, originally Tattersall's, which started as one dude taking bets on horse racing in his pub, but ended up getting supported by the Tasmanian government.
If it was a guy with a cowboy hat, usually kind of a line drawing, that's Tattslotto. Just your bog-standard lottery. It's run by the Tatts Group, originally Tattersall's, which started as one dude taking bets on horse racing in his pub, but ended up getting supported by the Tasmanian government.
Yeah, it was Tatt's. It took me at least a week to realize that logo was gambling related.
If it was a guy with a cowboy hat, usually kind of a line drawing, that's Tattslotto. Just your bog-standard lottery. It's run by the Tatts Group, originally Tattersall's, which started as one dude taking bets on horse racing in his pub, but ended up getting supported by the Tasmanian government.
Yeah, it was Tatt's. It took me at least a week to realize that logo was gambling related.
To be honest, the first time I went to Melbourne, I had to ask what the fuck that was about too - It's called Gold Lotto up here, and I'd never heard of this "Tattslotto" mob before.
Comments
Under old existing laws it has always been legal in the US to bet on games of skill. At least as long as it was your own skills you were betting on.
If I were to bet that I could jump higher than you, and you bet you could jump higher than me, that's totally legal.
What isn't legal is if Rym bets that Andrew can jump higher than me. It's also not legal to bet on anything based on luck. That's gambling.
However, there was a law passed some years ago.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unlawful_Internet_Gambling_Enforcement_Act_of_2006
Now, you could argue that fantasy sports games were already legal because they are games of skill. I agree that some are. But they completely avoided ever needing to have that argument heard in a court of law because the UIGEA makes a specific exemption for fantasy sports games.
Original fantasy sports games were such that you would manage a team over the course of a season. This may not be skill based, but it's knowledge and effort based. The more you know about the sport, the greater your odds are. It certainly isn't a game of luck the way that roulette is.
However, things like Draft Kings and FanDuel are daily fantasy games. You build a fantasy team for just one day of sports. Make a hockey team out of players who are playing tonight and try to score more points than anyone else who made a team for tonight.
This is still somewhat based on knowledge, but it is much much more luck based. Sure, you know that my man OBJ is going to make a few big plays on long throws from Eli. But this could be a bad day for him, or for Eli. It could also be a good day for the opposing defense. Over the course of an entire season that kind of luck evens out. But on any given Sunday, you might as well roll some fucking dice.
But because the law has an exemption for fantasy sports, you can make a fantasy sports game that amounts to nothing more than gambling, and it is explicitly legal in the USA.
And now there are people who are insider trading on these games. People who work for teams have information about players not available to the public. People working for the fantasy sports companies themselves have access to data that gamblers do not have. And they are playing these games because they are completely unregulated.
I expect this all to change very very quickly.
That said, I think the legal questions on what counts as "gambling" are actually of interest here. The "skill vs chance" issue is relevant due to the dominant factor test, which is used by many jurisdictions and states that whether something counts as gambling comes down to whether skill or luck predominates.
The issue is that, from a statistical perspective, whether skill or chance dominates is not an inherent aspect of the game itself, but also depends on the sample size you take. In fact, any game with a non-zero element of skill can become skill-dominant when given a sufficiently long timescale.
However, as Scott has said, the reason that fantasy sports get a pass is not because they've been judged to be dominated by skill, but rather because they are specifically exempt by law. The same can be said of, for example, stock trading---it doesn't count as gambling because the laws specifically exclude it.
New York is banning fantasy-sports-for-money.
http://news.slashdot.org/story/15/11/11/0029221/fantasy-sports-sites-ordered-to-stop-taking-bets-in-new-york-state