• quick_snail@feddit.nl
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    28
    ·
    12 hours ago

    Poly market is a gambling platform where people bet on things that will happen in real life.

    Bob made a bet that Iran would bomb Israel on some specific date.

    Unrelated and unaware about Bob, Fabian is a journalist. Fabian wrote an accurate article describing an attack where Iran bombed Israel.

    Bob’s bet was wrong. He’s about to loose a lot of money. So Bob threatens to kill Fabian. Bob tells Fabien he must change his story, so Bob doesn’t loose money.

    • certified_expert@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      8
      ·
      12 hours ago

      First, that is deeply fucked up. Second, who pays or determine which way a bet went?

      Do you see how many bets may end up in ambiguous states where it is interpretable which side won?

      • CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        9
        ·
        8 hours ago

        What’s even more fucked up is that there’s nothing preventing DoD employees from also betting on this stuff while simultaneously being the ones deciding the who, what, when, where, and why of bombing another country.

      • AnarchistArtificer@slrpnk.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        11
        ·
        edit-2
        2 hours ago

        ~~If the bet is successful, Polymarket pays out — just like how more conventional betting works ~~ (Edit: this is incorrect — it uses matched betting. See the comment below mine for more detail)

        In terms of who determines which way a bet goes, it seems like this is also Polymarket, and that they rely on journalistic coverage and official announcements.

        This journalist reported that one of the missiles landed and exploded, and it appears that this was used to deny paying out to the people who places at bet that no missiles would land that day. The gamblers tried to coerce the journalist to change their report to say that all of the missiles were intercepted, and that the thing that actually landed and exploded was just a missile fragment from the intercepted missile. I have no idea whether this would’ve actually changed the outcome of the bet from Polymarket’s perspective, but the gamblers certainly seemed to think so.

        It highlights the absurdity of betting on events like this

        • festus@lemmy.ca
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          4
          ·
          7 hours ago

          Actually Polymarket never pays out. Every bet is matched with someone holding the opposite bet (and prices to make a bet shift accordingly to market demand for each side). Polymarket just rakes in fees, but they never lose money regardless of how a bet goes.

      • whotookkarl@lemmy.dbzer0.com
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        6
        ·
        edit-2
        12 hours ago

        Shayne Coplan is the billionaire manchild who owns polymarket along with a couple other billionaire cofounders like Peter Thiel. It’s just like bookies with details decided before the bet is made, and the house/market/organized crime organization take a cut for guaranteeing the bet pays out.