Ask HN: Should I build this? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Should I build this?

sportsparadi.se

11 pointsdshipper10 comments

Since online gambling is illegal in the US, you may get push-back from Facebook even though you seem to only be emulating gambling.

You're also using the word "Bet" which may cause companies like Facebook and Google to censor you in areas like AdWords, Apps, etc.

If it was me and I wasn't based in the USA, I might create a standalone gambling site. US companies can't compete with you right now. Mark Shuttleworth figured out that US companies couldn't sell strong SSL certs to companies outside the USA thanks to ITAR regulations. So he created Thawte in South Africa and sold strong certs from there. Verisign bought the company for around $700 million. He used that money to create Ubuntu.

Best of luck!!

Thanks for the advice! Unfortunately I'm a student based in the US so I'm not sure how feasible it is for me to move for this project :)

Might want to check out StarStreet (https://www.starstreet.com/), which uses real money. They frame it as a sports stock market, to avoid running afoul of online gambling laws.

Intresting, thanks for the link!

Hey Dan! I think this is a really cool idea! I'm part of a team working on a startup, and I would love to chat. Email the team at selfey.sw@gmail.com if you're interested! Thanks!

Email sent :)

Sounds interesting, how does it work?

So I'm thinking when you first sign up you get 1000 "ParadiseCoins" which you can use to bet with your friends on Facebook. The more bets you win the more coins you get and the more cool stuff you can buy for your character.

So people can sign up with dummy accounts, make terrible bets against their main account, and collect the 1000 ParadiseCoins on their main account?

Well I was planning on making it a Facebook game. So conceivably you could still make dummy accounts, but because it's social and your friends will see who you're betting with I'm hoping that won't be too much a of a problem.

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