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Comment by insaider | Hacker News Reader

I make $3-5k a month with my golf betting algorithm: https://www.golfforecast.co.uk

I'm a data scientist/software engineer and I started the project 5 years ago as part of my masters thesis. Never intended for it to be gambling-oriented but that's just the best way to monetise!

Questions/feedback appreciated - cheers

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I'm always skeptical about these sorts of products. If the edge you have is real, why not just bet yourself? Theoretically each client you get lowers the edge of all other clients. If you have enough people following your tips, the lines will move. Sports betting is just another market after all.

I do bet myself. I think there will always be enough people who just bet for fun without any system to offset such effects, but it's a good point.

In the UK are you able to straight up create a gambling website/app? As an example, could I create a blackjack app and accept/payout money using, say, paypal or stripe? No other hoops to jump through?

You would need a gambling license for that which is quite expensive. My site doesn't facilitate gambling, I'm not a bookmaker, I just give tips.

As long as you don't have a UK company...

Looks cool! What kind of models are you using? I would have thought this is a very tight space. Did you develop the models yourself?

Thanks! Yea there's lots of competition for sure. It was originally just XGBoost and ARIMA, now it's an ensemble of several.

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