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Intrade Shutdown Hurts Academics

Posted by timothy on from the odds-are-against-immediate-return dept.

New submitter jader3rd writes "Intrade, a popular Irish website that lets people bet on anything, has shut down. In addition to being used by gamblers, Intrade has been used by academics and pundits to track public sentiment. '"... broad crowds have a lot of information and that markets are an effective way of aggregating that information," says Justin Wolfers, "and they often turn out to be much better than experts."' Being forced to lose their U.S. customers couldn't have helped.

11 of 131 comments (clear)

  1. The question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The question isn't whether other people "should have" the right to gamble.

    The question is whether YOU should have the right to employ violence (meaning physical force or threat thereof) against other people in an attempt to stop them from gambling.

    Now that the question has been properly rephrased, it can be properly answered.

    1. Re:The question by Aglassis · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It is actually a more general question. The question is whether the government has the right to use force (i.e. the police busting into your house with a SWAT team and shooting your dog) to prevent a person from doing an act that harms nobody but themselves or another fully consenting and knowledgeable adult. Drugs, polygamy, gambling, legal age prostitution, etc., could all be arguably classified under victim-less crimes. And not surprisingly, all of these are crimes against morality (except when there in a financial interest such as the lottery or alcohol sales).

      --
      Suddenly, the hairy finger of a familiar monkey tapped me on the shoulder. It was time.--G. T.
    2. Re:The question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Drugs, polygamy, gambling, legal age prostitution, etc., could all be arguably classified under victim-less crimes.

      Only if one is willing to disregard non-victimless crime that is often correlated, specifically with drugs and gambling. Even if violent crime, burglary, embezzlement, and the like don't occur on a 1:1 basis with, say, drug use, gambling, or gun ownership, that isn't to say that those practices are completely harmless. Indeed, a civilized society that cares about the health and well-being of its members has to look at things statistically, and sometimes make the tough calls about how much soda one man can responsibly consume at a sitting or how tall grass is allowed to grow in a backyard.

    3. Re:The question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      What a stupid argument. Make something criminal and then complain that it gets associated with other criminal activities, so it's alright it's criminal. Complete circular nonsense.

    4. Re:The question by DerekLyons · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Drugs, polygamy, gambling, legal age prostitution, etc., could all be arguably classified under victim-less crimes.

      An acquaintance of mine whose husband snorted both of their entire retirement funds up his nose might question that. So might a friend whose father consistently gambled away most of his take home pay. There's more to consider than just the direct participants.
       

      The question is whether the government has the right to use force (i.e. the police busting into your house with a SWAT team and shooting your dog) to prevent a person from doing an act that harms nobody but themselves or another fully consenting and knowledgeable adult.

      That presumes the adult in question is consenting and knowledgeable. There's a reason why the lottery is often called 'a tax on people bad at math".

    5. Re:The question by mjr167 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      If a woman marries a rich man it is often in her interest to kill him and inherit. Perhaps we should make marrying rich men illegal so that women won't be tempted to murder their husbands in their sleep.

      Making an activity that many adults do responsibility a crime just because some adults who do the same things also commit crimes that may or may not be related is dumb.

    6. Re:The question by Aglassis · · Score: 5, Insightful

      An acquaintance of mine whose husband snorted both of their entire retirement funds up his nose might question that. So might a friend whose father consistently gambled away most of his take home pay. There's more to consider than just the direct participants.

      Yes, but you are using today's drug math. If cocaine wasn't illegal, it wouldn't be so expensive. And if it was well regulated, the dosage could be monitored.

      But what if he blew his money on the stock market or a crazy investment? There are a million stupid ways people lose their retirement savings. You can't put people in plastic balls to protect themselves from everything in the world and you don't need to burn down crops and indirectly fund insurgencies in Colombia because some asshole snorted cocaine. It is amazing that you talk about considering people other than the direct participants while supporting the War on Drugs.

      --
      Suddenly, the hairy finger of a familiar monkey tapped me on the shoulder. It was time.--G. T.
    7. Re:The question by DerekLyons · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Yes, but you are using today's drug math. If cocaine wasn't illegal, it wouldn't be so expensive. And if it was well regulated, the dosage could be monitored.

      Yes, because after all.. alcohol, which is well regulated, hasn't caused any collateral damage. No, I'm not using "today's drug math", I'm pointing out reality - there is rarely any such thing as a 'victimless' crime. (Otherwise, what you're proposing is a system of legalization that is so regulated that it won't work like you think it will. If the state prevents an addict from getting his fix one way, he's going to get it another way.)
       

      But what if he blew his money on the stock market or a crazy investment? There are a million stupid ways people lose their retirement savings.

      The topic here isn't "ways to blow retirement savings", the topic is "the effects of so called victimless crimes". That you feel the need to change the topic tells me all I need to know.

    8. Re:The question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I think drunk driving should be 100% permissible. However I also believe that any accident that can be tied to that impairment should be considered willful and premeditated. Have an accident? It's now willful destruction of property. Hurt someone? It's now premeditated assault. Kill someone? 1st or 2nd degree murder.

      Punish the crime, not the potential for crime.

    9. Re:The question by chrismcb · · Score: 3, Insightful

      >The topic here isn't "ways to blow retirement savings", the topic is "the effects of so called victimless crimes". That you feel the need to change the topic tells me all I need to know.

      So it is ok to "blow retirement savings" if the thing it is blown on is legal? It isn't changing the topic, the topics are the same.

  2. Re:Good job, whoever is against online gambling by Penguinisto · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Err, bad news... I doubt the shutdown was religiously motivated.

    Even outright atheists in government would happily close the site. Why? Because government doesn't get the huge 'vig' off of it, like they do with lotteries and suchlike. Now state lotteries on the other hand (especially as they expand into casino territory, with "video lottery" slot machines, keno, etc)? Well, the governments get their take in way bigger chunks. This in turn raises a huge incentive to keep competition from private industry to a minimum.

    After all, if folks are going to gamble anyway, you may as well make it a levy on idiocy while funding government coffers at the same time...

    --
    Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?