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posted by
cmn32480
on Monday January 08 2018, @03:34PM
from the 1-in-365,214,231-chance-of-getting-the-good-stuff dept.
from the 1-in-365,214,231-chance-of-getting-the-good-stuff dept.
Loot boxes in video games give the player a random item, perhaps a weapon or a skin, typically in exchange for payment. Should they be viewed as a legal sweepstakes or as an illegal lottery? This video examines the legal issues and explains how loot boxes could be structured to avoid running afoul of gambling laws (which vary by state) in the U.S.. The video concludes that many current implementations of loot boxes are really illegal lotteries, and conjectures that major game companies use them anyway because the risk of being prosecuted isn't enough to dissuade them.
Previously: Belgium Moving to Ban "Loot Boxes" Throughout Europe, Hawaii Could Restrict Sale to Minors
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Are Loot Boxes in Games a Violation of Gambling Laws?
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I'm gliding over a NUCLEAR WASTE DUMP near ATLANTA, Georgia!!
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Wootery on Monday January 08 2018, @10:21PM (13 children)
I'm British, so to me, that reads like a joke. I don't really see what point you're trying to make. Libertarianism has zero traction in at least my country. We want better government, not minimal government.
In the US, it's currently the usual two-party affair, but with a cult-of-personality thrown in.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Mykl on Monday January 08 2018, @11:37PM (8 children)
I second this.
Libertarianism is not a popular theory in any other Western Democracy. Why? I suspect a combination of two reasons:
It only takes a handful of sociopaths to destroy a libertarian utopia. Failing to recognise that some people are sociopaths is the fatal flaw of libertarianism IMO.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday January 09 2018, @12:13AM (3 children)
Higher proportion of free lunchers and authoritarians. It's not that popular in the US either for similar reasons.
Well that would explain how a libertarian movement takes root then.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @10:45AM (2 children)
More like the USA has a higher proportion of stupid ignorant people.
For example, the healthcare thing.
If you were one of those who had to pay taxes, universal healthcare would still be the cheaper option for you.
Even a selfish but intelligent sociopath would realize that lots of OTHER people wouldn't be able to tolerate hospitals that intentionally shove the poor out of ER to die in the streets because the poor couldn't pay for treatment.
Treating the poor in ERs is more expensive than treating them via other channels - like normal GPs and clinics.
It's also even more expensive if the poor commit crimes to get money to get healthcare or worse to go to prison and get healthcare in prison (yes it does happen - more than a few people have committed crimes to get healthcare or just "food and lodging" ).
Delivering healthcare (or food and lodging) via the prison industry is far more expensive than just giving it to them "free".
It may cost you in other ways when ERs are closed down due to costs: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/18/health/18hospital.html [nytimes.com]
One day you might need an ER but there are fewer ERs near you and they are too busy...
The USA's healthcare costs are really higher:
See also: https://cdn.ricochet.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/ftotHealthExp_pC_USD_long-1.png [ricochet.com]
https://blogs-images.forbes.com/toddhixon/files/2012/02/MaryMeeker-graph-e1329513274401.jpg?width=960 [forbes.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:52PM
Than not paying US prices for universal health care? Right. My take is that even with prisons and ER care, sociopaths are paying less now than they would under a universal health care system, US-style.
Wouldn't be their problem. Don't think you're getting the point. The vast majority of people who claim on SN that people are acting against their self-interest, merely don't understand the self-interest.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @03:25PM
Unless that intelligent sociopath were running a long con on all of us and massively profiting from the popular delusion. I submit the health "insurance" complex.
The problem that the USA has is that too many people who aren't sociopaths (yet always temporarily embarrassed millionaires) don't understand how they're being manipulated and scammed by sociopaths. Only a gaslighting sociopath could successfully sell people individual aspirin tablets at $10 each.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:18AM (3 children)
You've got that backwards.
Only libertarianism embraces the reality that men are not angels, and the self-interest is the root of all motivation—your altruism, too, is selfish. If you ignore this fact, as all non-libertarian philosophies do, then you are doomed to construct a naive form of society.
Western society's success stems from the libertarian aspects of society; libertarian principles (consciously acknowledged or not) are what have made the West so successful, despite the fact that authoritarians make every effort to conceal or deny this fact.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Wootery on Tuesday January 09 2018, @10:00AM (2 children)
What on Earth are you talking about? Modern moderate lefties (myself included) want a hybrid system that combines capitalism with a benevolent welfare state. You seem to want to pretend that this is the same as full-bore communism.
Disagree. Capitalism, maybe, but not libertarianism. Modern Europe is nothing short of anti-libertarian, but compared to most societies it's pretty great.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @11:01PM (1 child)
... compared to the ones in the field. However, he was still a slave.
(Score: 2) by Wootery on Wednesday January 10 2018, @10:36AM
Very poetic. What's your point?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday January 08 2018, @11:45PM (3 children)
(Score: 2) by Wootery on Tuesday January 09 2018, @09:44AM (2 children)
There might be something there worth exploring, but as you say, it's not exactly libertarianism.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:48PM (1 child)
(Score: 2) by Wootery on Wednesday January 10 2018, @10:38AM
I suppose that's a fair point. Privatisation, for instance, has a streak of the libertarian to it.