An ESPN producer who quit because of sports gambling

Legalizing sports gambling was the biggest unforced error in United States public policy in living memory. I expect that almost nobody reading Hacker News has a gambling problem, but people at the other end of the economic spectrum are being absolutely ripped up by it. Unfortunately, it's probably not going to change soon. Too much money to be made now.

Reasonable overview here and it's only gotten worse since 2024. https://thezvi.substack.com/p/the-online-sports-gambling-exp...

It's interesting to discuss this here, when YC also invested in one of those destructive companies Kalshi: https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/kalshi

Betting of any type is bad for humanity

Its striking how fast gambling has been growing in the US. Up to $17B revenue (after payouts) in 2026, when it was $7.5B in 2022.

[0] https://www.statista.com/chart/29332/gross-gaming-revenue-fr...

I hope she goes to Pablo Torres podcast. I bet she is referring to that in her interview. He's fantastic and deserved to win the Pulitzer for his reporting on Kawhi Leonard and Steve Ballmer of the Clippers. They make me excited about sports again because they clearly are fans. I used to be a fan but the gambling is so disgusting.

I also really enjoyed Michael Lewis' podcast on sports betting. Fascinating people in that world. He did this series to try to teach his 16 year old son not to gamble and it didn't work out perfectly. Terrific storytelling.

I went on a cruise ship a few weeks ago. I decided I was going to try the martingale strategy in roulette.

I played the game for a grand total of like fifteen minutes, and even in that short time I ended up chatting with the fellow gamblers and ended up feeling a bit depressed. One guy there said he was down $700 because of the current long streak of red, and we were “due” for a black any time now.

He seemed like a nice enough guy and I tried to explain that each throw is basically an isolated event, so you’re never “due” for anything and the red streak can keep going for a very long time, well after you run out of money. I then realized he was not interested in a lecture from me about statistics and let it go.

My strategy worked, I won back the initial bet of $10, cashed out my chips, and left. I was happy to be $10 richer but it makes me sad how this guy might genuinely leave this vacation in severe debt because he doesn’t understand basic stats.

I'm glad I read this, but I wish the HN title included the subtitle too--it would be nice to be able to know know what the article was about before clicking it.

People excoriate Meta for its practices but they don't even touch the pure evil in psychological manipulation that seems to be openly tolerated with sports gambling.

For a long time I struggled to find a distinction between gambling and investing. And then I figured it out.

gambling - where the statistical odds are that you lose

investing - where the odds are you win

Counterpoint: Those companies won’t break your fingers if you owe them money.

A small portion of this complex issue to think about.

Sports gambling is the perfect counter to everyone who says "people are going to do xyz anyways so it's better to legalize and tax it". Yes some people will gamble regardless of the legality, but putting the experience in an app in your hand, gamifying it to maximize addiction, blasting ads 24x7, including in the broadcast itself, having all your favorite athletes and celebrities endorse it, getting VC/PE and big corporate involved and giving it wide social acceptance increases the problem 100000x. It's perfectly fine for such vices to be left in society's underbelly rather than shoved in everyone's faces.

I've stopped watching all sports because of this. You can't even talk about sports online now without some dull punter whining that their parlay didn't hit. It's nauseating. The gambling industry produces no value.

Are there safe ways to regulate gambling? If we capped everyone's yearly gambling budget to some % of tax they paid, (with some floor), does that solve anything?

I'm honestly curious if it's better to have some outlet for people who love gambling, and just have some cap, vs trying to ban it altogether.

State of sports in America is like this - any athlete can commit any crime whatsoever and there is no issues, you get a few game suspension and all is well. you can punch your wife’s lights out, you can mutilate dogs, anything at all, all crime is cool with US society. But you make a wager on a game - you are DONE - it is, in the eyes of Citizens of US - the highest crime you can commit as an athlete. Tbat’s where we are at…

I always thought the gambling ads were a bit dystopian when watching British sporting events. At the time, I had no thought of the same thing coming to America.

why is it legal? why is it being marketed on kids applications?

morality is completely out the window

[dead]

How do you stop gambling in the age of the internet? No choice but to legalize it.

gambling unfortunately is human nature. its much better to regulate vices then prohibition which leads to criminality and an increase in adjacent crime like racketeering and extortion