Bitcoin Forum

Lottos are fun, especially if it doesn't cost much to play.

I'm going to duplicate my states pick three lotto. It's easy and straight forward, plus I'll use the results from the actual state lotto for fairness. On top of that, I'm going to throw my own BTC into it to get people's interest. I'm not going to take a percentage of any winnings, so winner takes all (including all mine if you win).

Rules:

• Cost to Enter: 1 BTC
• What do you pick? Any number between 000 and 999; 000 counts as a number, so does 009, 099, etc
• You can enter as many times as you like for 1 BTC each, so you can pick multiple numbers
• The maximum (but not minimum) jackpot will always be 500 BTC, the reason for this; it prevents someone from just buying all the numbers for a guaranteed win. So you make it not feasible to try and game the system.
• Any extra BTC left over after a winner is put into the next jackpot. So if 600 BTC sits in the "bank" (server in this case) and someone wins pick 3, they get 500 BTC and the remaining 100 BTC starts the next pick 3 winner jackpot
• If no one wins, the jackpot will be used to start another new pick 3 and another date (probably just a few days into the future) will be used to pick the next winning number.
  
• There can be multiple winners, so then the winnings are split up (this also further helps to prevent someone from buying every possible number for a guaranteed win)
  
• Your 1 BTC and pick number are sent directly to a static IP address: 64.186.155.104 -- This is an 8-core server generating BTC (around 6000 khash/s) every day 24/7/365. Anything it generates on it's own (50 BTC) will also be added to the jackpot for the winner. I've reset it's balance to 0, so it's basically now going to be the jackpot holding machine. Please include either your BTC address or IP Address (if you have a static) along with the number you picked, otherwise I won't know where to send the winner the BTC
• Winning numbers (evening drawing) will be taken from my states official website here so you can check for yourself: http://www.tnlottery.com/
  If you can pick up the local broadcast stations here, you can see the drawing live on TV as well.
  
• When the lotto jackpot runs out of the money, no more lotto. So if we have a bunch of winners in a row, I'll have to decide if I want to chuck my BTC into the jackpot to start it again if it's unable to maintain itself from too many lucky winners (or people with time machines)
• No last minute submissions. Our timezone here is (-6:00 CST). No more submissions will be accepted *after* noon (12:00PM -6:00 CST) on the day of the drawing. If you send a coin to the server after that time, I'll return it. If you send a coin with no return address or way to know *who* sent it, it just goes into the winning pot for the next drawing.
  

Questions are welcome, I'll be glad to answer them here.

I've just transfered 100 BTC to get it started.

Winner will be whoever got the lucky pick 3 match with the evening state drawing on 7/21/2010 (This Wednesday)

Good luck to you all !! (kisses his 100 BTC goodbye to the winner  :'( )

I'll make another after post up a list of all the numbers that were *picked* by those that entered for further verification (just the numbers, not who for privacy reasons)

Current Numbers Picked (Owner hidden for privacy reasons)

• 003
• 006
• 007
• 011
• 012
• 020
• 023
• 025
• 030
• 055
• 109
• 141
• 161
• 218
• 230
• 235
• 271
• 273
• 300
• 313
• 314
• 333 - 333
• 401
• 455
• 460
• 500
• 511
• 512
• 523
• 524
• 555
• 557
• 585
• 619
• 675
• 683
• 777
• 783
• 832
• 888
• 914
• 953
• 954
• 955
• 956

Updated the topic subject with the new jackpot balance.

The server generated another 50 BTC (what luck for you all  :P ) Updated jackpot.

I'd like to buy lot 314, 271, 161, 141, and 020.  PM me an address to send the 5 bitcoins to?

(If anyone's curious, those numbers are the first 3 digits of Pi, e, phi, sqrt(2), and i^i, 5 of the most famous transcendental numbers.)

Send to IP: 64.186.154.76

Be sure to include the numbers picked and the address to send the winnings to it you win. The direct IP allows you to use the "from" and "message" fields.

Thanks for playing and the best of luck to you!

*Updated number picks and jackpot amount at the top*

Doh.  I assumed this was like the previous lottery I saw, and didn't read the whole post. ^.^

It's cool, I've updated topic as well with the new jackpot balance and the picked numbers.

In case anyone was curious, two people can pick the same number, but if that number wins, both people have to split the winnings.

Can you somehow indicate how many times each has been picked?

Yeah, I'll start double-up (like 213 - 213 side by side) the ones that have multiple people picking it. That's one thing I didn't like about our own state lotto pick 3, lots of people would play (it was a $500 prize only) but you had no idea what numbers every else picked, so you often had multiple winners splitting the prize and each not getting very much when they won, LOL.

Buying 557, 675, 006, 783, 585, 460, 524, 218, 401 and 832; numbers brought to you by random.org.  8)

Could you perhaps make a lower value BitCoin lottery for those of us with less than one BitCoin? Us smaller users are having a hard time generating anything. ;)

Yes, actually I was thinking that also. Since most can only get 0.05 from the faucet website, I thought about making a 5 BTC prize lotto, where 0.01 is the entry fee for the ticket. The problem is, I don't know if I could handle the amount of entries since someone could easily chuck in 100 entries for only 1 BTC. Would probably take some website automation for that.

Thanks, I'll add those to the list here shortly. Seems the network provider is having issues, as it's really slow to connect to the server(s) right now for me.

[edit] Updated jackpot and picked numbers.

^.^ Bit out of order there.

I will look into writing an automation system for the 0.01 BTC lotto.

I'm willing to help with any bitcoin related websites for super duper cheap ( paid in bitcoins of course =) ) to help stimulate the economy.

*jackpot and picked numbers updated*

knightmb - I'm just trying to work out how to create an automated Lotto and was wondering if you know of a way of identifying which account a payment comes from? For instance, if someone pays a fraction of a unit for the lotto, it can be returned and also so that the winner is automatically paid.

Yeah, at least from the GUI standpoint, if someone doesn't put in what BC address sent it to you, so I don't see a way to refund it.

I haven't looked through the headless server version to see how the data is handled for that.

Basically, someone would have to pay through direct IP and make sure they put in the from field, the BC address or else it's no different than a stranger in the street stuffing $20 in your pocket as you walk by and you never see that person again and don't know who it was.

Hopefully someone playing the Lotto would know to fill in the From box. :D

Today is the day, no more entries after noon (-6:00 CST) today, good luck to you all with this evenings drawing.

It's now past noon time, so I'm going to shut out the server from taking anymore entries so no one submits one by accident, I'm excited about today's drawing, look forward to a big winner(s) today!

Ok, I just watched them draw the winning number, congratulations to the winner with number 680!!!

I don't see 680 on that list, does that mean the lotto will continue into next week?

Yes it will, dang, I thought I saw 680 in that list, so I went back over the BitCoin logs to double check every number, but no one picked 680  :'(

Someone was close with 683, that's why I thought someone had won.

I'll start another topic that will start a new one and this jackpot will be used to start the next lotto. At the same time, I start a separate lotto that is pick 3, but using a smaller jackpot, so those that get 0.05 BC from the free BC site can participate.

So you're starting a new lotto, with new tickets?  Or just continuing on until a number gets drawn, with people keeping their numbers?

New lotto, new tickets just like the state lotto. I thought about just leaving it and continue on, but I looked over the last months winning numbers and even with the list of choices, no one would have won all month, which surprised me given how random the choices look. This being my first lotto, I would hate for it to go on for months with no winner because no one will want to play if no one is winning. That's why I set the next drawing in a few days, and if we still don't have any winners, I might just start using the daily drawing because someone has gotta win at some point or else no one will want to play (or they will just start playing the penny lotto instead since they can buy a ton more numbers for cheaper)