Low power mining pool: introducing LotteryAtHome.com

[buzzdave]

Got some low power mining gear that you don't even bother with?  A 3 year old gaming station?  Get that OCL card working for you again - join me at LotteryAtHome.com, where I use your low end mining power to buy lottery tickets each week.  Its a mining pool and a lottery pool combined!

YOU SHOULD BE AT LEAST 18 YRS OLD TO PLAY
Edit: Prize distributions to <18 yr olds will be treated as gifts, and are not income tax (or gift tax) up to $13,000 per year.

It's pretty simple:

-sign up at www.LotteryAtHome.com
-download the client & unzip the folder
-look for a 2nd email from me that gives you your membership ID (worker name for the pool)
-edit start.bat with the workername, or do it at the console if you are l33t  
-once you are mining, go to http://lotteryathome.com/stats.php and make sure your member ID is getting credit

That's it!  Each week, I'll take the pool proceeds and go buy lottery tickets.  I'll post the numbers before the drawing is held for full disclosure.  Prize money will be divided up based on each member's contribution each week, and displayed on the site.  You'll be able to request payment at any time and I'll paypal your proceeds to you (make sure to sign up with an email that your paypal works with).


A few things first:
-this thing is Alpha, so don't expect a lot yet
-this is for fun, and not as much about profitable mining - that's what your heavy machinery is for
-if we win the big one, I will choose the cash up front option
-the odds of winning the lottery jackpot are very low - read about it http://www.walottery.com/Games/Lotto/Default.aspx
-your individual prizes will be distributed after tax, and after I take a cut (up to 25%)
-I also take a cut of the BTC mined, before selling it for USD to buy tickets.  This will be to support the site costs and maybe cover some of my time getting the tickets. (Currently 10%)

You can even put LotteryAtHome's pool credentials (currently BTCGuild) in your hop rotation just enough to earn a spot in each week's pool - whatevs.

I hope some of you try it - it would really help me test the system, and I hope its fun!  

I have a referral system that will reduce the the cut that I take out of your winnings.  Use the sharing functions on page two of the signup process - each referral that is actively mining in a winning week reduces the cut that I take out of your prize by 1%.  Max discount is 20%, so if you get 25 active referrals, I will take a maximum of 5% from your prize money.

I know I'm new to the forum, but I think you could check my trustworthiness with guys like cablepair, Luke-Jr, and TheSeven if you are concerned about it.

Cheers!

[matthewh3]

You should play a bitcoin lottery definitely.  Also if you offered a litecoin pool that also played a litecoin lottery I might join soon if difficulty keeps going up.

[buzzdave]

Thanks for the suggestions Matthew, but at this point I'm trying to market this pool to the masses who will not understand Bitcoin much (or Litecoin).  I think the btc/ltc lottery services themselves should be thinking of this approach (becoming a mining pool or partnering with one).

With all the scams and overnight failures I see around here, I wanted to build something that members can depend on, so I chose the state lottery.  If we win prizes, we will definitely get the cash.  If I ever need to buy a large number of tickets in a week, they can support that.  I don't need to leverage or make risky promises to run this service, so I can operate and scale without serious problems. 

[lassdas]

So, you take a 10% of all mining to support the site costs and maybe cover some of your time getting the tickets,
what i don't get is the 25% cut of all prizes won, what are those for?

That's a hell of a big cut that you take for....what exactly?

[buzzdave]

Marketing cost and eventually profit.  In the first year I plan to spend every dime on paid advertising.  I am marketing the pool to the masses, so I'm already paying for advertising on Facebook and Adsense pretty soon. 

Its also an incentive to do referrals - you can work your individual percentage down to as low as 5% using the referral system.  You can FB share, tweet, email and post your referral link to get referrals.

[buzzdave]

After reading lassdas's post, I edited the details to better reflect payouts are on an individual basis.


"-your individual prizes will be distributed after tax, and after I take a cut (up to 25%)"

[Valalvax]

So, you're going to take unprofitable mining rigs, take a 10% cut (reducing profitability), buy lottery tickets (reducing profitability) then take 25% of any an all winnings that DO happen to take place (again reducing profitability) all in the name of "fun"

[buzzdave]

A forum member suggested that I can distribute prizes for under 18 yr olds as a gift - which would be untaxed up to $13,000 in a single year (I would still have to pay income tax on the initial prize).  So I'm removing the 18 and older restriction for now - if/when I need to create a legal entity for this pool, I'll get some legal advice to confirm it.

Valalvax: check out the referral system - you can significantly reduce that 25% by referring some friends.

[buzzdave]

Here comes the first of hopefully many big promotions at www.lotteryathome.com!

For the holiday weekend, now through Monday midnight PST, I'll credit you a referral for yourself, and I'll give double referral credits for any friends you refer.   

If you want to connect multiple machines, I'll give a double referral credit for each membership ID you request (PM me after signup)! 

Cheers and good luck, we need it!

Buzzdave