bustabit – The original crash game

[Timetwister]

However, calculating the commission rate like you suggest is also more difficult for investors to comprehend–especially retroactively–so I'm not sure that's the way to go. The bankroll should find an equilibrium regardless of Bitcoin's price. The only concern is that the equilibrium point becomes too low to support the bets our players want to make or too high for my risk tolerance. While I don't like making changes like this often, the formula is not set in stone and can be changed if necessary.

It's worth considering nevertheless. Maybe other investors can chime in. I'm curious what they think about adjusting the commission rate for Bitcoin's price.

I'd say not to complicate things further. If Bitcoin increases in price substantially it would be understandable if you wanted to make adjustments.

[1714877445]

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[1714877445]

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[devans]

What I don't like is that the offsite investment is being discontinued and that is because I have a large offsite investment, and yes I "exploited" the system by maximizing my offsite investment back in the day. Not sure if exploiting is the correct word, I paid dilution fee for it after all. I understand that RHavar wants to minimize the amount of funds he is responsible for, personally I was never worried about the game being rigged or whales winning long-term, but third party risk. Obviously I trust RHavar, but there is always a non-zero risk, as we recently saw with the ethercrash "hack" aka exitscam.

I know Ryan already mentioned it, but I feel that I should also point out that he's not involved in bustabit anymore beyond being a bankroll investor like yourself.

Anyway: When I launched bustadice and acquired bustabit shortly after that I was relatively unknown in the crypto gambling space and I assumed that there would be at least some concern that I might try to run with the money. Allowing investors to invest offsite was intended to appease these concerns, at least to an extent. Nowadays, however, I believe the more significant counterparty risk for investors is me stealing from the bankroll by posing as a lucky player and in this regard offsite investing doesn't help.

And how many dilution fee credits do you get? Is that equal to the offsite portion?

You'll receive an amount of dilution fee credits that's equivalent to what your offsite investment was. E.g. if you had a 1 BTC offsite investment you will be able to reinvest 1 BTC onsite without having to pay the dilution fee again. For what it's worth investors have always been able to move their offsite investments onsite and vice versa for free.

I'm not sure if it's a good idea, but one idea for Daniel: Instead of giving people "dilution fee credits", give them actual bitcoin. Then if they want to invest more, they can use that to cover the expense. Or if they no longer want to, they can withdraw that money. And then say you gave way X bitcoin, configure the site to direct the next X bitcoin of dilution fees to yourself instead of the bankroll.

I don't see any justification for that. After all, I'm not forcing anybody to divest. And other investors (i.e. non-offsite) don't have the opportunity to see their dilution fees returned to them when they decide to divest again. In addition to that, early investors with an offsite investment have likely benefited from the dilution fee more than average, i.e. they received more in dilution fees from other investors than they paid themselves.

[Marcelona]

Is it possible to win on that website? Any of you guys has some experience?

[numanoid]

Is it possible to win on that website? Any of you guys has some experience?

Always possible, there are lot of people who won from this site , but lot of people are losing too. Don't afraid with fairness of this site, since it has running for long time even though the owner has changed.
Exeperience? I have turned 10k bits deposit to 20k bits and withdrew, but few days later i lose it all,  .
On here, our deposit money called by bit, and 1 bit = 100 satoshis, so 1,000,000 bits = 1 bitcoin

[Lakai01]

Is it possible to win on that website? Any of you guys has some experience?

Of course, why not bustabit has been in business for a very long time, if there was any problem (no payout, nobody wins, ...) it would have been discovered immediately and they would have had to close down. But this is not the case, the site still exists and has dozens of (happy) customers every day.

You can also inform yourself about casinos at @efialtis site btcgosu.com. He reviews them and writes field reports about them. You would also know immediately about scam accusations or problems.

[devans]

You can also inform yourself about casinos at @efialtis site btcgosu.com. He reviews them and writes field reports about them. You would also know immediately about scam accusations or problems.

While they can be useful in finding out about other casinos, something to keep in mind about these "casino review" sites is that their business model makes it virtually impossible for them to have an impartial opinion. One of the main ways they earn a profit is by sending players to casinos that pay them a commission for whatever that player ends up betting or losing. bustabit doesn't have an affiliate program, so review sites cannot earn money by recommending bustabit. For example, BTCGOSU doesn't mention bustabit at all despite it being the oldest and largest crash game.

[Captain Corporate]

 I mean that kind of makes sense though isn't it? I am not here to defend efialtis or his website because that is not my job, however when you do not have any affiliate structure at all, a casino review website not caring about your website does kind of makes sense. The difference is, if you take a lot of money from a shady casino and publish them as 5 stars and best casino ever knowing that they are not really a good legit place just because you took money from them, that would be something very bad to do and I would condemn anyone that does that. However listing a bad place and not listing a good place are different things and shouldn't be really put to same light. I would say one is very bad while the other one is quite expected frankly.

[devans]

Of course it makes sense. It's just something a player looking for unbiased reviews of casinos needs to be aware of, so it's worth pointing out. After all, the conflict of interest extends beyond not including sites without an affiliate program, which is economically rational. It is also rational for such a site to favorably highlight casinos with higher commission rates over ones with lower commission rates, for example.

[throwaway42492]

thanks, for the clarification, I'm aware that devans/Daniel is the owner. I have a decent % of my networth on his website, obviously I trust him.

I honestly don't expect to get real btc delution fee credit, I still think it is a bad idea to trying to reduce the bustabit bankroll.

There are so many clones out there that have better graphics, boni, more coins, VIP systems, affiliate commission etc. Still people play on bustabit and I think that is due to those two reasons.
A) Trust
B) Gigantic betting limits for whales

Reducing the bankroll will make the whales unhappy and we just had a whale who went for max win possible per hand. Obviously there are also lots of customers who enjoy watching the whale action.

I have a feeling this change will reduce the bankroll, but also the overall betting volume and overall profit for devans and investors.

[chazley]

Is RHavar no longer one of the 3 multi-sigs for the cold wallet? devans said he has no role beyond being an investor and former owner.

And I disagree with changing commission structure based on USD. Keep it in Bitcoin.

[JollyGood]

Looking at these statistics shows just how big a success Bustabit (and after looking at Bustadice stats) these websites have become.

With phenomenal amounts of money involved it is clear not all investors and game players for that matter will be happy with all the decisions made but it would be wise to try to have some form of input from them at least to gain some form of consensus.

Code:

  month  |   wagered_btc   |   wagered_usd
---------+-----------------+-----------------
 2018-01 |   3089.54440200 |  $34,121,136.38
 2018-02 | 107460.38875000 | $996,376,713.88
 2018-03 |   7040.27589300 |  $62,256,276.78
 2018-04 |   6957.38473000 |  $55,414,979.30
 2018-05 |   7680.04243400 |  $64,872,011.18
 2018-06 |   9541.23297200 |  $64,930,742.51
 2018-07 |  54385.33604000 | $398,807,398.10
 2018-08 |  17366.30321900 | $113,090,361.89
 2018-09 |  11283.51036500 |  $73,694,508.50
 2018-10 |  16285.33384700 | $105,458,904.53
 2018-11 |  22352.72750300 | $123,457,666.00
 2018-12 |  38466.21535800 | $146,456,440.27
 2019-01 |  19846.31262100 |  $73,070,953.44
 2019-02 |  23801.41378000 |  $87,914,651.62
 2019-03 |  21570.01948300 |  $84,647,544.76
 2019-04 |  18975.72954800 |  $98,037,393.94
 2019-05 |  20063.16374100 | $141,976,857.93
 2019-06 |  16467.29457300 | $153,353,497.09
 2019-07 |  12597.00450100 | $134,437,656.73
 2019-08 |  10668.02239900 | $112,786,472.91
 2019-09 |   9765.14652500 |  $95,310,164.98
 2019-10 |  18544.82314300 | $153,762,287.41
 2019-11 |  19085.73434500 | $158,654,075.34
 2019-12 |  19855.11447000 | $143,982,856.47
 2020-01 |  22261.18473100 | $186,435,924.80
 2020-02 |  15844.86530900 | $153,348,130.51
 2020-03 |  30335.10983900 | $196,404,169.07
 2020-04 |  34272.84791000 | $244,552,426.08
 2020-05 |  23329.71224900 | $214,882,955.51
 2020-06 |  26727.17919200 | $252,317,808.80
 2020-07 |  18768.89132900 | $179,021,875.33
 2020-08 |  20397.17373400 | $237,097,778.28
 2020-09 |  16726.37967800 | $178,179,131.32
 2020-10 |  30828.70636200 | $372,183,553.18

[RHavar]

I don't see any justification for that. After all, I'm not forcing anybody to divest. And other investors (i.e. non-offsite) don't have the opportunity to see their dilution fees returned to them when they decide to divest again. In addition to that, early investors with an offsite investment have likely benefited from the dilution fee more than average, i.e. they received more in dilution fees from other investors than they paid themselves.

That makes sense, although I think I can make a decent counter-argument. By giving people dilution fee credits, you are giving them something worth something but it'd be very tricksy to sell. As they would basically have to sell their entire busta* account to someone who wanted to invest. At first I thought it'd be neat if you allowed people to safely trade their dilution fee credit for bitcoin with prospective investors, but that seems overly complicated when you yourself could just give everyone cold-hard BTC instead and recollect it on the next X of new investments. So in effect, it would be like everyone immediately and safely selling their dilution fee credits, and you're just fronting the money until enough new investments come in.

Then again, it is a bit of a weak argument as you logically extended it basically means the dilution fee shouldn't exist (as someone's should be able to sell their investment, rather than divest). But thought I'd throw that out there anyway 

The difference is, if you take a lot of money from a shady casino and publish them as 5 stars and best casino ever knowing that they are not really a good legit place just because you took money from them, that would be something very bad to do and I would condemn anyone that does that. However listing a bad place and not listing a good place are different things and shouldn't be really put to same light. I would say one is very bad while the other one is quite expected frankly.

My experience with virtually all casino-review sites (there are however a couple small exceptions) has been the only thing they care about and optimize for is their own bottom line, which generally means pushing what gives them the most affiliate returns. The casinos that give the most affiliate returns often are the worst (i.e. that's why they need to spend so much on affiliate, and they do dodgy stuff to have high margins). Ever wonder why sites like askgamblers will knowingly list and excuse outright scammy behavior like bitstarz as #1 (even defend WTF-bad practices, like seizing account balances for accidentally exceeding a software unenforced and unwarned betting limit )?

It's a pretty rotten industry really. I've been waiting for someone honest to disrupt it, but doesn't seem to be happening any time soon.

Is RHavar no longer one of the 3 multi-sigs for the cold wallet? devans said he has no role beyond being an investor and former owner.

I have never been doing that for bustabit. I do that for bustadice, as I run the audit server -- so it makes sense in that context -- as running the audit server allows me to verify wins/loses due to bustadice's multi-party provably fair scheme (there's basically 2 server seeds, and the audit server has one which Daniel himself doesn't know).

[Lakai01]

While they can be useful in finding out about other casinos, something to keep in mind about these "casino review" sites is that their business model makes it virtually impossible for them to have an impartial opinion.
-snip-
bustabit doesn't have an affiliate program, so review sites cannot earn money by recommending bustabit. For example, BTCGOSU doesn't mention bustabit at all despite it being the oldest and largest crash game.

This is true, of course, thanks for the clarification. Like any review (no matter if hardware, shoes or even casinos) you should not trust them blindly but get further opinions if necessary before you deposit larger amounts of precious BTC.But why I mentioned BTCGosu is that efialtis also reports about scam accusations against casinos and in such cases even takes their reviews offline. This was the case not long ago with Sportsbet: Sportsbet.io & Bitcasino.io temporarily deactivated on BTCGOSU

I have already pointed out to efialtis that both bustadice and bustabit are definitely worth a review, if only because they are among the longest existing casinos and serve thousands of customers per year. I will ask about the reviews when the opportunity arises

[chazley]

I have never been doing that for bustabit. I do that for bustadice, as I run the audit server -- so it makes sense in that context -- as running the audit server allows me to verify wins/loses due to bustadice's multi-party provably fair scheme (there's basically 2 server seeds, and the audit server has one which Daniel himself doesn't know).

So, to clarify, Bustabit has one sole owner of the cold wallet (devans) and bustadice's cold wallet had 3 multi-sig owners that require at least 2 signatures to open it?

Is this right?

[RHavar]

So, to clarify, Bustabit has one sole owner of the cold wallet (devans) and bustadice's cold wallet had 3 multi-sig owners that require at least 2 signatures to open it?

Is this right?

I can only speak for bustadice, which does indeed use 2-of-3 multisig wallet, of which I hold one of those 3 keys.  I can independently verify bustadice's player profit/loss (and thus investor profit/loss). So I use that to guide if I should sign a transaction. Although worth emphasizing that  independently verifying player profit/loss is not really enough information to do a great job at being a cold-wallet-key-holder because I have no way to independently verify the bankroll size. (i.e. If Daniel was malicious, he could simply say "Oh we've had a mass exodus of investors. Need you to sign the withdrawal so I have enough funds to pay them" and I'd have no way to know either way).

I have a special role for bustadice (I run the audit server, and hold one of the keys). But don't provide a similar service for bustabit. I could however take a pretty good guess at what Daniel is doing for cold storage there, but it's not really my place to do so.

[chazley]

The 2-of-3 multisig cold wallet I think is a brilliant idea (for multiple reasons). I hope devans is doing something similar on bustabit. If devans hasn't already revealed a basic overview of how he handles bustabit's cold wallet (I assume RHavar would've known otherwise) I'd be interested in knowing for peace-of-mind reasons. I assumed bit/dice both used the same multisig cold wallet storage techniques, but if devans has a superior way of doing it, don't know why he wouldn't use whatever is the safest, most secure option on both sites.

[JollyGood]

I asked about something similar in the Bustadice thread and he said he would not in to detail which is definitely his right but he seems to have covered ways for investors to get their funds back though he did not elaborate: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2219681.msg55608148#msg55608148

With the greatest respect devans, which safety mechanisms are in place to ensure those 11,000+ Bitcoin investors will have access to both their profits and their investment in the unfortunate event something were to happen to you (incapacitated or death)?

I mean 11,000 BTC x $16,000 per Bitcoin = $ a lot of USD

Without going into detail, I've taken precautions to ensure that everyone including bankroll investors would be able to safely withdraw in case something were to happen to me. It may take some time, but everybody would eventually receive their money.

Hopefully that will never be necessary, though 🤞

The 2-of-3 multisig cold wallet I think is a brilliant idea (for multiple reasons). I hope devans is doing something similar on bustabit. If devans hasn't already revealed a basic overview of how he handles bustabit's cold wallet (I assume RHavar would've known otherwise) I'd be interested in knowing for peace-of-mind reasons. I assumed bit/dice both used the same multisig cold wallet storage techniques, but if devans has a superior way of doing it, don't know why he wouldn't use whatever is the safest, most secure option on both sites.

[GamblingSiteFinder]

While they can be useful in finding out about other casinos, something to keep in mind about these "casino review" sites is that their business model makes it virtually impossible for them to have an impartial opinion. One of the main ways they earn a profit is by sending players to casinos that pay them a commission for whatever that player ends up betting or losing. bustabit doesn't have an affiliate program, so review sites cannot earn money by recommending bustabit. For example, BTCGOSU doesn't mention bustabit at all despite it being the oldest and largest crash game.

My experience with virtually all casino-review sites (there are however a couple small exceptions) has been the only thing they care about and optimize for is their own bottom line, which generally means pushing what gives them the most affiliate returns. The casinos that give the most affiliate returns often are the worst (i.e. that's why they need to spend so much on affiliate, and they do dodgy stuff to have high margins). Ever wonder why sites like askgamblers will knowingly list and excuse outright scammy behavior like bitstarz as #1 (even defend WTF-bad practices, like seizing account balances for accidentally exceeding a software unenforced and unwarned betting limit )?

Hey, not all of us have bad intentions!  

Since I started GamblingSiteFinder.com back in 2018, I've had both Bustabit and Bustadice ranked very highly in the Crash Gambling and Dice categories. We're ranking #1 in Google for various Busta- related keywords and have happily sent hundreds (probably even 1000+) new players to BaB and BaD over the years.

My site is quite small, but I can only imagine how much referral commission we could have generated if we had referred those players to higher paying, yet inferior crash gambling and dice sites.

Something readers here might not know either is that online gambling sites approach review site owners (like myself) and offer us money in exchange for higher rankings. You wouldn't believe how many times a major competitor to Bustadice (I won't say names) has emailed me offering $$$ in exchange for removing BaB and BaD from the top positions on my site.  

[RHavar]

Hey, not all of us have bad intentions!  

Yeah, your site was actually one I had in mind of thinking of exceptions. It just is unfortunately pretty small compared to some of the competitors, although I think if you expanded more with content (reviews?) (and community?) there would be some serious potential. There was one site (thebitcoinstrip.com) that I thought had so much potential and was going the right way, but then as I understood, sold to someone who just destroyed it

[bitgolden]

Like captain corporate said, I agree with the notion that what you guys are saying on "bad place gets good review for affiliate commission" is a bad thing but I also think that what you are missing out here is that what he was trying to say is that as long as they do not list shady casinos as good just for good income, they also do not have to list good places that have no affiliate business neither.

I mean you are still saying that "these places list bad casinos as good because of affiliate" and we get that, nobody denies that, but you are also not focusing on the part where they are not forced to show any casino they do not want to show, it is their own business and if they do not want to list you because you have no affiliate, they are free to do that.

Only thing they are responsible for is not listing bad casinos, as long as they do not list bad casinos, they can list "some" good casinos and not list other good casinos.