ASIC Raffle III: Win a BFL Single SC & MORE! (NMC/LTC/SLC Welcome)

[Merrick]

not if he converted BTC to USD to hedge in case BTC price went down.

Valid point that I'd not considered.

[Luceo]

There have been a number of hedges into USD along the way, and a number of tickets were given away in specials (buy 100 get 5 free, buy 25 get 1 free, get one for renting a VPS) so I haven't taken anywhere close to enough to cover the raffle prizes.

Additionally as stated a number of tickets were sold at 0.25 BTC rather than 0.3 BTC.

The raffle cannot end before 1024 tickets are sold. The draw relies on this because of the way it works, the terms and conditions all purchasers agreed to and accepted state this. There will be no early end, no change to the prizes, no modifying the agreement we entered.

Like your idea 2weiX to stabilize pricing but the problem is I'd have to be able to convert those BTC into USD at the time of sale rather than at the time I choose, this would require either some time-intensive programming to use a bot to do so, or for me to have staff awake 24/7.

Total value of the raffle is ~$1390 for the single plus ~$180 x 2 for the Jalapenos, plus a margin, so that's $1750 plus margin required intake. I would have to add a greater margin to allow for USD fluctuation, so let's say 5% for that is $1837.50, with my margin of ~7% on top of this, would be around $2,000.

1,024 tickets for $2000 is ~$2 per ticket. If you consider that the raffle opened at $6 per BTC, the original pricing was quite a bit better than this (was more like $1.75). Right now, the tickets are more expensive. Will there be another price drop? Possibly, if the market deems that the current rate is too high and the price remains stable above $10 (worried about the medium term effects of pirate default).

Neither of these are feasible on a couple of hundred dollar margin over 2 months.

The raffle is going strong, have sold over 50 tickets in 48 hours. Keep the orders coming and thanks for the support.

[squid]

There have been a number of hedges into USD along the way, and a number of tickets were given away in specials (buy 100 get 5 free, buy 25 get 1 free, get one for renting a VPS) so I haven't taken anywhere close to enough to cover the raffle prizes.

Additionally as stated a number of tickets were sold at 0.25 BTC rather than 0.3 BTC.

The raffle cannot end before 1024 tickets are sold. The draw relies on this because of the way it works, the terms and conditions all purchasers agreed to and accepted state this. There will be no early end, no change to the prizes, no modifying the agreement we entered.

Like your idea 2weiX to stabilize pricing but the problem is I'd have to be able to convert those BTC into USD at the time of sale rather than at the time I choose, this would require either some time-intensive programming to use a bot to do so, or for me to have staff awake 24/7. Neither of these are feasible on a couple of hundred dollar margin.

The raffle is going strong, have sold over 50 tickets in 48 hours. Keep the orders coming.

So... who gets all the extra money then? A raffle seems like a great idea if you hedge on bitcoin intrinsically increasing in value. Suddenly your modest percentage becomes something much more.. I was tempted in purchasing tickets, but the lack of transparency here makes me lose interest.

[digital]

There have been a number of hedges into USD along the way, and a number of tickets were given away in specials (buy 100 get 5 free, buy 25 get 1 free, get one for renting a VPS) so I haven't taken anywhere close to enough to cover the raffle prizes.

Additionally as stated a number of tickets were sold at 0.25 BTC rather than 0.3 BTC.

The raffle cannot end before 1024 tickets are sold. The draw relies on this because of the way it works, the terms and conditions all purchasers agreed to and accepted state this. There will be no early end, no change to the prizes, no modifying the agreement we entered.

Like your idea 2weiX to stabilize pricing but the problem is I'd have to be able to convert those BTC into USD at the time of sale rather than at the time I choose, this would require either some time-intensive programming to use a bot to do so, or for me to have staff awake 24/7. Neither of these are feasible on a couple of hundred dollar margin.

The raffle is going strong, have sold over 50 tickets in 48 hours. Keep the orders coming.

So... who gets all the extra money then? A raffle seems like a great idea if you hedge on bitcoin intrinsically increasing in value. Suddenly your modest percentage becomes something much more.. I was tempted in purchasing tickets, but the lack of transparency here makes me lose interest.

Don't even see the point in posting why your not going to participate...

[Luceo]

There is no extra money, only what people willingly spent on tickets (in their judgement, at the time of purchase, the ticket was worth what they paid for it). Some of this has been converted to USD as a hedge (mostly around $8 and again around $10), some is still sitting in the wallet hoping it increases further.

I'm not a clairvoyant, I don't know if Bitcoin will always increase in value. I know, in fact, that it has a tendency to bounce around, we've seen $7 and $15 both within the past month; we've seen $30 and $2 in little over a year, that's hardly a sure bet on value increasing.

 If I'd started a raffle in July 2011 and it ran through to September, we'd all be talking about how the Bitcoin had dropped from $30 to around $10, and how my tickets which started off at $1.80 had only netted me enough BTC for $0.60 had I not converted them to USD.

I don't feel that there is a lack of transparency. The first post gives you everything you need to do the math. If I were trying to hide something, I probably wouldn't put the number of tickets sold, the price of all the prizes, the value at which each ticket was sold etc. on the front page.

If you don't feel that a ticket is worth 0.3 BTC, I suggest you don't buy one at 0.3 BTC. Many people do believe it is worth it, and have bought them.

[squid]

There is no extra money, only what people willingly spent on tickets (in their judgement, at the time of purchase, the ticket was worth what they paid for it). Some of this has been converted to USD as a hedge (mostly around $8 and again around $10), some is still sitting in the wallet hoping it increases further.

I'm not a clairvoyant, I don't know if Bitcoin will always increase in value. I know, in fact, that it has a tendency to bounce around, we've seen $7 and $15 both within the past month; we've seen $30 and $2 in little over a year, that's hardly a sure bet on value increasing.

 If I'd started a raffle in July 2011 and it ran through to September, we'd all be talking about how the Bitcoin had dropped from $30 to around $10, and how my tickets which started off at $1.80 had only netted me enough BTC for $0.60 had I not converted them to USD.

I don't feel that there is a lack of transparency. The first post gives you everything you need to do the math. If I were trying to hide something, I probably wouldn't put the number of tickets sold, the price of all the prizes, the value at which each ticket was sold etc. on the front page.

If you don't feel that a ticket is worth 0.3 BTC, I suggest you don't buy one at 0.3 BTC. Many people do believe it is worth it, and have bought them.

Sorry I wasn't trying to cause trouble, I had just felt that the listed margin was a bit misleading since it could significantly increase as the value of bitcoin has been increasing steadily from when the auction was started. In the end that margin doesn't really matter since it is a raffle and whatever percentage you take home doesn't matter so long as the prizes are distributed accordingly.

I also didn't mean any personal offense to you Luceo as I recognize you are a well known and well respected member of the community.

[Luceo]

I do agree that the listed margin is awkward. It's very hard to state a margin when dealing in USD on one end and BTC at the other, and USD:BTC had been in that $5-6 range for long enough that I felt comfortable that it would stay there, I was wrong and I won't try to second guess margins this way if we do another one.

No offense taken, criticism is the only way in which we learn and improve.

[420]

Final stretch! Only 1/3rd tickets left.

Either buy or don't buy. All the rules and price and prizes are there, there's no deception, get over it

[psilan]

Lets stop talking about USD. I think this is the problem.

If you get any profit out of this you completely deserve it.
Will you run another?

[Luceo]

Thanks for the support guys.

There will be more raffles, not sure if I'll be doing BFL-based or preferring things I can buy for a flat BTC price. ^^

[osoverflow]

maybe mtgox coupons

but I think I will prefer more ASIC pieces

Thanks for the support guys.

There will be more raffles, not sure if I'll be doing BFL-based or preferring things I can buy for a flat BTC price. ^^

[Luceo]

Maybe hosting & domain names, who knows? ^^

[camosoul]

maybe mtgox coupons

but I think I will prefer more ASIC pieces

Thanks for the support guys.

There will be more raffles, not sure if I'll be doing BFL-based or preferring things I can buy for a flat BTC price. ^^

Moar ASIC! BFL or that other one I saw that does 27. I think you can sell anything like this. Especially high-dollar items that people might not otherwise be able to afford. Houses, cars.... Anything. Once you have more reputation you can step it up. And get that conversion rate auto-tracker going. That is the most objectionable art at this time; the time it takes to sell all these tickets and the #TC fluctuations.

Hope you got my BTC. Sorry it took 4 days for my blockchain to update. Silly thing...

I think it might help you to NOT repeat using the same thread. It is confusing and makes people say "WTF? it too THAT long?" whent hey look at the wrong date, not realizing there are 3 raffles here.... Probably making people turn away before they figure out what's really happening. People are stupid and lazy like that.

[420]

Simple solution: add a start date for this third raffle near the to of the OP

[Luceo]

I'm pretty sure I have to use the same thread: One thread per site only.

The start date was mid July 2012 so we've been going around 2 months., the sales were really slow during the climb to $15 and then slowed down again during the Pirate default fallout, they've been getting back to normal recently.

It has been a long raffle, but I think that's pretty normal for such a high value competition.

Also, few more sold. Keep 'em coming!

[evanesce]

In for one, thanks!

[camosoul]

I'm pretty sure I have to use the same thread: One thread per site only.

But you're not a site. And you're not merely advertising. You're actually doing it here. Forced to that creates confusion. I don't think that rule applies...

[Luceo]

I'm pretty sure I have to use the same thread: One thread per site only.

But you're not a site. And you're not merely advertising. You're actually doing it here. Forced to that creates confusion. I don't think that rule applies...

If and when I do a num 4, I'll put a start date on the first post.

[420]

I'm pretty sure I have to use the same thread: One thread per site only.

But you're not a site. And you're not merely advertising. You're actually doing it here. Forced to that creates confusion. I don't think that rule applies...

If and when I do a num 4, I'll put a start date on the first post.

We waiting for the new forum software (http://betsofbitco.in/item?id=179) to have a little note on posts: "Edited on XX Of Month, Year"

[Luceo]

I'm pretty sure I have to use the same thread: One thread per site only.

But you're not a site. And you're not merely advertising. You're actually doing it here. Forced to that creates confusion. I don't think that rule applies...

If and when I do a num 4, I'll put a start date on the first post.

We waiting for the new forum software (http://betsofbitco.in/item?id=179) to have a little note on posts: "Edited on XX Of Month, Year"

Wouldn't help much because it gets edited every time I add a ticket. ^^