Show HN: Website that plays the lottery every second

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

Why People Play the Lottery

  • Many see tickets as buying “hope” or a temporary fantasy, not a rational investment.
  • The anticipation between draw and result is described as the real “product”: a week of daydreaming and dopamine.
  • There’s a social element: joining in when jackpots hit the news, having something to talk about, or sharing family discussions about probability.
  • Some treat it as a barometer of their own hopelessness: buying more when life feels bleak.
  • Others see it as a small indulgence comparable to entertainment, especially if only playing occasionally with disposable income.

Hope vs Harm and Addiction

  • Several comments distinguish between a rare $2–$10 ticket for fun and compulsive spending of hundreds or more by people who can’t afford basics.
  • Scratch-off tickets and high-frequency, low-odds games are seen as especially predatory.
  • Some argue critics can be elitist and condescending; others counter that criticism often comes from witnessing real financial damage in families.
  • There’s debate over whether this is “just irrational fun” or an addiction exploited by state-backed systems designed to maximize revenue.

Understanding Odds and Human Intuition

  • The site is praised for making extreme improbability visceral: years of “every second” play with no jackpot.
  • Multiple analogies: keys fitting exactly one house in a country, hitting a single human hair across kilometers, or postcode lotteries where near-misses drive FOMO.
  • Discussion around misconceptions: people thinking 1–6 is “less likely,” thinking many tickets massively change odds, or misunderstanding expected value.
  • Some emphasize that while people “know” odds are bad, they don’t grasp how astronomically bad.

Lottery as Tax and Public Funding

  • Lotteries are framed as “optional sin taxes” that plug budget gaps without raising explicit taxes.
  • Revenue earmarked for education or “good causes” is questioned because money is fungible; other funding often shrinks accordingly.
  • Regressive impact is highlighted: they disproportionately tax the poor and less educated, who are least able to complain.

Feedback on the Website and Feature Ideas

  • Users like the shared live simulation and the intuitive odds visualization.
  • Requested features:
    • Enter personal/fixed numbers and track over time
    • Show cumulative spend vs winnings and government profit
    • Adjustable “ticket frequency” (e.g., seconds as weeks/years)
    • Simulate many players in parallel.
  • Some bug reports (pause, pagination) and naming suggestions appear.
  • A few admit the site paradoxically nudged them to go buy a real ticket.