The mind of a gambler must make a fascinating case study for a psychiatrist. It’s human nature to remember the good things that happen in life, whereas the not so good things are consigned to the dustbins of our minds.
For gamblers, the wins are readily recalled and related to others, the losses, not so much. Certainly not many gamblers will admit that they regularly lose overall, although some social gamblers I know are quite happy regularly losing a few quid, and winning on rare occasions, but for them it is entertainment. Personally, I don’t find the offices of my local Stanley Betting shop too much fun, but give me a casino and I’m quite happy to lose (a little) money playing craps – it’s the cost of entertainment.
The Betfair forum is (by definition) full of gamblers, some of whom seem genuine, but many of whom seem anything but. Often there are dubious claims of fantastic wins and sometimes incredible losses, accompanied by supposed profit and losses. “1.01 smashed! (Yawn) £20,000 traded!”
Sadly, the blogosphere seems to be no different. One of the blogs listed on the right, whose blogger (Walter Mitty) recently had me exchange links with them, frequently posts tales and screenshots of his wins and losses. I was already a little suspicious since there never seems to be any reasoning to explain the outcome, (just a “Last night, Team A beat Team B - here’s how I much I won/lost”), but I’m a nice guy – benefit of the doubt and all that. He even wrote one curious post a while back claiming that a couple of people had contacted him asking him how to open a Betfair account, a tale that I recounted here after my comment to that post was deleted:
His latest post describes how he had a $39.54 back matched at 100 on the Nets v Sixers NBA game on Monday night. Now my ‘blink’ instinct was to wonder why he would wait almost two days to post such a tale. (Actually, my ‘pre-blink’ instinct was to wonder why he felt the need to do this at all!) Then I looked at the accompanying screenshot, (see above), and noticed that the total Traded was $40.
Since Betfair count the traded total as the Back amount PLUS the Lay amount (e.g. a bet of $39.54 will show in the Traded column as $79), this bet clearly was never struck.
I’ve posted a comment, but I’m sure it will be removed. I guess it took almost two days to come up with the screenshot.
6 comments:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Mitty
http://www.theterras.co.uk/website/match-reports/2008-2009/rushden-h.htm
TG again.
I blog because, frankly, my friends and family aren't interested in my ramblings, and it's good for discipline. There are always people looking to take your money in any walk of life. A combination of blog and subscription tipping service seems to be a recipe for such people.
I shouldn't imagine my comment will last much longer.
I don't read many sections of the forum (only Tennis and General Betting) but Tennis is a sport where 1.01s are smashed a few times a week as a player "chokes" and the forum loves it. Most of the posts relating to this are mainly comments on how much the bots and courtsiders have traded at 1.01 rather than "I layed £1000 at 1.01 - GUBBED :D Fanks 4 da phree munny mugs". But who knows there are a lot of dillusional posters on the forum. "Carsten19" is a "blink" moment there.
Curly.
Quite possibly the worst fake screen shot of all time :o) Look at the zero's on the supposed 100, they dont even match.
I assure you that I did make this bet. The point you made is a good one, I do not know why it wasn't showing $79 matched.
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