Personally, I have long had great _hopes_ for using crypto for non-sanctioned gambling, but I'm pretty skeptical that many people will do it. For one thing, anyone knowledgeable enough to be comfortable with the crytography knows that gambling when a house cut exists is a lose. (And gambling with no house cut is, at best, a wash.)
"anyone knowledgeable enough to be comfortable with the crytography knows that gambling when a house cut exists is a lose." These people would not be the target market. My figuring is that the target market for lotteries would be your average joe home web browser, and your gambling addicts, of course. These people would not be caomfortable with encrypted open books, but I don't think that encrypted open books is really necessary to run a lottery which provably doesn't cheat. (Perhaps not *provably*, but reliably enough that people will play... ) High stakes lotteries may not be suitable but a slot-machine low-stakes system with perhaps a $1/play and a 40% chance of winning *something* (maybe not the full $1.00) could satisfy people enough that they will keep playing, and tell their friends about it. The target market here is by no means people who understand that house cut gambling is a lose. The reason to have an ecash casino/lottery is two-fold: A) Make ecash take off. B) Make lots of money. -- sameer Voice: 510-601-9777 Community ConneXion FAX: 510-601-9734 The Internet Privacy Provider Dialin: 510-658-6376 http://www.c2.org/ (or login as "guest") sameer@c2.org