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As someone who founded a startup that navigated the legal boundaries of an over-regulated industry, I may suggest that the founders may find comments that say "

As someone who founded a startup that navigated the legal boundaries of an over-regulated industry, I may suggest that the founders may find comments that say "not sure if this is legal" a little annoying. I doubt they put their blood sweat and tears into this without going at least as far as they could to determine whether they could legally do this. Now, "I've done something similar and here is what I ran into" or "I'm an expert and here's what you're up against" - now that's constructive.

tomasien 14y ago
I seriously can not tell you how many times someone in Virginia went to thecityswig.com and then was like "awesome, but did you know ABC in Virginia has strict laws?" - No, I spent a year building this and it never occurred to me. So maybe I'm just projecting, but I would find those comments annoying.
rudimk 14y ago
I second tomasien on that.
objclxt 14y ago
Actually, I'm really surprised they got permission from all the sports leagues to use their trademarks and not have to put some small print in crediting them. You don't get to use the Premier League logo, for example, without a licence. (to answer your second point, I've done a lot of work in the sports area, so use of league and team logos is something I'm fairly up on).
- tomasien 14y ago
  There you go! That's what I'm talking about!
- rprasad 14y ago
  I'm really surprised as well, as several of those leagues do not allow sportsbooks to use their logos, especially the MLB, which has had several betting scandals in the past. The NFL also do not grant license requests to use its logo to sportsbook; only certain business partners (and their subsidiaries) may use the NFL logo in association with a sportsbook offering.
analog 14y ago
By that token we would assume that anything that takes any effort is legal. You can argue if something should be legal or not and that's a fair debate, but some people are concerned if something is legal or not, and they have a right to ask that question. Personally I wouldn't use the site because they're using the logos of well known sports organisations, and I presume they're doing this without their knowledge or approval. It's maybe not a big deal but it's enough for me not to trust them with my data.
- tomasien 14y ago
  We should just assume "not sure if this is legal" is not constructive unless we know something they should know, then we should OFFER that information
  - analog 14y ago
    Disagree, it's perfectly constructive feedback, if not advice. The founders have an opportunity to clear up any confusion, and we get to see that others also had an intuition that something's not quite right.
rprasad 14y ago
I would agree with you, but for several, very crucial facts: 1) The use of logos without permission. Some of these leagues do not allow the use of their logos in connection with betting. That alone suggests they did not put much research into the legal and business environment they are trying to play in. 2) The website. Are you really going to tell me that a startup which has managed to land licensing agreements with all of those leages can't do better than a website my mother could create in 10 minutes? The lack of effort in the website--the point of first impression of most of their customers--strongly suggests a lack of effort in other areas. 3) Show HN. A startup in this field, somehow snatching up licenses to some of the most popular, heavily betted leagues...and the first we've heard about it is on Show HN? No TechCrunch, no WSJ, no Gambling News, no nothing. No details on the team, on the investors, on anything. Tomasien, you have a legitimate gripe. But the people behind this website have clearly not done their homework.

tomasien 14y ago

I seriously can not tell you how many times someone in Virginia went to thecityswig.com and then was like "awesome, but did you know ABC in Virginia has strict laws?" - No, I spent a year building this and it never occurred to me. So maybe I'm just projecting, but I would find those comments annoying.

rudimk 14y ago

I second tomasien on that.

objclxt 14y ago

Actually, I'm really surprised they got permission from all the sports leagues to use their trademarks and not have to put some small print in crediting them. You don't get to use the Premier League logo, for example, without a licence. (to answer your second point, I've done a lot of work in the sports area, so use of league and team logos is something I'm fairly up on).

tomasien 14y ago
There you go! That's what I'm talking about!
rprasad 14y ago
I'm really surprised as well, as several of those leagues do not allow sportsbooks to use their logos, especially the MLB, which has had several betting scandals in the past. The NFL also do not grant license requests to use its logo to sportsbook; only certain business partners (and their subsidiaries) may use the NFL logo in association with a sportsbook offering.

analog 14y ago

By that token we would assume that anything that takes any effort is legal. You can argue if something should be legal or not and that's a fair debate, but some people are concerned if something is legal or not, and they have a right to ask that question. Personally I wouldn't use the site because they're using the logos of well known sports organisations, and I presume they're doing this without their knowledge or approval. It's maybe not a big deal but it's enough for me not to trust them with my data.

tomasien 14y ago
We should just assume "not sure if this is legal" is not constructive unless we know something they should know, then we should OFFER that information
- analog 14y ago
  Disagree, it's perfectly constructive feedback, if not advice. The founders have an opportunity to clear up any confusion, and we get to see that others also had an intuition that something's not quite right.

rprasad 14y ago

I would agree with you, but for several, very crucial facts: 1) The use of logos without permission. Some of these leagues do not allow the use of their logos in connection with betting. That alone suggests they did not put much research into the legal and business environment they are trying to play in. 2) The website. Are you really going to tell me that a startup which has managed to land licensing agreements with all of those leages can't do better than a website my mother could create in 10 minutes? The lack of effort in the website--the point of first impression of most of their customers--strongly suggests a lack of effort in other areas. 3) Show HN. A startup in this field, somehow snatching up licenses to some of the most popular, heavily betted leagues...and the first we've heard about it is on Show HN? No TechCrunch, no WSJ, no Gambling News, no nothing. No details on the team, on the investors, on anything. Tomasien, you have a legitimate gripe. But the people behind this website have clearly not done their homework.