<story><title>Virtual Weapons Are Turning Gamers into Serious Gamblers</title><url>http://www.bloomberg.com/features/2016-virtual-guns-counterstrike-gambling/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>levemi</author><text>This story isn&amp;#x27;t about Valve but the author sure made it seem like it was. A third party site uses Valve&amp;#x27;s API to enable users to bet skins on esport competitions. This third party site uses Valve&amp;#x27;s API. Valve is in no way involved in betting. The only thing they haven&amp;#x27;t done is turn off access to the API for this third party company.&lt;p&gt;This is probably more because of Valve&amp;#x27;s management structure than it is about any policy. Valve is a flat company with no managers. People work on what they want to work on. Jobs like customer support and policing API use are akin to taking out the trash, nobody wants to do it but someone has to. It just isn&amp;#x27;t a priority.&lt;p&gt;Anyway, ignorant article with a dishonest attempt at trying to spin two things together &amp;quot;illegal betting!&amp;quot; &amp;quot;valve&amp;quot; and failing.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>thrubbery</author><text>No, Valve sells scratch-off tickets. Or if you like, they give you the ticket (&amp;quot;case&amp;quot;) and sell you the coin to scratch it with (&amp;quot;key&amp;quot;). Same thing.&lt;p&gt;They&amp;#x27;re not directly involved in the sports betting aspect, but they&amp;#x27;d be running an illegal lottery without the fiction that their digital goods have no real world value, which is the same fiction maintained by the betting houses.&lt;p&gt;It stretches credibility to say they aren&amp;#x27;t &lt;i&gt;very&lt;/i&gt; involved.</text></comment>
<story><title>Virtual Weapons Are Turning Gamers into Serious Gamblers</title><url>http://www.bloomberg.com/features/2016-virtual-guns-counterstrike-gambling/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>levemi</author><text>This story isn&amp;#x27;t about Valve but the author sure made it seem like it was. A third party site uses Valve&amp;#x27;s API to enable users to bet skins on esport competitions. This third party site uses Valve&amp;#x27;s API. Valve is in no way involved in betting. The only thing they haven&amp;#x27;t done is turn off access to the API for this third party company.&lt;p&gt;This is probably more because of Valve&amp;#x27;s management structure than it is about any policy. Valve is a flat company with no managers. People work on what they want to work on. Jobs like customer support and policing API use are akin to taking out the trash, nobody wants to do it but someone has to. It just isn&amp;#x27;t a priority.&lt;p&gt;Anyway, ignorant article with a dishonest attempt at trying to spin two things together &amp;quot;illegal betting!&amp;quot; &amp;quot;valve&amp;quot; and failing.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Goronmon</author><text>&amp;gt;Anyway, ignorant article with a dishonest attempt at trying to spin two things together &amp;quot;illegal betting!&amp;quot; &amp;quot;valve&amp;quot; and failing.&lt;p&gt;How is a system where you spend real money in the hopes of receiving a valuable item by random chance not considered betting&amp;#x2F;gambling? Because that&amp;#x27;s effectively what system like the skins in CS:GO is at its core.</text></comment>