my_hat_stinks

Okay, I’ll simplify. Store advertises three sandwich. You buy three sandwich. You get one sandwich. Store says fees+taxes ate other sandwiches. You say it’s fine, you got sandwich. I say it’s not, store lied.

They absolutely can give a solid number even when a lottery runs in areas with different taxes, they simply choose not to because they make more money that way and for some reason you lack regulation there. See for instance here where the prize money may be partially subjected to income tax, meaning tax varies wildly depending on the winner’s other income:

£10,000 every month for 30 years. […] However, based on tax rules and rates at the date of these Procedures, the monthly payments will not be less than £10,000 after tax.

So there’s three obvious choices: mislead customers, calculate the correct prize after relevant taxes and advertise that, or give a fixed value and eat the cost of any taxes themselves. They chose the first one.

A lottery isn’t necessarily inherently a scam, at least no more than gambling is in general. In practice the odds of winning are pretty poor compared to alternatives but as long as they’re up front about the odds of winning I wouldn’t call that a scam. Eg, this lottery lists the odds of winning each prize, though it would definitely be better if they published those on the main page rather than in the terms. A fairer lottery is possible pretty easily by adjusting the prize values, range of numbers to select, or how many numbers the gambler selects. This would kind of defeat the purpose of most lotteries to raise money for government, but personally I’m for more progressive taxes anyway.

Advertising one prize when the real prize is significantly lower is just lying and not an inherent trait of lotteries.

You’re walking down the street and see a sign in a new sandwich place saying they have a three-for-one deal on, buy any one sandwich and get two sandwiches completely free. Sounds like a great deal, it might be a bit much but you skipped breakfast today and you can always keep one for later anyway, right? So you head inside and think about what you want, maybe you’re cutting back on red meat and you’re tired of chicken so you go with a tuna or cheese sandwich. You get to the counter to pick up your tuna+cheese sandwich, the worker hands over your two freebies and you walk out. Turns out you’re hungrier than you thought so you practically inhale your tuna+cheese, barely savouring the flavour. You reach for your second sandwich but when you unwrap it you discover it’s not the same as the one you ordered; it’s bread with a thin smear of butter, technically it is a sandwich but it’s definitely not what you wanted or expected when you ordered.

Did you get scammed? Are you okay with that since you still got one sandwich even though you chose that vendor because they advertised three?

It really shouldn’t be a controversial statement to say that lying to people to get their money is wrong. If it really makes no difference as you’re suggesting why can’t they just advertise the real value instead?

That seems incredibly scammy to me. They’re pretending the prize is double what it actually is and then claim even more of that back as taxes. If the actual prize money is only 20% of what you’re advertising that’s dishonest at best.

Where I am lottery winnings are tax-free and without an insane hidden 50% “claimed your winnings” fee. What they advertise is what you get if you win.

You’re thinking of misandrists. Feminism is about equality of the sexes. Other groups (eg misandrists and terfs) sometimes claim to be feminist as a cover. A feminist believes men and woman are equals, a misogynist believes women are inferior, and a misandrist believes men are inferior.

Good news! You can buy Murder Harem: Furry’s Vore Safari Edition (if that’s what you’re into) on Steam and nobody would ever know as long as you mark it as private while it’s in your basket! Assuming it works as they say you’ll still be able to play the game as normal but nobody else would know unless they directly log in to your account.

The faq doesn’t mention the new Steam Family stuff though. I’m guessing it’ll at least be hidden for parent accounts, but since parent accounts can control game access for child accounts that might not be as private?

Ironically enough it’s the opposite. Banks answer to shareholders, building societies answer to its members. Building societies compete with banks, if they’re unheard of in the US that certainly does explain the state of the US banking system.

Okay? But you presumably do still have an account with a bank or building society, right? So why use a third party when you can request a transfer from them directly?

Why use a third-party at all? It’s been trivial to send money via bank transfer for a long time, check your banking app or website and you’ll likely find a way to send money with just an account number + sort code. If your country has a system like faster payments the transfer will be near-instant too.

Do you make an exit speech every time you leave somewhere? That sounds tiring, standing in doorways shouting “Not enough salt on my fries, I won’t be back!” while everyone else just doesn’t care.

Sure, but the downside there is you’ve got a big orange cursor.

I switched to a custom black cursor a few years ago (Posy’s cursor mono block if anyone’s curious) and it’s so much easier to find. I also added the ping when I hit control, but that’s less useful and a bit distracting in games.