All: Been super swamped today, checking in for first time. I'm kinda surprised babs took the ban after Soup's update post last night!

HIV: I don't see babs going a full hunchcap under the radar.

SCT: I think you are looking for this post.

Howard: I'll post the up-to-date rules and non-babs contestants tonight. Most everyone expressing interest is already known or easily vouched for, so I don't see any problem starting on Saturday.

Soup: I'm a big fan of Charity Navigator as well. I'm fine with doing either the same or different charities. I was considering http://www.edgewood.org/whoweare/ (I've volunteered there in the past) but they aren't on CN. Maybe just pick a favorite charity each or get suggestions from the thread. Happy to consider any suggestions from you or anyone in the thread.

The poster named Big Bear?

Naw, I dont think that is him... I just looked at 10 or so posts in that thread, but it didnt sound like him.

I saw this note now placed top of page 1. Whilst I am glad to see it, I believe that it should include his real name. I think he got to over 1k posts as Sup before being outed.

Sct,

I haven't looked yet, just remembered xx's post.

Maybe we'll never know if he gets that raise.

He's actually paying $300.

$105 for gang bang
$145 HU
$50 charity

Edit: He's actually getting an $11 discount.

What?

I thought they were both donating the HU match funds to charity and not actually playing it.

And I thought you were paying the 50 escrow breaking penalty? Oops... I see my El D's post below it is BluffMN paying it, not you.

Banned,

No. The total buyout of babs is $300. Babs gets his $250 back.

Soup pays $105 to enter the contest.
Soup donates $145 to charity in lieu of HU (I'm also donating my $145 to charity)
Bluff is paying the $50 buyout fee into the prize pool.

the perma is bs. everyone knows a guy like tbab in real life, a real sweetheart as long as matters of trust and money aren't concerned. baiting him with contests and a chance to impress people on the internet was only going to end the same way it always has. i think he was making real progress in improving himself thanks mainly to this thread...now he's without a friend on this dark and cruel place called earth.

Beast, if you're reading this, understand that plenty of motivations around here don't involve money. Take NS4U, for example. The amount of his buyout is utterly immaterial to him; he thinks of it no more than he would leaning over to pick up a coin in the street. I don't know why he's willing to bail you out here, but I think his doing so is misguided. Getting 250 in cash doesn't actually help you, even though you think today that's what you need. Enablement is not the medicine you need.

I am likewise sure that El D doesn't give a rip about the magnitude of his charitable donation. And I understand your perspective that El D can seem like a prick at times. In reality, he isn't: as a matter of political thought and social justice, he's much softer than I am and is at root likely more generous than I am. He does see reality for what it is, however, and is usually willing to hold to those standards here.

I myself am a cynic. You may actually think, Beast, that you were taken advantage of around here. Not so. In fact, to the contrary; you seem to have left a fair amount on the table during this thread, both in terms of cash income and in terms of lessons learned. Your track record suggests to me that you're irreedeemable.

Just to leaven my cynicism this evening, I'm going to match El D's and NS4U's contributions to charity. Gentlemen, please post or PM the charities to which you're going to donate along with the specific amounts, and I will match the same -- be it wounded warriors, autism, GA, or whatever.

Oh you degenerate dromedaries, put me in for the match. (Charity only, no gambling for me.)

he was already honestly, but this was to much fun not let happen

2 things guys

1) if this is now "over" I dont want anyone relaying msgs for him, you will be banned for that ( Alobar will make that decision in this thread if he deems the tbab action closed)

2) If hes back he is going to be nuked, his posts, his PM's all of it.

he was PNG a long time about but man this thread was hilarious and has gone on far longer then it should ...God damn so many laughs...are we all part degen and part sociopaths for enjoying this so much ...man IDK but ffs that dude deserved it regardless.

To clarify, I don't perceive that I lost any money in the transaction. I paid $105 to enter the hunchcapping contest and I paid $145 to compete in a heads-up gambling competiton with El Diablo. El Diablo and I agreed that instead of competing with one another we would instead donate that money to charity. I don't regard that money as "lost" but even if you say that it is, the government is happy to return slightly more than half of it at tax time because our tax policies reward charitable donations and permit me to donate up to half of my income tax free. So I suppose I lost $70-ish on the transaction if you aren't a believer in charitable donations. It is not an amount of money that has any consequence to me.

Thanks. I really did enjoy reading much of the back and forth about tbab for these many months. He is sometimes a very entertaining guy. Had the thread continued in the same way it went in the early days, I would have remained a lurker.

I share the assessment of others here that he would be fairly recognizable in his new identity. If somehow he wasn't, I wouldn't actually care because he would have to be behaving very differently and everyone else would accordingly treat him very differently and everything that I disliked about the last few weeks would be changed.

I had it in my power to stop a pattern of behavior that I objected to and I did so. My sense of myself and my worth was not changed in any measurable degree. I am at a place in life where I pretty much do what I want to do without much regard for the opinion of others or my reputation. Oddly enough, I probably behave better now that I do.

I've tried really hard to avoid taking the bait on these kinds of comments, but if it is your position that compelling the beast to participate in the heads-up contest and Hunchcap II was somehow some kind of tough love that was likely to teach him some valuable lesson or lead to some kind of personal growth, I think you are deluding yourself. I rather suspect that some people (perhaps you are one) believed that banning him as his self-destructive behavior spiraled out of control and simply distributing his money to the prize pool and to El Diablo was going to either (1) help him or (2) give him what he deserved. I understand the people that think that his bad behavior deserved to cause him to lose the money -- I disagree with them, but I totally get that position. People who think that it can be justified as somehow teaching him some life lesson and that they are doing him some kind of favor by dragging out that process are deluded, confused or simply mean.

I think that is a great idea and I'd be happy to receive any suggestions from in-thread. If not, I'll just pick one. FYI, charities that are not listed on Charity Navigator generally have an entry on Guidestar and you can peek at their 990s there. Edgewood looks like they do good work and fwiw I think they would be a fine choice (not that you require my approval).

When I spoke earlier about being unable to figure out when people are trolling and when they are serious, this is a fine example. Do you honestly believe something like this?

To be clear, I don't think receiving the money was helpful to tbab. I think getting banned was helpful to tbab.

Outstanding! You are a mensch.

Let's assume a crack addict gives you $250 to hold for him and the proceeds to blow $300 on crack right in front of you (in a matter of minutes) . Then said crack addict begs you to give him back the $250 you were holding for him saying it's for bills and life expenses. Do you think you are helping him by complying? If you give him the money only on the condition that he is no longer able to converse with those that are telling him that he is a crack addict and that that is a very bad thing he is doing does that make it better/ok for him?

Note: this isn't directed at anyone in particular, just a hypothetical

I'm very well pleased by this! In the same spirit, I will recognize BluffMN's willingness to pony up the $50 penalty and match that with a separate donation to a military charity. Unfortunately, the Wounded Warrior project is one of the three star charities that I do not choose to support. Only 58% of the money they raise is actually spent on programs and some of that is not spent very well in my personal opinion. They do a much better job of promoting themselves than they do delivering support to the troops. I would suggest that if you are interested in helped wounded service members, your money would be much better spent contributing to Fisher House. They deliver 95 cents of every dollar donated directly to the cause and anyone who knows a wounded vet knows how awesome they are. They provide free housing for the patient's family while their vet is getting treatment at a VA hospital and I doubt that you will be able to find a single person with a bad word to say about them. I can personally vouch for them. I'll ship them $50 and post a receipt here. For anyone who finds $145 more than they are comfortable spending, I'd encourage you to consider a smaller donation to Fisher House.

I missed this on my first pass. Kudos to you as well, my good man. I feel more pressure to suggest a quality charity if no one else does. I'll even check out some autism spectrum charities for whomever suggested that previously, although I think I could come up with something more appropriate.

Participants,

Hunchcap II rules:

50 picks
Starts Aug 23 (dates California/Pacific time)
Ends Sep 30 (all picks must begin play by Sep 30 and end by Oct 1 to count)

$100+5/entry
+$5 fee paid to SCT for managing results spreadsheet
up to 25 players
Something like 75/20/5 split for first, second and third.
(that would be $1875/$500/$125 if we end up with 25)

Any pick avail on PM between -400 and +600
Picks under -400 will be subject to penalty
Picks over +600 will be paid out at +600

1-unit placed per bet on PM
Unused picks count as a loss

Penalties: .25/.5/.75/1/1.5/2/forfeit
Alobar/SCT/Diablo to judge any disputes
Howard to act as judge if any of those three directly involved in dispute

Picks can be posted here if you want a backup record in case there is a problem with PM. If you don't do that, you're out of luck if something happens w PM.
PM is the definitive record of what counts for your picks.
Any messups (invalid odds, bet other than 1 unit entered, pick outside date range, duplicating a pick, etc) on PM subject to penalty.
Taking opposite sides of a contest to burn picks not allowed (this will be up to judge's discretion. If you believe you have a chance to win different sides of a contest with different wagers, be sure to explain that in thread before making wagers).

New, empty PM account required for all participants.

[Hunchcap II participants list to follow, both of these will be linked from OP when finalized and contest starts]

NoSoup, thanks for the heads up. I will start donating to Fischer House instead of WW.

No I think it's more like a group of friends that gets together once in a while to do some blow on a Friday night. Let's assume once a month they get some **** and go crazy together. You collect the money a week in advance. At some point, after money gets collected, but before blow is purchased, friend x has a bad night and feels he's hit rock bottom and wants to quit drinking and drugging. Do you refuse to let him out of his piece of the score to teach him some sort of lesson about keeping his word?

tbab has no intention of quitting gambling.

Brow, all that except you just saw your friend blow $300 right in front of you on crack minutes before and he's desperately begging you to give him another $250. So, really not like that at all

Do you have specialized training in assessing the desire of an individual to stop gambling?

I think you might be saying it's highly unlikely he actually will find a way to stop.

Doubt you are in a position to claim with any certainty what his "intention" is.

(Signed someone who kept using drugs for a long time after he originally desired / intended to stop)

I guess I'm focusing the idea of contributing to locking someone into/ incentivizing someone to continue something they indicated they might want to stop doing.

I think you are focusing on the idea that it is highly likely that refunding will contribute to more bad behavior.

I think both factors are present here so I admit it's hard to speak forcefully about what the right thing to do is.

blah blah blah, somebody find us a new dancing monkey

Yes. Well technically I have specialized training in assessing the desire of an individual to stop drinking or using drugs, but it's not hard to adapt that to gambling.
I'm saying it's not his intention to stop gambling because he said so.

Count me out of Hunchcap II. Good luck to all participants!