I really like this idea. I am about to release a couple apps on the app store, and would be interested in using reviewrobot.
I am interested in how and when you will be reporting the data back to your servers. Do you send this info every time the app starts and stops, or collect the data locally and then periodically report it back.
Actually, no. In those games, its the lowest unique bid. check out http://www.bidster.com/ . This way, if more than one person choose the lowest bid, then those cancel eachother out, and the next lowest, but non-duplicated bid wins. There's a large number of these sites out there actually, but none-the-less a very profitable business. Might be less of a lottery though, because one could claim its a game of skill.
So I have a personal experience with this idea. I was living in Finland for the past year and a half, and came across this same idea with a site called fiksuhuuto.fi. I didn't have any moral opposition to the idea, because I believe that its no different than any other sort of lottery or game of chance. Adults should have the right to risk their money for the possibility of reward.
I was working remotely for a company at the time, so gave them 2 months notice and started developing, with the intention of launching a similar company in Canada in 6 months time. I had another Canadian partner, and started looking into all facets of the idea. The site development went fairly straight forward and allowed me the chance to return to web development after 5 years of Mac and Windows application development.
We had contacted the best law firm we could find with experience in gaming and intellectual property. After spending a fairly large sum of money to get a risk assessment, it was clear that the idea was definitely illegal. Because many people were paying for the chance to win a product, it was online gaming and illegal in Canada. We had a few options, none of which were very reassuring.
I am rambling now, but I just wanted to mention that I paid nearly $10K to have this looked into by lawyers, quit my job to implement it, and moved back to Canada from Finland to go ahead with the project. I am stunned that this is being done in the US, and am no going to be surprised at all when it goes bad for them. If it doesn't, then I made the wrong bet of calling it quits.
On a side note, if anyone wants to buy a nearly completed site with the same idea as this, feel free to contact me.
I have been doing this for the past year and a half (Canadian Citizen, working in Finland). It has been great, but there are some things that you need to watch out for.
- Ensure the countries have a double taxation treaty in place, so that income you claim abroad does not have to be claimed at home (or rather you have to claim it, but not pay tax on it again)
- Residence permits for self-employed persons can take a long time in some countries. For example, Finland has two national languages, and I decided to apply in the minority language (Swedish) because I was studying it. It took nearly 5 months to get the residence permit, partially because of the extra bureaucracy involved with doing things in the minority language.
- Cost of living is a huge issue. Choose a country where you will benefit from the currency exchange (harder with the US dollar lately). I am earning Canadian Dollars, living in Euros, and it hurts.
I do not think that citizenship should be an issue, though, unless you obtained your citizenship recently. If you are a natural born citizen, living in another country under a residence permit should not affect things.
The past few months I have been working my FT job, and also working on my start-up every spare moment I have (I would say 25 - 30 hours per week. Come June, I will be quitting the FT job and focusing exclusively on the startup.
I have been working FT for a large company for the past 5 years (past year remotely from home) and am really excited for moving to full time on my startup.
I am interested in how and when you will be reporting the data back to your servers. Do you send this info every time the app starts and stops, or collect the data locally and then periodically report it back.
Great idea.