"A chance to win" can mean that chance is very little, almost impossible for you to accomplish, but that 'chance' is enough to make that phrase legally accurate. Think gacha games.

[–] scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech 10 points 1 month ago

They could create a system that picks one person out of the millions that do it, and then still make a random number generator pick a number that they have to choose out of 1000, and it would still mean that "You have a chance" to win. Sure, a chance, like, but at what odds, and that's only if they were actually checked if it was true.

We all know there was never a chance.

[–] postnataldrip@lemmy.world 2 points 1 month ago

As I understand it these are basically an insurance policy. The promoter takes out a policy detailing the odds of a payout being required, and pay a premium based on the insurer's risk assessment.

And of course the insurer wants to minimise the odds of paying out, and the promoter wants to minimise their premium - so the top prize is usually, as above, near-unwinnable.

[–] xia@lemmy.sdf.org 5 points 1 month ago

At most one person gets it... :)

[–] anarchoilluminati@hexbear.net 5 points 1 month ago (1 children)

In the US, especially in the 90's, there were a lot promotional mailers, TV ads, and so on to prey on people's desperation and ignorance that were sent out that would say that the person has "a chance to win $1M!" or "may have already won!"

Of course, I've never heard of anyone who actually won anything from them. It was probably just a data collection thing or asking people to send $20 to enter the fake lottery, I'm not sure. But, I have to admit, I did join a lot of those because I was a kid and I thought it'd be fun or easy and my dad would humor me by going through the process—or, at least, pretend that he did. We never won anything though.

[–] P4ulin_Kbana@lemmy.eco.br 2 points 1 month ago

Thank you, this explanation was very helpful!