RETIRED: Coca-Cola.com/offers (formerly My Coke Rewards) / Discussion Thread 2018! - No OT

Another $100 birthday winner here!

25 caps, which is a lot for me. There was also that Amazon movie rental promo, so I figured I would at least get a $4 Amazon out of it.
I guess I got pretty lucky if people were putting in a whole lot more

Not only incorrect, but the opposite is true. Apologies in advance for my geek coming out:

A raffle has 1,000 tickets. You buy one. Your odds on that ticket are 1:1,000. Guy next to you bought five tickets. His odds on each of those tickets is 1:1,000. He just has more chances, same odds.

This promo from Coca-Cola did not have a set number of entries. Say 10,000 play and each entered 25 caps. 3,500 prizes makes the odds 1:71.4. Apply "More entries makes your odds better" and all 10,000 enter 30 caps. Odds just went down to 1:85.7. The only way to "make your odds better" is to have more prizes or less entries.

But by adding more of your entries, you are increasing your likelihood of winning. Lets scale the contest size back to an extreme example to make it more obvious.If the contest is simply pulling a slip of paper out of a hat, and there is only 1 name currently in the hat, would you rather put 5 slips of paper with your name on it, or just 1? Obviously you have a better chance that your name will be picked if you put in 5. And it doesn't matter how many slips of paper are in that hat to start with, you will still increase your odds that the one chosen is yours if you add more.

Granted, it does mean that each slip you put in the hat has a smaller chance (1 in 6 instead of 1 in 2 if you only put in 1) to be picked. But since you only need 1 slip to win, it is an OR situation, meaning they add up. So your chance of winning one is 1/6+1/6+1/6+1/6+1/6 or 5/6.


Your example only applies if by putting you name in the hat 5 times, that also means that the other person puts his in 5 times as well. But what you do is irrelevant to the other person's decision making and that isn't what happens in the birthday sweeps. The other people have already made their decision as to how many entries they are putting in. So increasing yours does increase your odds. And the more entries you have, the closer that increase is just your chance of 1 multiplied by how many you put in. So in my extreme example, your chance goes up much less...just from 50% to 83%. But if you had 999 slips of paper in that hat before your decision to put 1 or 5 in, you would go from 0.001% of winning to 0.00498%.

IT is the same for contests that have multiple winners. Let's go back to the extreme example and say that 2 names will be drawn from the hat. There are already 2 entries in. But this time, you can put in 1 or 2. And again, no matter what you do, the other two people are not changing their mind. If you put in 1, there are 6 possible ways the drawing could work 1-2, 1-3, 2-1, 2-3, 3-1, 3-2, where 3 is your entry. So you would win in 4 of those situations. 2/3 of the time. But if you put in 2, there are now 12 different possible outcomes of the drawing. I won't list all here because everybody can figure it out. But suffice it to say that if there are 4 numbers and you can win on 3 or 4, that 10 different combination will result in you winning. for you have increased your odds of winning to 5/6. IF you put in 3 entries, you now have 18 combinations out of 20 that will result in a win. If you put in 5 like before, now you have 40/42 combinations.

But by adding more of your entries, you are increasing your likelihood of winning. Lets scale the contest size back to an extreme example to make it more obvious.If the contest is simply pulling a slip of paper out of a hat, and there is only 1 name currently in the hat, would you rather put 5 slips of paper with your name on it, or just 1? Obviously you have a better chance that your name will be picked if you put in 5. And it doesn't matter how many slips of paper are in that hat to start with, you will still increase your odds that the one chosen is yours if you add more.

Granted, it does mean that each slip you put in the hat has a smaller chance (1 in 6 instead of 1 in 2 if you only put in 1) to be picked. But since you only need 1 slip to win, it is an OR situation, meaning they add up. So your chance of winning one is 1/6+1/6+1/6+1/6+1/6 or 5/6.


Your example only applies if by putting you name in the hat 5 times, that also means that the other person puts his in 5 times as well. But what you do is irrelevant to the other person's decision making and that isn't what happens in the birthday sweeps. The other people have already made their decision as to how many entries they are putting in. So increasing yours does increase your odds. And the more entries you have, the closer that increase is just your chance of 1 multiplied by how many you put in. So in my extreme example, your chance goes up much less...just from 50% to 83%. But if you had 999 slips of paper in that hat before your decision to put 1 or 5 in, you would go from 0.001% of winning to 0.00498%.

IT is the same for contests that have multiple winners. Let's go back to the extreme example and say that 2 names will be drawn from the hat. There are already 2 entries in. But this time, you can put in 1 or 2. And again, no matter what you do, the other two people are not changing their mind. If you put in 1, there are 6 possible ways the drawing could work 1-2, 1-3, 2-1, 2-3, 3-1, 3-2, where 3 is your entry. So you would win in 4 of those situations. 2/3 of the time. But if you put in 2, there are now 12 different possible outcomes of the drawing. I won't list all here because everybody can figure it out. But suffice it to say that if there are 4 numbers and you can win on 3 or 4, that 10 different combination will result in you winning. for you have increased your odds of winning to 5/6. IF you put in 3 entries, you now have 18 combinations out of 20 that will result in a win. If you put in 5 like before, now you have 40/42 combinations.

A clear mathematical demonstration that increasing your entries in a sweepstakes will absolutely increase your odds. So much for the "totally incorrect" school of thought.

Here are some more flaps if anyone is interested (24 packs I believe):

RMOL4WVLWVMWBJ
OXTW9JHNJTXJKP
P67WRJWV96MVTK

The more you enter - the higher probability or chance that you win. I see that proven all throughout that demonstration. I don't see that sliding over to "odds" though. I'd imagine the definitions of probability, chance, and odds are in question here and that is where "pendantic" came in.

Strangely enough, dictionary.com defines "odds" as meaning "probability" and "chance." They are the same.

"odds, noun: The ratio between the amounts staked by the parties to a bet, based on the expected probability either way. The chances or likelihood of something happening or being the case."

If you put your Target gift cards in their app, can you still use them on paper if you want first?

Anyone know the answer? I was wondering also.

Anyone know the answer? I was wondering also.