Thought Penny Auctions Were Bordering On Gambling? Zookt.com Charges Users to Play Games to Try to Win

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Zookt is a social entertainment shopping site a bit different than a penny auction, but in essence it seems to be based off of the same idea – purchase bid points and win. But there’s a twist.

The twist: You pay to play games with hopes of winning more points to try to win items. In order to win items you have to play games and win the games. Totally random? Gambling?

What is Gambling?

“To gamble is to wager on a contest or to play at a game of chance for stakes. When you gamble, you are risking money (or something else of value) on the outcome of something that involves an element of chance, uncertainty, or hazard—for the possibility of winning something someone else has put at stake.” – Source http://www.gty.org/blog/B110525

Zookt Games

 Zookt users purchase “Zook points” in packages ranging from 5,000 Zooks for $5, 10,200 for $6.50, 20,500 for $13, 52,000 for 32.50 and 105,000 for $65. Plus they offered me a $5, $10 or $15 Amazon.com gift card if I purchased a Zook pack instead of skipping the purchase page to browse further.

Each item has a specified number of Zook points before you can try to win it.

You’re probably wondering where the gaming aspect comes in. Zook has a game center with games like Bingo and a Color Match game, but it’s not free to play the games. I used up 20 of my free Zooks to try Bingo and didn’t match their pattern sequence to win, but got 2 Zooks just for playing. If you do win you could win “16 times your Zooks.”

 

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I won a few Zooks when I was chosen a winner in the “Random Color” game, but one game isn’t enough points to try and win any of the offered items.

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Zookt’s items include $60 gift cards to Amazon.com, PayPal, Walmart, Apple and Target. $1000 Zookts are needed ($1) to try to win. Again, to win any item you must win one of their random games. I.e. Bingo or Random Color.

High value items include a Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 which costs $8.75 to play a game to try to win, same goes for a Coolpix. An unlocked iPhone 5S, $9.50, iPad AIr $9.98, Apple MacBook Pro $27.02. Then there are other laptops, a wireless speaker, Kindle Fire, iPods, TVs, Keurigs and more. All of which users have to purchase “Zook” points for a chance to play a game like Bingo or “Random Color” and win.

Zookt.com is asking consumers for something of value for a CHANCE to win something of value. Now here’s where the gambling element comes in.

An element that is not in penny auctions.

Sure, granted, say there was a penny auction site, all real consumers bidding to win, I bid, you bid, more users bid, we all spend money trying to win one item… the clock ticks down, and the cycle continues on again, that’s how a penny auction works. I’ll state that yes it ‘s unpredictable, but there seems to be more of an element of control when it comes to bidding and possibly winning penny auctions. The winner is ultimately the user who keeps bidding long after everyone else does, (obviously!) the clock hits 0, no competing bids were received or recorded in the system and the item ends. So yeah, you can spend more money and more money and maybe everyone will drop out or you have deeper pockets than everyone else.

Take a look at one of Zookt’s items… a new Apple iPhone 5s 16GB Gold and Factory Unlocked with a suggested retail price of $649. Zookt offers the opportunity to pay $9.50 to play for it, or to buy it outright for 811,250 – if all purchased Zookts this purchase price would be about $511, right? 811,250 Zooks – this would cost roughly 7.72x the highest bid pack of 105,000 Zooks for $65… Hmm?

zookt iphone item

On Zookt you are paying money, to play games, to try to win. Games that have random algorithms in there. So what are the odds of winning? Don’t they have to post these? How often is a game ever going to let anyone win? Isn’t this just like gambling? Gaming? Is this not regulated? Is this legal in the US? All questions that an inquisitive observer is going to ask because I could be over here pouring all of my money into trying to win items by trying to win games and well, could just end up broke and the site could become rich.

Zookt.com states to be doing business as Zookt, LLC with a listed address on their website of 3720 Gattis School Rd
#800-203 – Round Rock, Texas, 78664.

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  • “Unlike other gaming or auction sites, Zookt…
    • Adds a new dimension by letting people know the odds, know the competition and know what they’re playing for
    • Adds a fun prize in the product you choose to play for and compete to win
    • Allows you to choose games you like and based on your feedback, we will keep on adding new games”

So, here’s what I don’t understand or what I haven’t seen – the odds. What are the odds? Just knowing how many people are in the “bingo” game with you? Are they real people? Not saying they’re not, just questions that need to be asked.

“What is Zookt?

  • Zookt is about choice – You can chose to continue building your points towards getting your item or, just playing for it, or a combination of both.
  • Zookt is about selection – You have access to thousands of products.
  • Zookt is a social experience – You play against other people, and can share your experience with friends and followers
  • Zookt is exciting – You get to build your Reward points while having fun playing Our games (earning reward points does not have to be only about completing third party surveys or playing affiliate games) 

So what do you think of Zookt? Would you play there?

 

Join the new and improved Penny Auction Watch forum and discuss Zookt.com and all other social gaming and penny auction sites with us.

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