What? You didn't take 1 in a million odds because? The challenge was free. I took the challenge (and lost). To dismiss the challenge because of the long odds is silly. You left a free lunch on the table.
Elsewhere in this discussion someone posted this link [1] which claims that
Odds are that Buffett’s bracket isn’t worth your time,
however. Having a 1-in-7.4 billion chance of winning a
billion dollars is worth the equivalent of 14 cents.
That’s before accounting for taxes
I understand why you entered. It's for the same reason people play the lottery. People value a large payoff much more highly than a small one, even if the odds are worse for the big payoff.
I.e. for many people it's not worth betting $2 for a 1:2 chance of winning $4. That won't be a life changing event. But people are willing to bet $2 for a 1:175,223,510 chance of winning perhaps $100,000,000, even though those odds are much worse. That's how Powerball makes money. BTW I do bet on Powerball once in a while.
In my case I figured it wasn't worth betting $0.14 (because I knew it would take more than that of my time) to win $1,000,000,000.
It's not actually a 1 in a million chance though. It's more like 1 in 9.2 quintillion. I'd argue for many the time it takes to enter is worth more than those odds, not to mention giving up all the personal info to Quicken loans and Yahoo.
You appear to be discrediting opportunity costs (could those 30 minutes of researching brackets be better spent doing something practical?) and privacy costs (I'm sure Buffet's entries required a certain amount of personal information.)
