Over the weekend, we launched the Genius Picks service. This is a major milestone for WinTheTrophy.  

We founded WinTheTrophy upon the theory that the best sports pickers in the world were among the every-day sports fans. What these sports enthusiasts needed was a platform like WinTheTrophy through which they could reveal their inner sports betting genius. For example, maybe you’re terrible at picking winners in the NFL overall, but perhaps you’re a demigod when it comes to over/under bets in the NFC East. Without WinTheTrophy, it’s tedious to track these statistics. We've given you a free and automated way to track your personal betting trends, results, strengths and weaknesses.

After analyzing hundreds of thousands of picks using our proprietary algorithms, you've proven that you can beat the oddsmakers on a consistent basis. And, IMHO, you've demonstrated that you're the best sports pickers in the world.

So with that, we offer the world the Genius Picks service, powered by you -- WinTheTrophy users. With this service, if you achieve (and maintain) genius status, you can earn redeemable currency. And (we hope) a lot of it. We're giving all geniuses a 40% share of the Genius Picks sales proceeds. Payments will be distributed via credits that can be redeemed at the store. We realize that you don't necessarily want to redeem credits for a custom avatar, so we'll be adding highly-valued items to the store shortly. Things you'll really want.

Over the next several months, we plan to aggressively market the Genius Picks service. We need people to buy the Genius Picks so that you can benefit. However, we can only do so much. We need you to brag about your genius status and promote the service. This is your site -- your platform through which to show the world that you're the best sports picker money can buy.

Want the new iPad 2? Got lots of friends? If you do, then simply refer the most friends by 11:59 PM EST on April 17, 2011 -- and it's yours! Referring friends to WinTheTrophy is easy. In your profile, you’re assigned a dedicated 3-digit referral code. Give this code to your friends and ask them to enter it upon signing up. To make sharing easier, hover over your Jersey with the referral code in your profile. Copy the link and then share it with your friends! Few contest rules and notes:

• To get full credit for a referral, your friend must signup using your referral code and then activate his or her WinTheTrophy account.
• Prior referrals do not count towards your total referral count. For example, if you currently have 5 referrals, and you refer 75 new friends by April 17, your total contest referral count will be 75, not 80.
• Referring yourself under alias email accounts automatically disqualifies you!
• To be eligible to win, you must have a minimum of 10 referrals.
• The WinTheTrophy user with the most activated referrals at the end of the contest periods wins the iPad 2.
• We will ship the iPad 2 (free-of-charge) to the winner within 4 weeks after the contest period ends. (If you win, we'll contact you for your preferred shipping address.)
• The type of iPad 2 is the 16GB, Wi-Fi (retail price is $499).
• We reserve the right to modify this contest and its rules at our discretion. (We don't expect that we'll need to...it's just that our "lawyers" told us to say this!)

We will announce who the current contest referral leaders are every week. Stay tuned. Good luck!

There are currently several bugs and issues that we are working on the site, as part of our ongoing beta development:

• When you perform actions such as ordering item or deleting a comment, you're being forced to log-out.  We are currently working this one.
• Some of the profile pages are taking a long time to load.  We are in the process of optimizing the load time.
• Some users have had issues with the chips balance.  We've identified the issue and hope to have it resolved soon.
• Users are being award win streak trophies for making bets on the same game. The way this should work is that only unique bets count. We'll get this one addressed for sure.

We encourage you to, please, inform of us of any other issues. Appreciate your patience and ongoing support.  We are working hard to make this best experience possible.

This weekend the WinTheTrophy development team is gathering for three full days of product development.  There are a number of misc. features and bugs that we'll be working on, but most importantly we'll be focusing on:

• Genius Picks -- The site is finally at the point where we have enough users placing bets that we can start offering quality Genius Picks for sale.  If you're one of the site's geniuses, this means that you can get paid actual cash for your picks.  As part of the Genius Picks development, we'll be changing how the Genius Ladder works so that users can't rest on their laurels forever.  In other words, if you don't place so many bets over a certain period of time while maintaining your superior BetIQ, you lose your status.
• Free Cash Payouts -- While it may seem to be good to be true, we plan on allowing you to cash-out your positive accumulated net chips for real green.
• Facebook Integration -- This is something that the site is sorely missing.  We'll take some time to develop our Facebook integration strategy and to design how that integration will work.  Facebook integration will make it easier for your friends to sign-up.

I'm excited for the weekend to arrive so we can start grinding on three of our most-exciting features. Thanks for reading...now go place some bets!

The development team here at WinTheTrophy wrapped-up our second WTT Hackfest this weekend. Our focus over the past three days was on a new and upcoming feature called BetDuel. (Those users who attended the PUG a few months back received a preview of the mockup.)

We're really excited about this feature, as it will add direct, head-to-head competition to the site. You'll be able to challenge other users to see who can accumulate the most chips using just 1 bet, 3 bets, or multiple bets over a period of 7 days.

Look for this new feature within the next couple of weeks!

You may have noticed a new entrant in the weekly leaderboard this week, our first algorithmic bettor, the NBA Over/Under Bot. We'll be using this bot (and a few others over the coming weeks) to work out the kinks in the WinTheTrophy BetBot API.

The algorithm behind this first bot is incredibly simple, but we look forward to seeing what the developer community comes up with in terms of computer bettors and we are confident, that you, our human experts, will smite them all!

And don't worry, we're going to be setting up the system to be fair to both the human and computer players alike and to ensure you always know when you are going up against a computer. They'll have their own silicon ghetto.

Good luck! Take NBA Over/Under Bot down! Viva la flesh and blood!

Starting next Monday, Weekly Leaderboard Winners will be posted on the WinTheTrophy Twitter account. Follow us!

We’re currently addressing some issues with last week’s Weekly Leaderboard winner. We hope to announce the winner by tomorrow! Apologies and thanks for your patience.

So you’re sitting around watching your 29th sporting event in a row and you’ve been clicking back and forth between 8 games in 5 different sports and that still isn’t enough. Well, you may need a little medical help, but other than that you’re a perfect candidate for WinTheTrophy. In fact, even if you only watch an occasional sporting event, you’ll find this free fantasy sports betting site fun, engaging and challenging.

After you signup, you fill out your profile (optional) – and you’re ready to start picking. “But wait,” you say, “I have no understanding of sports wagering and don’t really care to learn.” In that case, WinTheTrophy has you covered with its approach to automatically interpreting the complex numerical nomenclature of sports handicapping. Behind the scenes at WinTheTrophy, the complex numerical valuations of a sports wager are analyzed and then translated into normal every-day language like “Huge Payout,” “Tiny Payout,” “Favorites,” and “Underdogs.” Sound easy? It is.

To place a bet, you just click on one of the buttons associated with the three different bet types: moneyline ("Who will win?"), point spread ("Who will cover?") and over/under ("How many total points?"). After you click the button, you then choose how many free chips you’d like to wager. Upon entering the amount, WinTheTrophy automatically calculates how many chips you will win and – if you think that is fair – you go ahead and confirm the wager.

After you have placed a bet, you can see your wager(s) on your personalized My Bets page, which allows you to review your selections, watch the scores in near real-time and see whether you have won, lost or pushed.

Bad week? No problem because each week your 1,000 free chips resets and a new contest for the Weekly Leaderboard begins. Each week you are automatically entered in the Weekly Leaderboard contest. And if you wager with skill and consistency, you have a good shot at victory, online accolades, a coveted virtual trophy and Points (virtual currency units).

Points are also accrued as you wager, make comments, post blog content, invite friends and so forth. In the future, WinTheTrophy will have a virtual store where you can redeem these Points for virtual goods, bonuses, skins, avatars and other items.

Another key feature of the WinTheTrophy is personal betting statistics. On your personalized “My Profile” page, you can see your cumulative wagering record in the 100+ categories WinTheTrophy tracks. With this information, you can identify your betting strengths and weaknesses, compare your skills against others and formulate personal betting techniques that might yield more winnings.

So no matter who you are, you can have fun and benefit from the features of WinTheTrophy. Follow your favorite team, make a wager (or two hundred) and sit back and watch your team, and know that you have a little extra incentive for them to win (or lose) or to score a lot (or a little). It’s always fun watching your favorite team but WinTheTrophy will make it even better.