I'm going to assume you couldn't charge to play, otherwise you'd certainly run afoul of gambling laws, so it'd have to be funded by advertising revenue, right? Perhaps show a full-on thirty-second video ad before you get to play?
If the economics of that work out, then why should it be an iPad-only affair? Why not do it web-based so everyone can participate (and also avoid whatever issues Apple might have with it being in their app store?)
Now I'm not sure the economics of it could ever work since the amount an advertiser will pay is pretty small meaning the prizes are either too small to bother with or too rare to have a significant chance of winning regardless of how popular the site gets, but hey, if you can figure out a way to do it...
Yea, I thought of this (I'm sure others have, too) a few months ago and dismissed it after a few back of the envelope calculations made it clear the business model just wasn't there.
Could have the interstitial ad after the scratch but before the result is shown? People would be paying more attention then. Work in a survey question even.
then the prices are somewhat higher than I thought -- anywhere from $15 to $100 CPM, or between 1.5 and 10 cents per ad view. I suppose if you were selling at the high end of this range you could fund some reasonable prizes -- how about a one in ten thousand chance of winning an iPad and a one in ten chance of winning a voucher redeemable for a chocolate bar at your local 7/11? At the low end of the range the value proposition becomes a lot iffier, though.
My understanding of the App Store policies is that they prohibit applications where you pay to buy a ticket and then give a prize away.
I am a bit surprised that this policy hasn't been amended to add "…unless you sell the tickets with in-app purchasing." But, I suppose that gambling falls under the same "family-friendly" restriction that porn apps do.
3.3.17 Your Application may include promotional sweepstake
or contest functionality provided that You are the sole
sponsor of the promotion and that You and Your Application
comply with any applicable laws.
Couldn't the issue mentioned by the comment be addressed pretty easily? Just have a blog or twitter client that announces the giveaways as well; "Giving away: A shiny foo! To enter, use our iPad app!"
If you're not going to implement something tell the community. Let us vote it up if we think it's good.