“You have more chance of being struck by a lightning than winning that game show.”

I was talking with my sisters a while ago. They were excited by the price of the game show in GMA Gobingo was stepping up. They were playing the play-from-home show since its launched and I’m always amazed by how they are hooked.

When my youngest sister said what would she would do with the money if she won that P150,000 cash prize. All sorts of things pop out. The usual girl thing, shopping and all. And I said that you have more chance of being struck by a lightning than winning that game show. And I said, do you want to know how much chance do you have to win Gobingo?

It’s really easy, the formula would be :

( Your # of Cards in hand / # of people playing ) * 100

So she have 5 Gobingo cards. I said divide it by the number of people playing Gobingo. There are 60Million people in the Philippines. We assume all people in the Philippines are playing at least 1 card. Not to mention anyone can get a hold of more than 1 card. So by her chance to win with 5 cards is

Chance to win Gobingo : 1 : 12,000,000

Chance to be struck by a lightning (US probability) : 1 : 280,000

This is only when every game there is a winner. If we take into account that sometimes there are no winners in the contest. Now to know the chance to win in Gobingo taking to account the number of combinations.

There are 3 studio contestants each having 15 numbers. 3 * 15 = 45

Note that the number of digits will not repeat. How many chances to win?

Get the factorial of 45. (45!) = 1.2e56 (Thats 1.5 times 10 raised to 56. That’s 1.5 + 56 zeros.

Since there is only 1 winning combination the chance to win Gobingo is 1 : 1.2e56

Now we know that its a lot riskier to gamble and join game shows than to really put up a business. In business its almost a 50% 50% chance since the choices are only “did you made the right decision, Yes or No”.

Gobingo is a fun game and is intendedly only for entertainment. I have nothing against the game. In fact, I like it. We should still remember that the money we spend to get the Gobingo cards should be a secondary choice after our primary and basic needs.

But still, its a fun show and you get the chance to play bingo with the whole family.