Weve designed the contract so a few key constants, including the rate rake, will be able to be adjusted over time. Limits to the rate of this change are built into the contract and changes will always apply to future, never current games. The contract will also have a "nuclear option", a function that, if we call it, will prevent even us from making any future changes to these constants including the rake.
You make a good point that as more PopCoins are mined the incentive for new players to enter the game will decrease; as this happens likely the rake will be lowered.
Were also of course hopeful that by the time a large majority of PopCoins have been mined the game will have a healthy player base and rounds will be generating pots large enough that play will largely come from organic interest in these pot sizes and not only a desire to mine PopCoin.
Also as a technicality, all PopCoins will never be completely mined. The rate PopCoins are issued at will decrease as more are issued, but this rate will only approach 0, never quite reach it.
Thank you for that explanation again, I do think it is one of the more interesting concepts to be introduced lately, but I will say that the early people, like me, if I plan on joining, will definitely want to own the PopCoins and those that come later may not be as incentivized to join for the lack of rake shares/popcoins.
August 20 2 UTC for launch is about 18 hours from now, looks really exciting. How will we know it has launched? When that ETH pot shows positive? Will we be able to deposit from an exchange or casino or must we stick to MetaMask?