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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Here's a nice, simple way to visualize some basic statistics:

Imagine you have a bag that contains 99 white marbles and 1 black marble. You get one chance to (blindly) pull a marble out of the bag. What are your odds of pulling the black marble on your one try? [b]1 in 100[/b].

Now imagine that you get to pull a marble out of the bag 12 times, but each time the bag is reset to 100 marbles. At first glance it may seem like it makes sense that you have a better chance of pulling the black marble if you get 12 tries. However, during each of those 12 tries, there are still 100 marbles, [b]so each draw is still a 1 in 100 chance of pulling the black marble[/b]. Get it?

Another simplified scenario is coin flips. You flip a coin 1 time and there is a 50/50 chance of heads or tails. Let's say you flip the coin 11 times and get heads each time. What is the chance of you getting tails on the 12th flip? It's still 50% despite the 11 previous heads. The outcome doesn't change based on the earlier coin flips.[/quote]

Your first claim is obviously incorrect and does nothing but confuse the whole issue.  You have a 1 in 100 chance of winning each of the 12 times you play, so your chances of winning at least one of the lotteries in 12 in 100.  If what you appear to claim is true -- your chances of winning remain 1 in 100 no matter how many times you play --  there would be no point in playing more than once, which is absurd.  Your second claim is, of course, trivially true but not really on point.

The reason all this is so confusing is that both sides have some truth on their side.  Statistically, the old and new systems will result in the same overall odds of winning a desirable spot assuming that you hold all of the variables constant -- the number of "good" spots are the same,  the numbers of children are the same, the number of people playing are the same, etc.  However, the new system is simpler and reveals to everyone much more quickly how small their chance were from the gitgo of winning a spot they really wanted.  The old system was better at keeping more people's hopes up for a longer time that they would come out a winner.  And hope is a thing with wings.
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