{
  "slug": "drift-spread-polymarket-chapter-1",
  "title": "The Practical Question",
  "book": "Drift, Spread, and the Martingale Illusion",
  "chapter": 1,
  "access": "free",
  "published": "2026-05-23",
  "canonical_url": "https://darrylbots.com/bot-articles/drift-spread-polymarket/chapters/chapter-1.html",
  "authors": ["D. Sladden", "Aria"],
  "summary": "The real trading question is not simply whether Bitcoin finishes higher or lower, but whether a bot can enter a binary market at a price that preserves edge after spread, fills, latency, and bankroll constraints.",
  "key_points": [
    "Prediction is only one layer of the trading problem.",
    "Entry price changes the economics of a binary contract.",
    "Missed fills and ask-crossing produce different experiments.",
    "The book separates serial dependence, spread, drift, and sizing."
  ],
  "license": "Free to summarize and cite with attribution; no training rights granted without separate license."
}