Yep, you're right. As I mentioned in the post, I use the word "business" liberally for lack of a better term. If there had been a future for the product I would have iterated, created a web app, etc, but I decided it wasn't worth the effort. As far as the lessons, figuring out how something fails is strongly tied to figuring out why it succeeds.
Good decision. It seems like you have a lot of talent and can make a LOT more money in a vertical other than poker. Also, it will probably be more enjoyable in another domain.
My 2 cents. We tried to a business in the lottery space once because it seemed there were no good tech companies there, there was a ton of money at stake, and lots of innovation to be done. But after a short time it was really demoralizing to be in that type of vertical. Fail fast and move on!
