The 647th and final show has been posted on YouTube.

Interesting, sort of reminds me of those WWTBAM-licensed boxes of chocolate from the early 2000s.

The few minutes of web searching implies that it's an insurance product, so you would be paying an outside company to underwrite a policy that pays out in the event of the jackpot being won, presumably at a lower rate per annum than even the "cash option" value of the annuity. Once the conditions of the policy are met, it's up to the insurance company.

/OT but related: both big lottery jackpots are 30 payments with +5% per payment
//As of now, the first payment for the base Powerball jackpot ($20M) is like $301k; for Mega Millions (now $50M) it's $752k
///The $2.04 billion Powerball first payment would have been $30.7M, so like hitting the Powerball every year for 30 years

I've always wondered how secure annuities are.  I mean, lotteries are essentially run through the government, so I'd feel pretty safe with an annuity there.  But what about a private organization, such as a game show production company.  Not Fremantle necessarily, but a lesser one with fewer assets.  If I decide to produce The $1,000,000 Words Have Meanings, and it's a huge flop but seven people won the jackpot, can I declare bankruptcy and just not pay them the last 19 years of their winnings?

The obvious real-life example is Chance of a Lifetime, and from all indications all those folks did get paid.  I'm still interested in the hypothetical.

We had a lump sum vs. annuity conversation at a barbecue years ago when one of the lottery jackpots was incredibly high, and while everyone had their reasoning, one that I'd never considered came up when a family member who's notoriously bad with money mentioned always taking the lump sum. Almost immediately afterwards, someone else said "Maybe you should take the annuity, because even if you mess that money up, you still have 19 more chances to get it right!"

This is why I'd be inclined to take the annuity as well.