Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Roulette machines: the crack cocaine of gambling (Guardian)
Article in the G2 section of today's Guardian:
Tags for Forum Posts: Betting, FOBT, Fixed Odds Betting Terminals, shops
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by John McMullan on
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Wit? Clive, I don't know why you bother. The readership has gone south obviously since FOBTs were big news.
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Permalink Reply by maggie on
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Another interesting article in the Guardian with a different take on betting and drug dealing........http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/nov/08/gambling-machines-dr...
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Almost ripped word for word from years of debate on HoL... No?
They missed the even easier trick of how you can go into one bookie and bet one way, the one next door and bet the other. Arsenal to win, Arsenal to lose. But of course you can't do that all day.
Also I think it exposes a problem in the technology. These machines are supposed to be a "view" of a remote game somewhere else. I would argue that if it's not possible for two machines to bet on the same game running "remotely" at the same time then the technology used fails to meet the requirements of the legislation.
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fpr Some serious 'projecting' going on here - my advice would be to start a sentence like this with 'in my humble opinion...' ... .. ..''Some times you get a Muslim bloke that comes in, gambles a bit to scout out the weak ones, gives them some spending money, when that's gone offers Allah As a solution and probably eventually from there grooms them for something more sinister.''
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Again, the fights are over a particular machine. They are primed to "pay out" in a way that makes them addictive so someone who has just put £500 into a machine and lost it all knows that if he puts another £100 in it may pay out big. Does this meet the requirement of a "remote game going on at another location" when the payouts are tied to behaviour on a particular machine?
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OK, gamblers believe that certain machines are more likely to pay out than other machines. Watch how they shun a machine that has just paid out big in favour of one that has not paid out for a while.
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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For people who've missed it, there's an article in today's Guardian (17 October 2015) by Michal Safi.
"Ka-Ching: pokies documentary reveals what makes the machines so addictive", could do more than confirm people's worst fears about gambling machines. It claims that very sophisticated psychological manipulation is being practised on the punters.The Australian research echoes issues in the UK. For example the idea that gamblers are solely "responsible". So it always irritates me when I see brightly coloured posters in the windows of betting shops where - as in the photo below - a betting shop presents themselves as wanting their customers to "gamble responsibly" and "stay in control". Safi's article about an ABC documentary "Ka Ching? Pokie Nation" suggests this is exactly what the machines are carefully designed to avoid.
John McMullan raised an interesting question in this thread back in 2013. He asked what was the point of discussing the issue when it was no longer in the public spotlight. As he put it, "the readership has gone south obviously since FOBTs were big news."
Well, perhaps the ABC documentary will shine a new temporary spotlight and again make this big news.
But there's another reason. Which is that somebody has to keep raising it. Especially since we have so-called "regeneration" plans and reports which appear to substantially ignore gambling. And the use of gambling to launder drugs money and other criminal funds. For example, I couldn't find any mention of gambling or bookies in the report "It Took Another Riot" chaired by Stuart Lipton. This fundamentally flawed document appears to remain the blueprint for the Council's failing strategy. Similarly, I found only two brief references to drugs - both superficial.
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