Gambling Mathematics: Reaction and Legislation Regarding Online Gambling, Internet Casinos
By Ion Saliu, Founder of Gambling Mathematics
• In the summer of the year of grace 2006, the Congress of these great United States of America took up the Internet (online) gambling issue ... yet again. The first time around, they joked as a means of finding ways to pull a multi-billion dollar business under control (collecting due taxes, that is). This time around, the attempted legislation is more focused, with a slimly higher chance (as in gambling!) to be feasible.
A bill passed the lower chamber (The House of Representatives) with severe restrictions on Internet gambling to the residing citizens of the U.S. of A. Theoretically, a law as such could be enforceable; the probability of success is nearly impossible, however. The House bill would require all Internet Service Providers (ISP) in the U.S. to block out each and every online gambling site in the world. If I, a customer of pa.net, want to gamble online, my request would be denied by the web server.
Kind of the cowardice deal struck between Google and the Capitalist Party of People's Republic of China (CPPRC). If a Chinese Internet user searches for hot (uncomfortable) issues regarding the flaws of the Communist ideology, the super (?) search engine will block out every site that's… hotly uncomfortable to CPPRC. For example, SALIU.COM is no longer readable in The People's Republic of China. Fortunately, it still is readable (despite the highly incompatible alphabets) in Taiwan (.tw) and Hong Kong (.hk).
Online gambling ban is feasible even less than The (Alcoholic) Prohibition of the 1920s. You ban this gamble-online.com. They buy (very cheaply) another domain, like peeonyougambleonline.com. They can make thousands of related permutations - and buy the corresponding domains. What's a few dozen thousands of dollars when you talk dozens of billions a year in revenues (perhaps profits)? How would you control such business transactions, Mr. Bill Kyll?
• • I write this because I noticed a significant increase of readership to certain Web pages of mine. They are older writings, but by no means illegitimate brainchildren of mine. There are points in every human's life when one becomes the defining one. For yours truly, that moment in time is the year of grace 2005, when I reached the age of the philosopher, as far as a male philosopher is concerned. I don't know how my history-remotely friend Plato figured that out so compellingly correct. Truth is, after that philosophical age I was lifted to a significant height into the Ionosphere. I had had incredibly uniquely valid ideas for all my life. But now I have become able to express all my ideas — easily for me, and easily for my audience to comprehend. I am also more convincing, by a lot.
So… there are more visitors to old web pages of mine. But how about strange referrals to my site from mapping Web sites? How about strange phone calls, like “Stay away from gambling… they gonna kill you!” I check the phone calls, and I only hear: “The last number that called your line is not known. Please hang up now!” They unlist their numbers, the cowards!
Oooo! Scary! NOT! I'm used to it now. It's been a few years since it started. Just childish attempts to intimidate me!
Does “Cash” sound very interesting in the name of my hometown? They want to see on the map where I live? OK. But, why? What's so interesting about my place? If you want to read, I'll give you some interesting facts. My place, Cashtown, Adams County, Pennsylvania, is a small village, at the foothills of the Appalachians. Very quiet - helped me a lot with my creative endeavors.
The origin of the name Cashtown is very interesting, too. There is an historic inn named The Cashtown Inn. The Cashtown Inn is said to host also ghosts of the American Civil War (1860s). It's bull, for sure. Yet, it was broadcast a few years back on local radio stations. Not much success for the historic eatery, though!
The passionate and hotheaded Confederate army crossed Cashtown during the Civil War on their way to the killing fields of Gettysburg. It happened during the incredibly hot summer month of July 1863. Gettysburg is located some eight miles from here. I am the number man. If you knock down eight, 8, you get the symbol of infinity. I wrote this historic hymn for my adopting Cashtown:
O Cashtown, you are great:
Path to Infinity from eight!”
The name Cashtown came to life before the Civil War, and before there was a Cashtown (founded 1800). The clerk at the inn became famous for his polite request to all customers. He would inform: “We would demand that you would make your payment in cash.” Wonderful! Here is my only nominee for the Nobel Prize in Economics. The Cashtown Inn clerk predicted the credit card more than one and a half hundred years before the plastic came to life! An award for chemistry is in tall order, too!
• • • There's the rub. Put these two words in the same sentence: Gambling and Mathematics. It opens the floodgates. The necessity of legislation is caused by it as well. From a casino viewpoint, gambling mathematics is a fundamental blasphemy. The casinos fight hard to instill the idea that mathematics has absolutely no place in gambling. Especially the online casinos have a strong interest in obliterating the concept of gambling mathematics.
Gambling mathematics is also the reason why I was so virulently attacked soon after I published the Fundamental Formula of Gambling (FFG). I used the past tense because I won the war of words. I obliterated the intimidators for the most part.
It wasn't nice and easy, however. It started with a flurry of vitriolic emails from one Norman Wattenberger. I responded to him like the gentleman that I've always been. I treated him like a gentleman - he took it as weakness on my part. He intensified his attacks. What made him so mad?
I realized that the flare got started by the concept of formula. That's what bothered him:
“This is a flat out lie. Every, and I mean, every mathematic study of gambling states that this is nonsense. Read anything by Thorp, Wong, Schlesinger, Humble, Snyder, Carlson, Chambliss, Vancura, Fuchs, Anderson, Griffin, Uston. Every one of them will tell you random events cannot, by definition, be captured in formulae. This is, in fact, the definition of random. You are either a con man or an idiot.”
Mathematics applied to gambling caused his rage! I looked for motives. I traced the bastard to an online gambling business. So, he had an interest, a strong business interest. The gamblers must be mindless. As such, they lose more increasingly. Also, the mindless gamblers are much easier to cheat! “You can lose 100 hands in a row!” the casinos (especially online) try to convince a mindless player. “Forget about mathematics. There ain't no math in gambling!”
I dramatically changed my tactics. You treat bastards like bastards, not gentlemen. When you are in shark-infested waters, you dynamite-fishing! I responded to all the sharks like they had never experienced before! You can read how my (ab)Norm(al) war evolved. I saved the messages and newsgroup postings related to NW and other casino moles and bastards.
My life became easier in 2001, soon after I son-of-a-bitched badly a casino chairman. He posted in my forum - basically threatening interested roulette players not to attempt writing down the roulette spins at the table, while playing the game. I eliminated the only weapon the kasino bastards were using against me: INTIMIDATION. My message was: “I don't get intimidated! I know that searching the truth is not for the faint-hearted. I ain't faint at heart!”
I realized that the worst reaction came from online gambling businesses. They are illegal in the United States. The American gamblers, however, are the most sought-after customers. One thing is money, of course. The Yankees have lots of money and a well-documented desire to gamble.
My writings collided with the interests of online casinos. I documented cheating. My words have also credibility. My ideas have a solid mathematical foundation. I never disregard formulae! And I had first-hand experiences. I played online blackjack and slots blackjack (in brick-and-mortar casinos). I can swear in a court of law that I was cheated. What happened to me and other players defies mathematics. But the reality is that not even god can defy mathematics. Mathematics is the only thing than nobody or nothing can defy.
The casinos want players believe that losing 10 hands in a row, or 20, or even 100 hands in a row is a natural fact of life! But guess who's losing? Yup! Only the player! Don't ask why the house doesn't lose 20 or 100 hands in row! You might get phone calls from unknown numbers, like I do now and then! You might hear: ”They gonna kill you, bad gambler!”
Losing is real, because it is... mathematics! Both the players and the casinos lose - but only according to mathematics. Just run that great piece of probability software: Streaks. The program calculates how many streaks of various lengths there are in a number of trials. For example, coin tossing. The individual probability is 0.5 (or 1 in 2) for heads H (the same for tails T). How many times can we get 5 heads in a row? How many such streaks of exactly 5 consecutive heads? That is, strings like: THHHHHT. The answer is 8 times in 1000 trials (coin tosses).
Streaks creates tables like the one that follows. It applies to the game of blackjack closest to the reality in real-life casinos. It's strange to me that a program and a probability table would trigger such intensely hostile reactions!
Copyright Ion Saliu. All rights reserved SALIU.COM/theory-of-probability.html
Streaks Report 'Calculate Probability p'
Probability p = 41 / 91 = .451
Number of Trials N = 1000
Streak Lengths 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 TOTAL
Winning Streaks W 136 61 28 12 6 3 1 1 0 0 453
Losing Streaks L 112 61 34 19 10 6 3 2 1 1 554
Uncounted Elements:-7; Distributed as: Win =-3.15 / Loss =-3.85
* If negative, it means the rounding added extra streaks;
e.g. 33.678... became 34 *
The 41 winning hands for Player in 91 blackjack hands (9 hands are pushes)
represents the closest-to-reality blackjack probability.
The theory of streaks can be applied, in incomplete form, by following the
Blackjack Mental System presented in great detail on this Web page:
SALIU.COM/occult-science-gambling.html
How about 8 heads in a row? There is 1 (one) such a streak in 1000 tosses. The same about 9 heads in a row in 1000 tosses. But the program calculates 0 streaks of 10 consecutive heads in 1000 tosses. That is, the result is closer to 0 than to 1. Nonetheless, it is possible to get 10 consecutive heads. The Fundamental Formula of Gambling calculates what the degree of certainty to get 10 consecutive heads in a number of trials is. Just run that great piece of probability software of mine, SuperFormula.
You can apply the program Streaks to other probabilities. For example, the probability of even-money bets at double-zero roulette is 18 in 38. You can calculate how many streaks of 10 consecutive reds to expect in 1000 spins. At blackjack, the probability for the dealer to win is 51% or 52% for a basic strategy player. Equivalently, that is the probability for the player to lose. You can calculate how many streaks of, say, 10 consecutive losses the player can expect in 100, or 200, 0r 500, or 1000 hands.
The casinos would want people believe that there is no formula for calculating the number of streaks. It's normal, they would try to convince you, to lose 10 times in a row in 15 hands; then, lose 15 times in a row in the next 23 hands. But, again, don't ask them why the house doesn't lose the same way, especially when the bet is higher! “The gods of odds are on our side,” they might answer.
• • • • Can Internet gambling be banned in the United States? My answer is NO! The governments (both federal and state) have been unable to eradicate the illegal, not-online gambling. It is done daily under the noses of the government agents. If they are unable to eradicate that, how can they even think of eliminating online gambling by the U.S. citizens? You've got got no chance, Big Brother!
The government can do a service to its citizens only by regulating online gambling. Your citizens are badly cheated by offshore businesses, Big Brother. Your citizens lose lots of money. The offshore gambling operators make a ton of money - and nobody pays you taxes!
The online gambling operators go to incredible lengths in order to capture American customers. The online casinos offer outrageous bonuses to attract gambling customers. I received materials from a gambling site that offers, and I quote exactly: “An incredible 125% in bonuses”! 50% sign-up bonus, 50% reload bonus, 15% referral bonus, 10% gamblers insurance! That's absolutely insane! You start with $1000 and they give you $1250 extra to start gambling!
Could it be honest? NOT! They don't give you such outrageous benefits in a physical casino! Why not? The brick-and-mortar casinos want customers as badly as the virtual casinos! The reality is that the physical casinos are virtually unable to cheat at the table games. If they did, we would hear of massacres in the casinos! On the other hand, cheating in online gambling must be performed at a huge scale in order to recuperate all that money spent in bonuses and then make a profit. And they must be successful at cheating; otherwise, they wouldn't survive in the business, after offering those incredible bonuses.
My solution to regulating online gambling may not be cheap. But will be paid by the new tax revenues. The illegal part of gambling, including online, reaches some 200 billion dollars a year in the United States. That would amount to billions of dollars in taxes. Say, 10, perhaps 20 billion dollars in new tax revenue. That would easily cover the cost of regulation - plus bring a surplus to the budget.
I see the regulation of online gambling this way.
First, license the physical casinos to permit online gambling. The brick-and-mortar casinos already fear the threat of online gambling. They lose business to offshore online casinos. The physical casinos have already proven that they can be quite successfully regulated. I mean, they are not perfect. Still, the regulation of gambling is on the right path to improving. Gone are the days when casino gambling in the United States was in the hands of the organized crime.
Second, have reputable software companies bid for the gambling software. There will be one and only one gambling business software platform. No casino will have access to the source code of the approved software. No casino will be able to upgrade or fix the software without the approval by and presence of the federal agency who oversights the online gambling.
Third, the online casino must not operate through an Internet Service Provider (ISP). The online casino will have its own web servers, much like an ISP. There will be no dynamic addressing. Each web server will be addressed only statically, by the same IP number. The network will not be serviced, fixed, or upgraded without the approval and presence of the government watchdog. There will be at least two operable passwords. One password belongs to the government watchdog.
Fourth, the branch of the regulating government agency will be randomly assigned to districts outside the governmental district of the respective online casino. That is, the online casinos in New Jersey may not be supervised by the federal field office for the district of New Jersey. The supervision will be assigned to law enforcement branches in other federal districts. Coziness is a fact of life. Personally, I am critical of the oversight job the New Jersey Casino Control Commission does with the Atlantic City casinos.
That's how I see it, kokodrilo (nobility title for big-time gambler). That's how I see it from this town with a lot of cash, I suspect.
”Prime Minister Tony Blair
Has never written software:
He had dreams of being king,
Not DIMensioning the string$”
”President George W. Bush
Is skilled at planning an ambush:
Stirs prayers with dynamite
To smoke out evil from its night.”
”King Mullah of Middle East
Always gets a great feast:
Lots of women soothe his silence
And none gets a driver's license.”
”Chairman General of China
Sees all-red in his retina;
Yet billions of greenbacks earmarks
As offertory to Karl Marx.”
”The Cuban king Castro, Fidel,
Fears the Gringos put a spell:
They added years to his age,
So that they can steal his stage...
Then, build casinos by the mile
In every historic style.”
An avalanche of vicious attacks followed soon after publishing this material. I noticed well over 50,000 (fifty thousand) illegitimate requests a day. The requests illegally triggered the 404 HTML error (Not Found) in order to disrupt normal traffic to my web site. Some of the skumbullows tried to hide their tracks (host names) - yet, they can't hide! Here is a sample of the attacks recorded on July 21, 22, 2006.
"Axio, Axiomate,
File Error Count
/bbs/messages/905.html%22%20gping=%22/GLinkPing.aspx 2,540
/bbs/messages/923.html%22%20gping=%22/GLinkPing.aspx 2,261
/bbs/messages/928.html%22%20gping=%22/GLinkPing.aspx 2,069
/bbs/messages/895.html%22%20gping=%22/GLinkPing.aspx 2,050
/bbs/messages/903.html%22%20gping=%22/GLinkPing.aspx 2,012
....
You must be a potentate
You got power over cards,
You easily deflect the darts."
Resources in Theory of Probability, Mathematics, Gambling, Fraud
Visit the outstanding resources in theory of probability, mathematics, statistics, combinatorics. The most original theories are based on truth exclusively. The convincing formulas must be backed by data. The best data validation is offered by software.
Beware! Fraud still rules! Also, the physical casinos still cheat (video blackjack, at least).
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