A High-tech Wheel of Fortune 371
tcp writes "The BBC is reporting that the London police have detained three people, for allegedly beating the roulette wheel at a London casino. Using a cell phone, a computer and a laser scanner, they were able to predict where the roulette ball would land, winning more than 1.5 million dollars in the process. This technique was not new, and as I recall was the plot of a movie once. The suspects have not been charged yet. The UK has been behind in bringing their gambling laws to deal with new hi-tech threats unlike the US and Las Vegas."
Why were they detained ? (Score:5, Insightful)
I know... (Score:5, Insightful)
If you can find a way to improve your chances, it's probably against the rules. The only game I'm aware of that has a better than 50% chance of winning (against the house, that is) is blackjack.
Winning big (and often) on roulette raises eyebrows right away. They could have at least tried to beat a game that wasn't quite so obvious.
Re:Las Vegas (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I know... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Well you know one thing (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Why were they detained ? (Score:5, Insightful)
But, they didn't cheat. The croupier turned the wheel and released the ball. All they did was "predict", albiet with the help of some equipment. Isn't that what gambling is about? Predicting?
As the article states, the casino can avoid prediction, by simply spinning the wheel faster.
Re:Why were they detained ? (Score:5, Insightful)
I have mod points, but I feel the need to reply here, though it sounds like flamebait.
The 3 other "obvious" emaples you cite are cheating - they circumvent the rules of the guessing competition. Why do you label the actions mentioned in the story as cheating? No rules have been circumvented. All that is being done is making use of the information which is available to everyone in a clever way.
A similar thing happens with card counting in blackjack - all you do is play the game in a smart way instead of blindly guessing. However, the casinos don't want people to do anything other than blindly guess because it means the odds can be tipped in their favour instead of in favour of the house.
Re:Physics can solve anything if it has all the in (Score:5, Insightful)
Unfortunately though, we live in an analogue World. It's impossible to specify the exact position of anything in relation to anything else
read "the eudaemonic pie" by thomas a. bass (Score:5, Insightful)
As an aside... If you really want to play an advantage game in a casino, try a game where you don't play against the house. Like poker.
Fuck Em (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I know... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Physics can solve anything if it has all the in (Score:4, Insightful)
The most famous example is the weather, were a butterfly flapping it's wings in the Amazone could theoretically cause a violent storm in Brittain. This mathematician in the first Jurassic parc film also tries to explain it, using drops flowing down from a hand.
I think balls in a bin are a chaotic process.
Re:Physics can solve anything if it has all the in (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Why were they detained ? (Score:3, Insightful)
sports betting is predicting.
casino games are all about 'random'(well, unless you count counting cards in blackjack). at least they're supposed to be(and in some places, this is relevant for taxation as there is no skill involved).
roulette is a fine casino game in the sense that it's possible to choose quite a variety of what chances you're wishing to take(not that it matters anyway).
Re:Why were they detained ? (Score:3, Insightful)
Counting cards is hard, and a lot harder when you are actually in the casino than when you are practicing at home.
Most card counters are easily spotted, but only the few who are able to win get banned.
Re:Why were they detained ? (Score:3, Insightful)
It is usually illegal to use a "device" other than your brain to help you make bets in a casino.
It's cheating in the same way that it would be cheating if you used a hidden computer to win a chess tournament.
Re:Why were they detained ? (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually I don't even think all of those other methods of cheating are actually cheating.
Cheating involves breaking the rules of the game.
The 1st example is cheating because you the rules specifically forbid you from circumventing your opponents ability to prevent you from seeing his cards.
The 2nd example is both cheating and not cheating. A device that influences the roll of the dice is cheating, a device that helps you predict the roll of the dice is not.
The 3rd example is also clearly cheating because hacking a slot machine is clearly changing the rules of the game. However having a device that could let you know if a slot machine was close to paying off would not be cheating.
Mike
Re:Idiots. (Score:3, Insightful)
Jedidiah.
Re:Idiots. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Why were they detained ? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Why were they detained ? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Why were they detained ? (Score:4, Insightful)
Casinos are the suxx0rz!!!11111 (Score:3, Insightful)
Fscking casinos.
Re:I know... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:The technology involved... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Why were they detained ? (Score:2, Insightful)
In the early days of vegas it was not illegal, partly because nobody really thought of it.
Using a computer to win a chess tournament is different.. because the game of chess is completely about mind-vs-mind.
In a casino.. the casino tries to portray the games as perfectly random.. that's why it's called gambling. IN a few games, however, it is possible for the observant calculating person to gain an edge on the house, and suddenly not be gambling, but working. Obviously the casinos do what they can to demonize this, and call it cheating.
Re:Information and games of 'skill' (Score:3, Insightful)
It would also allow the casino to "cheat". They know the speed the wheel is spinning and they choose where the ball is released, so using the same technique as the "cheaters" (well solving for a different unknown - but they can precompute everything since they control the inputs) they can release the ball to minimise their gains.
I suspect the authorities that monitor things like machine odds would have issues with that.
Re:Why were they detained ? (Score:3, Insightful)
They are using public information available to everyone. That is not cheating.
They are in no way influencing the outcome for everyone else.
Using hidden cameras to view other player's poker hands is cheating.. the game is based on the fact that you can't see other players cards.
Unethical? Casinos are unethical in the first place, many would argue.
Counting cards at blackjack is not cheating. Neither is using the same system with a computer instead of your brain... however, the latter is illegal in Nevada. It is still not, however, cheating.
It may very well be that the law where these guys pulled this stunt has nothing in it that bars observing the game or computer assistance. So long as they in no way tampered with the outcome of the game, it's not cheating.
Re:Why were they detained ? (Score:4, Insightful)
For a casino that uses and 8 deck shoe (+.58% H/A) and allows doubles after splitting (-.14% H/A) you are playing a game with a
While playing this shoe, if you use the high/low count system, and have a true count of +2 you are actually playing at a
There are thousands of books on counting out there, I suggest that you check out a few and see what can really be done.
Re:Casino games ... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Physics can solve anything if it has all the in (Score:2, Insightful)
You are correct about the uncertainty of the universe, but some things are *very* certain. The bouncing of balls in a bin is one of them.
The poster above is correct, since this is a classical system. If you read in all the ball positions with an accurate sensor of some type (X-Ray tomography, like a CAT scan, comes to mind) and then solve the simulation numerically, taking into account gravity, air movement, collision dynamics, etc, etc, (all these things are very well understood for classical systems like this) and you can predict the fall of the balls.
Re:Are oppotunity costs similar to opportunity cos (Score:4, Insightful)
Its obviously true that over a long enough period of time, all of the games in a casino have a probability spread that benefits the casino over the player (although some games are as low as 51% to the casino). However, the very same math shows us that at different times the results of gambling will favor either the casino or the gambler (that is, at point A the gambler may be low, at B the gambler be high, whereas at C he's way down). The real trick to gambling (and I know, incidentally, two men who are professional poker players, i.e. they make all their income gambling) is to recognize when you're too deep in to recoop your losses (and thus, to bail out), but also to recognize when you're sufficiently high up so that you're statistically likely not to get any better. The good gamblers know how to quit, and in doing so they ride the same probabilities that the casino does.
Re:Why were they detained ? (Score:2, Insightful)
afaik, counting cards is perfectly legal. It is also perfectly legal for any given casino to throw you off their property if they suspect you of counting cards. They can throw you out for no good reason at all...it's their property, after all.
Casinos LOVE this type of thing. (Score:5, Insightful)
Why?
Because the PRESS claims that with a little smarts, the average guy can beat the casino! If you're really smart and really quiet about it, you can beat 'em and become rich beyond your wildest dreams!
Therefore, you get a lot of quasi-smart losers into the casinos, all who have the fantisy of "out-smarting Vegas". Those people proceed to lose all kinds of money as they "hone their smarts".
This is exactly how casinos attract people who are "too smart" to waste their time gambling.
Card counting, roulette prediction, psuedo-random numbers of elecontrics-based slot machines - they're all an ADVERTISEMENT designed to attract those who imagine that they're super-smart enough to tilt the odds. Of course, it simply isn't true.
The casinos in Vegas would love you to come to Vegas and attempt to put your super-smart skills into action... just as long as other players don't see you "attempting to cheat" - the casinos don't want you to scare any other customers away.
Re:Why were they detained ? (Score:2, Insightful)
The ball speed is irrelevant because the speed necessary to hold it up to the inner rim is a constant. No matter how hard you snap it, it will eventually drop to that same rate, after going around the rim a few extra times.
Different dealers use different balls too -- usually a larger ball for someone with bigger hands. This has an effect on the hotspot as well, but this likely is of the same nature as the speed factor and will just slide the hotspot down or back a number. It seems to me that the smaller, lighter ball takes more odd hops and tends to end up further downrange, similar to a fast wheel.
The obstacle to doing this without assistance is, of course, the mathematics. I have no doubt some people can pull it off, but they're going to be a very small group in relation to the thousands of suckers who sit down at the table every day. These people got busted because they used technological assistance, and (probably more importantly) played it huge and made it rise above the background noise. Had they won 10,000 pounds, I doubt it would have aroused nearly so much suspicion.
Mal-2