[ExI] gaming reports

[Damien Broderick]

On 6/30/2010 8:39 PM, Ross Evans wrote:

> Are the dice rolled the same number of times every year? The reels on
> the slot machines rolled the same number of times? Of course not, and
> that variation, is a major contributory factor to the year by year
> differences

Really? And how would that work?

Here's a much better account of slot machine mechanics, from a learned 
friend:

<In fact slot machines are not gambling devices, in the sense of playing 
odds, they are cash collection machines. Each slot is actually a 
stripped down computer with a cable link back to the corporate command 
and control center. The one I know best is International Games 
Technology which has its command center in Reno. Deep underground there 
is a very large room with literally hundreds of screens lining its 
walls. It looks very much like the NORAD center in the Colorado 
mountains, which I have also seen. Each screen represents a certain 
number of machines using split screens. An evaluation is made as to how 
much the machines should produce each day. In the project in which I was 
a partner in St. Petersburg, Russia, they were set at $150 a day. The 
algorithm for that room constantly changes the odds so that the machines 
produce a fixed amount of money each day. Because there is nothing about 
gambling -- from the point of view of the machine owner -- involved in 
this business they are not greedy. That is they don't try to make more 
than $150 a day per machine x the number of machines. Some machines make 
a bit more some less, but the room overall, with remarkable consistency, 
will average whatever the set number is, in this case $150. So the odds 
for any given machine are constantly in flux, and one machine may have 
one odds profile while a machine right next to it may have another. 
Slots don't have to be crooked; they are money trees that are remarkably 
predictable over a room. In the case I know there were 365 machines in 
five rooms. The venue gets a negotiated share, the owner of the machines 
(they are usually leased) makes a percentage, and the person/company 
putting the deal together makes a percentage. >

Damien Broderick