vpFREE2 Forums

Stations Taking More Anti-advantage player measures?

#1

--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "John F. Thomas, Jr., Esq."
<jfthomas3@c...> wrote:

>Now the big question is whether IGT, Ballys, etc. want to get into
>this quagmire. I wouldn't if I were them. I'm not even sure it's
>legal. Just the potential for a class action lawsuit about privacy
>issues could make any VP machine manufacturer keep away.

Why would you think this is a privacy issue? Casinos can watch, for

example,

every single bet you make on a BJ table, especially when the cards

are dealt

face up. They always have been able to. You're betting on their

machines,

on their property. I don't think you'd have any reasonable

expectation of

privacy as to what buttons you might hit on someone else's

computer.

Are you saying that just because a casino is a business you are
visiting that they can ignore all privacy issues? Hmmmm.

Furthermore, what I said was "potential" and it wasn't the casino I
was referring to but the makers of the VP machines. They would become
the middle men since it would be extremely difficult for the casinos
to gather skill levels without help from the VP manufacturers. Or, if
you have some non-labor intensive (ie. not cost prohibitive) way of
analyzing everyones' play without the VP manufacturers help please
feel free to pass it on.

>Are you saying that a tickler list keeping track of minor,

moderate & major

>errors like we have in WinPoker would not be good enough to

determine

>whether a player is a skillful player?

Does it really matter whether someone is skillful, or lucky? To

the casino,

it's irrelevant. Sure, they *could* monitor your playing strategy,

the

technology exists to do it right now,

OK, share it with us. How do they do it without the VP machines help?

but I'd doubt they'd bother.
I think
they'd be far more interested in your actual return as compared to

the

theoretical (or their expected for the machine, which may differ
significantly than the theoretical maximum), and all they'd have to

do is

monitor your coin in and coin out and play time for that -- WHICH

THEY

ALREADY DO,

Well not everyone uses a players card and some folks have been known
to remove their cards at appropriate times. Hence, your assertion is
false.

without it being a privacy issue, either. :slight_smile:

The casino cares about one thing -- their hold. If you are

consistently

giving them a lower hold than other players, then whether because

you're

amazingly skilled or amazingly lucky the end result for the casino

is the

same.

Well, if I were running a casino I'd care a lot. If it's just luck I
want to keep inviting the person back. I know I'm going to make more
future money off bad players than good players. In fact, this is
really what the discussion is all about. In the past there hasn't
been enough information available for casinos to make that trade-off.
If the information to track your skill level was actually "easy" to
obtain then the casinos would use it to their advantage. It would
increase their "hold" so why wouldn't they?

Dick

#2

Well not everyone uses a players card and some folks have been

known

to remove their cards at appropriate times. Hence, your assertion

is

false.

there are very few positive plays left that don't involve a card club
also, most systems in use defeat the pull the card trick, as well as
the put a different card in, etc. ...

Well, if I were running a casino I'd care a lot. If it's just luck

I

want to keep inviting the person back. I know I'm going to make

more

future money off bad players than good players.

if the casinos were smart, they would accept some good players
because they attract lots of bad players (excluding the obvious like
tying up machines or playing more than 40 hours per week or team
play, etc.)

but the casinos are simply not very smart, plus they are looking for
someone to blame, so the good players (winners whether through skill
or luck) are easy to single out, then they look around dumbstruck
when action drops off - the only hope is that they remember that
allowing good players (within reason) maximizes their action and
profits

ยทยทยท

--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "rgmustain" <rgmustain@a...> wrote:

#3

Are you saying that just because a casino is a business you are
visiting that they can ignore all privacy issues? Hmmmm.

Nope. I'm saying that because you know you're being monitored in a casino,
and that there's no reasonable expectation of privacy in what you're doing
out in the open on the casino floor (i.e., a casino could, if they wanted
to, simply train an "eye in the sky" on you and your machine, videotape you,
and analyze your play later based on what you were dealt and what you held.
They've been doing this to blackjack players for years and years).
Furthermore, there's no reasonable expectation of privacy using their
equipment. It's their machine, why should your use of it be secret to them?

Does that mean that they can listen in on the phone calls you make from your
room, or have a camera on you when you're in the shower? No, because you've
got a reasonable expectation of privacy when you make a phone call or when
you're in your hotel room, and you're not told you're under surveillance.
But I don't think that holds water when you *know* you're under all sorts of
surveillance on the casino floor.

And I don't think it changes the analysis to move the onus to the machine
manufacturers. They'll make them however the casino wants them (at least,
within the boundaries of the law, for the reputable ones) to provide
whatever data the casino wants for its tracking systems. If it's not an
invasion of privacy for the casino to monitor you, why would it be an
invasion of privacy for IGT to build a machine that allows the casino to
monitor you?

monitor your coin in and coin out and play time for that -- WHICH
THEY ALREADY DO,

Well not everyone uses a players card and some folks have been known
to remove their cards at appropriate times. Hence, your assertion is
false.

Just because some players take methods to attempt to thwart a casino's data
gathering does not mean that the casinos are not gathering data. Hence, my
assertion is true -- they are certainly trying to gather that data.

And if you call yourself an "advantage" player (that term just makes me
snicker) you're using a slot card, because you're not going to squeeze every
last coupon for two-for-one senior citizen buffets on Tuesday out of the
casino that way. So not using a card isn't germane to this discussion.

Well, if I were running a casino I'd care a lot. If it's just luck I
want to keep inviting the person back. I know I'm going to make more
future money off bad players than good players. In fact, this is
really what the discussion is all about. In the past there hasn't
been enough information available for casinos to make that trade-off.
If the information to track your skill level was actually "easy" to
obtain then the casinos would use it to their advantage. It would
increase their "hold" so why wouldn't they?

Because, again, why would they bother to go through a lot of rigamarole to
track theoretical strategies when they can consider actual returns, and get
the same information.

Let's say player X has visited the casino 10 times. He uses his player
card, and plays $0.25 VP. He tends to play 4 to 5 hours a session, 300
hands an hour, and tends to play 9/6 JoB. Based on his coin in and coin out
during each of his sessions, the casino determines that on average, he's
playing at a 96% return level.

Now let's say player Y has also visited the casino 10 times, and has the
same play as player X. However, player Y's coin in and coin out determine
that, on average, he's playing at a 91% return level.

After 10 visits, you can conclude that player Y is more valuable to the
casino than player X. You can also conclude that player X is probably more
skillful a player than player Y. But since player Y loses more, he's going
to get more offers.

It's all about the average losses. And they don't need "advantage player"
strategy tracking to track average loss -- all they need is coin in and coin
out.

#4

--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "bobinreno2000" <bobinreno2000@y...>
wrote:

there are very few positive plays left that don't involve a card

club

also, most systems in use defeat the pull the card trick, as well

as

the put a different card in, etc. ...

Is this really true? I still see lot's of player's pulling their
cards.

Dick