--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "John F. Thomas, Jr., Esq."
<jfthomas3@c...> wrote:
>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?
This sounds like you really believe casinos have the manpower (and VP
strategy knowledge of every VP game) to track your play, my play and
every little old lady that steps through their doors. This just isn't
the case. Clearly, they could monitor individual players if they so
desired and were willing to pay the training costs. Just as clearly,
this would do little to impact their bottom line. They would need a
way to monitor the majority of players. And, the only way to
accomplish this would take the help of the VP manufacturers!
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?
Now you're getting to the heart of the debate. If someone was banned
from a casino and decided to file a law suit (privacy or whatever),
then if IGT provided the information to the casino that caused the
person to be banned they could be named as a co-defendent. IGT may
not want to take that risk. They gain nothing directly from providing
the information to the casino but risk lawsuits by providing the
information.
If you remember Bill's comment it really doesn't matter whether the
lawsuit has significant merit. There's a significant cost to defend.
>> 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.
OK, if you can give me the mechanism (without the support of the VP
manufacturers) that tracks ALL player's accurately and doesn't have
prohibitive costs, then please let me know. Just asserting it to be
true does not make it true.
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.
Oh, but it is. Your assertion is that casinos can just look at your
win/loss and determine whether your an advantage player. This is
simply not true.
>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.
After 10 visits you might be able to to get a "feel" for JOB, but it
would take over a 1 million hands to have any idea on DDB and some
other highly volatile games. Your assumptions just don't hold up
under any kind of mathematical analysis.
Look at what happened in Detroit. One casino banned players that made
money just as you have proposed. I seemed to remember several of the
banned players indicated they had just been lucky and hit one big
jackpot. You will get some of the advantage players with this
approach, but it certainly is not foolproof. It also resulted in lots
of bad publicity for the casino and I doubt had any positive impact
on the bottom line.
Now, if the casinos do get together with the game manufacturers then
they could know your skill level (whether or not you win or lose)
based on very limited play.
Dick