These things can happen with all random events. I've posted this before, but it's been a long time...just a summary this time.
The Indiana lottery is about 12.2 million to 1 to hit the jackpot; it pays $1 million at the start and goes up $1 million per week. They draw twice a week, and increase the jackpot $0.5 million with each drawing. When they had a record run (over a year!) without a jackpot winner, I wrote (49 weeks into the run) to ask if they'd checked their software lately to assure that everything was random, and asked how many tickets they usually sell (so I could figure how likely it was for this to happen). Obviously, if they don't sell many tickets, there won't be winner very often.
They hadn't checked their software, and said they sell about 450,000 tickets when the jackpot starts out (at $1 million), for about a 4% chance of a jackpot winner, and were up to 1,500,000 tickets currently, because they sell more when the jackpot grows (12% chance). I did a very rough calculation of the probability of going that long without the jackpot being hit, based on the 4% figure. I got a 2% chance of such a streak 49 weeks into the event; of course, since the calculation was based on the LOW end of ticket sales, it was VERY conservative, and since it went another ten drawings after I ran the figures, it was still further reduced.
When I emailed them with this information and again suggested that they should get a consultant in to make sure everything was "right" with the system, they again declined - "it happens, we're doing everything right". Of course, the person with whom I was corresponding only knew the safeguards they took to make sure everything was right, and did not seem to comprehend the math.
Still, I think it was most likely that everything WAS right -- and that we were just experiencing a very unlikely streak. The very unlikely scenarios are NEVER impossible, even with large-number events such as a lottery. Our own small samples of a few thousand hands for a session will often yield reports of no "big hands" in a given session, especially with so many of us playing so many sessions.
--Barry Glazer
ยทยทยท
1c. Re: Were 13 cards "missing"?
Date: Mon Feb 1, 2010 8:23 am ((PST))All of these posts reflect one common theme: that despite the %'s that the
machines are expected to pay in the LONG RUN, we each are living in the short
run. 9/6 JOB may offer a greater possible opportunity to grind out trying for a
few bucks an hour profit than 9/6 DDB, but nothing guarantees you're going to
end up either in the middle of the bell curve, or on the profitable tail.