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A Gambler Who Beat Roulette

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131–140 of 142 posts

Re: A Gambler Who Beat Roulette

#131

I found some roulette operators are so routined from the number of times they have spun the wheel and lauched the ball over the years that the movement of grabbing the ball, turning back and swinging the wheel, and launching the ball has become so engrained as to actually shift the odds. It is not that you can predict the next number from the previous, but the next quadrant on the wheel given the previois outcome is…

The Eudaemonic Pie documents the true story of building wearable computers to input the initial ball speed and wheel speed in order to predict well better than average the final octant (one eight sector) of the ball on the wheel.

This took place in late 1970s | early 1980s.

It's much simpler with todays tech to do something similar with good camera feed and computer vision (rather than a spotter with clickers watching ball and wheel).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Eudaemonic_Pie

Re: A Gambler Who Beat Roulette

#132

The article mentioned the book The Eudaemonic Pie by Thomas Bass. This was recommended to me back in the late 80s by my favorite professor in undergrad. It is quite good, a rare book that I go back and read every year or two.

It must be quite a book if you reread every year. Could you elaborate on what questions that book answers?

Re: A Gambler Who Beat Roulette

#133
post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"There really is no reason to legalize gambling casinos." When you make gambling illegal you just drive it underground and fund organized crime, with all the additional crime and corruption that brings with it. The arguments against making gambling illegal are similar to many of the arguments against making drugs and prostitution illegal, such as consenting adults should be free to do what they want as long as it doe…

I'd like if we could find a middle ground between gambling prohibition and ads for gambling right from your phone in every break of sports broadcasts as the situation we're quickly finding ourselves in.

I think banning of advertising on various things is entirely reasonable approach. Like in Europe prescription drugs can not be advertised to consumers. And I think that is sensible.

Re: A Gambler Who Beat Roulette

#134

>Tosa, Marjanovic and Pilisi returned to the Ritz at 10 that night, as promised. This time they were led to a private room where a squad from the London Metropolitan Police was waiting. An officer politely informed them they were under arrest on suspicion of “deception” and led them away to be interviewed at a nearby police station. Once the gamblers were out of earshot, Wootten urged the cops to check their shoes an…

That jumped out at me too. You could lose 500K in a casino and nobody would bat an eye but win 500K and suddenly the police is involved and the casino refuses to pay out. Personally I think if they can't prove that you are cheating that you should be allowed to continue to play as long as you feel like and the casino stays afloat. What's good for the goose should be good for the gander. The police automatically sidin…

happens so much in many other types scenarios they like to think they are just interviewers and let the judges determine guilt they're power is beyond measure causing systemic effects in the entire system. i think the individual officer know this to an extent better then anyone.. so best not give off any body language avoid speaking at all costs because all are parasites feeding off the energy from all the pain and turmoil caused. then throw their hands up and be like not my problem double it pass to the next person.

Re: A Gambler Who Beat Roulette

#135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article says they generally bet "neighbors" bets which cover 5 out of 37 numbers. It also says they had win streaks of as many as 13 in a row. The odds of that happening randomly are (5/37)^13, or 5 in 1 trillion. Casino security was certainly correct that this was not normal play. I don't know why they made so many small bets. They should have come in, made like 3 huge bets, and walked out.

You make small bets in a scheme like this to avoid the possibility of enough bad results wiping you out to zero so you have no capital to start again. Suppose you have $100 and can flip a coin to lose $1 on heads or win $2 on tails. The highest expected value per flip is to bet all $100. But you shouldn't do that since you have a 50-50 chance to go to zero and be unable to continue. You should bet something like 1/8…

I'm aware of the Kelly criterion. But that formula doesn't take into account the odds of being noticed and arrested by the casino.

Re: A Gambler Who Beat Roulette

#136

>Tosa, Marjanovic and Pilisi returned to the Ritz at 10 that night, as promised. This time they were led to a private room where a squad from the London Metropolitan Police was waiting. An officer politely informed them they were under arrest on suspicion of “deception” and led them away to be interviewed at a nearby police station. Once the gamblers were out of earshot, Wootten urged the cops to check their shoes an…

The article says they generally bet "neighbors" bets which cover 5 out of 37 numbers. It also says they had win streaks of as many as 13 in a row. The odds of that happening randomly are (5/37)^13, or 5 in 1 trillion. Casino security was certainly correct that this was not normal play. I don't know why they made so many small bets. They should have come in, made like 3 huge bets, and walked out.

It seems like they had way better than even odds to win, but not perfect odds. Smaller bets smooth out your mistakes. Although when you are dialed in, maybe you can up the bet size? This is assuming the no outside assistance theory is valid.

Re: A Gambler Who Beat Roulette

#137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There might be a crime involved when someone .

You said it, I just quoted you.

The thing you quoted did not justify action.

Your "exactly" was wrong, because you're using a different meaning of "might be" than the person who wrote the quote, and given the childish "you said it" reply it seems like you did that on purpose.

Re: A Gambler Who Beat Roulette

#138
post #132

The article mentioned the book The Eudaemonic Pie by Thomas Bass. This was recommended to me back in the late 80s by my favorite professor in undergrad. It is quite good, a rare book that I go back and read every year or two.

It must be quite a book if you reread every year. Could you elaborate on what questions that book answers?

That's something I should ask myself too when re-reading it. It has elements of: scientific heroism, science and technology ethics, the hacker mentality, and "science the shit out of it". The characters are quirky and interesting. It's Zen and the Art of Motorcycle maintenance in that it makes you think about some of the more interesting corners of technology ethics. The writing is gentle and affable with interesting tangents and rabbit holes. It's maybe more comfort than enlightenment after reading it so many times, but it's still thought provoking.

Re: A Gambler Who Beat Roulette

#140

A couple of notes from my own experience in casino hacking fun: 1. if they spot you singularly winning way too hard, they will cut you off 2. if you can distribute the wins wide enough between enough individuals you might get away with it There ARE exploits and you can get away with them. People find them pretty regularly and the ones who get away with it are really organized. My favorites over the past years: Weak P…

> Because Bliev and his cohorts had pulled their scam across state lines, federal authorities charged them with conspiracy to commit fraud.

> Bliev, Gudalov, and Larenov, all of whom are Russian citizens, eventually accepted plea bargains and were each sentenced to two years in federal prison, to be followed by deportation.

I don't quite follow here. What is fraudulent/illegal? Surely if you offer a pattern based game for money it should be legal to analyze and learn the pattern?

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