Gambler Loses Lawsuit Against NJ Casinos

So it would seem that a former New York attorney by the name of Arelia Margarita Taveras sued several NJ casinos because she was addicted to gambling. More specifically, they never made her stop. Huh?

Ok, so she had a gambling problem and over 2 years time she lost $1 million. She has a problem. But casinos have no way to tell that she's an addict. It's not like you can look at her and see it, like, for instance, a bartender can look and tell someone is innebriated. She should own her mistakes and issues and chalk it up to a lesson learned.

And apparently, U.S. District Court Judge Renee Bumb, and I are on the same page, because she threw it out.

The attorney is going to appeal. No kidding?

If you want to read up on the case, click here.

Roulette in London --- Playboy Style

As a teenage boy, I always dreamed of going to the Playboy Club. I would sneak peeks at the magazine that I was not supposed to read and I saw what I thought was the pinnacle of success, Hugh Hefner. In 1988, my dreams were crushed. The last one closed.

But, last year, my dreams were rekindled. The Palms Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas opened the newest Playboy Club. And they added a new element to my dream, gambling.

A croupier in a bunny suit. What a fantasy! But why am I writing about this today? Well, the answer is that the concept has been so successful, that the Playboy Club is looking to open a new club in London. As a matter of fact, the Las Vegas club is taking in triple the amount of cash than any other casino tables in Vegas. That recipe for success is hoping to be repeated across the pond.

London used to be a site for the legendary club, but there was a scandal that Playboy was later cleared of that closed it and it never reopened. It was legendary for VIPs and high rollers from all over the world. The re-opening will undoubtedly attract a whole new list of luminaries, as well as some of the old ones. Hef will be there, he will be pushing 85 when it opens (incidentally, his girlfriends ages combined will still not equal that!) I will eventually make the journey, as I love traveling, I love gambling and I love Playboy bunnies!

So you bunny croupiers get ready to spin the will and roll the ball, because, I'm coming and I wanna make some dreams come true!


London Times Article

Interactive Roulette, Roulette on TV!

On July 1st I talked about Roulette Nation on British TV. It was the first show on Virgin's new interactive gambling channel. Today, I thought I'd show you a clip of a related show. It has the same premise, just on a different channel. Enjoy!

Rapid Roulette Expanding To More Casinos

I was reading an article today in the Laughlin, Nevada Entertainer and they had an article on how the Aquarius Casino Resort is the first Laughlin casino to add the newest innovation in Roulette technology, Rapid Roulette.

Now, for those of you who did not see my June 18th blog (titled "Welcome") I spoke about Rapid Roulette making it's inaugural appearance in Atlantic City. And it debuted in Las Vegas a few years back. But now the game has made the 100 mile trip south to Laughlin.

Jim Tuthill, Aquarius vice president of casino operations has a laundry list of reasons behind the move. Among them are:

• comfort aspect, no encroaching on other space or accidental moving of others chips
• the technology is easy to embrace
• the intimidation factor of first time players is all but eliminated
• younger players can relate well to the video aspect of it
• it gives more time for the dealers to interact with players
• game play is not slowed by questions about the game or by disputes

Another benefit for players is that they can use their casino reward card to track time playing for comps.

One thing that Aquarius is counting on is this drawing business. Tuthill remarked "It's exciting that our property is adding new games while other properties are removing them. We are aggressive, dedicated to our desire to make this property a real destination for the gamer. We're letting our customers know we're vital and alive and that we are taking an aggressive approach in a down market.” With the national economy on the downturn, this could be a way for the casino to not only attract more players, but get them to spend more (faster play=more money).

Tuthill also states in the article that Aquarius did not negotiate an exclusive contract for the area, so more casinos in Laughlin may see Rapid Roulette soon.

And if the word of mouth can be taken as even the slightest truth, these casinos with Rapid Roulette will be very popular.

If you wish to read the article, click here.

Roulette Scam - Follow up

Last Wednesday, I wrote about the 3 Eastern Europeans that used their cell phones to will $2.5 million from a British casino. Well, I decided to delve further into the case, just to see what came up and I found an article in of all places NewScientist.com. In this article the scientist not only breaks down the system, but mentions alternatives.

The author of the article consults Dr. Norman Packard, a physicist at the Santa Fe Institute in New Mexico. But he's not just any normal, run of the mill physicist. He actually developed a a computer system that his students strapped to their bodies and controlled by tapping their toes in the 1970's.
The system itself was successful, but practical use was hard to employ.

Moving forward 30 years to our Eastern European friends situation, Packard states that the quadrant of the wheel where the ball will land can be predicted simply by working out 2 equations, one for the ball and one for the wheel. He said that there are variables though, such as the mass and size of the ball, the shape and roughness of the track, and the tilt of the wheel.

He says the the British caper could have been further simplified by the perpetrators. He said that if instead of scanners, they used the buttons on the phones when the ball was released and then after one spin and pressed them to mark the speed, that a remote computer, or perhaps even one in the phone, could then solve the equations "very rapidly".

The article goes on to talk about the odds of winning by his method, talking about how the casinos can beat his method and why he stopped his own research. It makes for a good read and the article just goes to show that there are a lot of ways to overcome a situation. If you would like to read the entire text of the article, you can do so here.

Roulette Variations: French Roulette

There are a few major variations of Roulette that you should familiarize yourself with. Today I'd like to talk about one, French Roulette. Much like the more common versions you may have seen, American and European Roulette, French Roulette has the same premise---you wager on which number the Roulette ball will land on after the croupier sends it spinning around the Roulette wheel. There are special features in French Roulette that make it distinct from — and in some ways, superior to, the other Roulette variations.

The first thing you might notice when you look at a French Roulette table is that it is all the numbers are red. On the French Roulette wheel, as on all Roulette wheels, the numbers alternate red and black. And, as in all Roulette games, you can still place an even-money bet on red or black in French Roulette. So this is not a difference you need to pay much attention to.

The French Roulette wheel, like the European Roulette wheel, has only a single zero. From the player's point of view, this means that you have a higher probability of winning at French Roulette or European Roulette than you would have at American Roulette, which has both a single zero and a double zero. But the French Roulette game also provides another advantage, which European Roulette does not have. French Roulette game has a unique rule called La Partage. The La Partage Roulette rule is that if an even money bet is made, and the Roulette ball lands on zero, you lose only half your bet. This rule provides a significant statistical advantage to the French Roulette gambler.

French Roulette allows for all bets that you can find in American and European Roulette. However, French Roulette adds special bets known as Call Bets.

These call bets seem a bit strange and at first, however, there is a logic to the them, they are based on the positions of the numbers on the French Roulette wheel.

These are the call bets available in French Roulette:

Finales a Cheval: This is a bet on all numbers ending in either of two digits. For example, Finales a Cheval 2/5 is a bet on 2, 5, 12, 15, 22, 25, 32, and 35.

Finales en Plein: This is a bet on all numbers ending in a particular digit. For example, Finales en Plein 3 is a bet on 3, 13, 23, and 33.

Orphelins (Orphans): A bet on the eight remaining Roulette numbers that are not included in either the Voisins or the Tiers: 1, 6, 9, 14, 17, 20, 31, and 34.

Tiers du Cylindre (Third of the Wheel): A bet on the twelve numbers that are situated on the opposite side of the wheel from the 0: 5, 8, 10, 11, 13, 16, 23, 24, 26, 27, 30, and 33.

Voisins du Zero (Neighbors of Zero): A bet on the seventeen numbers that surround the 0 on the French Roulette wheel: 0, 2, 3, 4, 7, 12, 15, 18, 19, 21, 22, 25, 26, 28, 29, 32, and 35

Call bets aren't necessary to memorize, nor are any they any more likely to win than the regular inside bets and outside bets that are available. But they do add an interesting and unusual twist to your regular Roulette betting repertoire, and that always adds to the fun of playing Roulette.

From the name of the call bets above, you may have noticed is that a French Roulette table is in French. In fact, the very name "Roulette" is a French word meaning "little wheel." To further help your understanding of the game, here is a glossary of some of the French terms you will encounter in French Roulette:

Pair - even numbers

Impair - odd numbers

Manqué - the low numbers 1-18

Passé - the high numbers 19-36

P-12 (Premiere 12) - the first dozen (1-12)

M-12 (Moyenne 12) - the middle dozen (13-24)

D-12 (Derniere 12) - the last dozen (25-36)

Well, I hope this lesson has helped you. Remember, knowledge and planning are the keys to winning. So now that French Roulette has been demystified for you, play, enjoy and win!

Roulette Folklore

In research for this blog, I come across a lot of interesting stories. Some of these are legendary. I wanted to dedicate today's blog to sharing a few with you.

The first is about the inventor of the modern European Roulette wheel. He was a 19th century French casino owner named François Blanc. He is said to have bargained with the devil to obtain the game's secrets. As proof, some point to the fact that the sum of all the numbers on the wheel (from 1 to 36) is 666, the "Number of the Beast."

In 1884, a man threatened to contaminate the water supply of New York City with bubonic plague if he wasn’t repaid $ 20,000 he’d lost at roulette. Of course, no one believed him; the croupier sent for the police and he was arrested. But it was found that the threat could easily have been implemented: The man was a laboratory assistant who had been experimenting on ship’s rats and was, in fact, carrying the bacteria of plague in a vial in his pocket. (The vial was later restored to the laboratory without having at any time been opened.)

On July 9th 1959, the record for the highest recorded times that the same number has come up in a row was set at the San El Juan Hotel in Puerto Rico when the number 10 came up 6 times in a row. Incidentally, betting on this hppening is not the wisest of strategies to employ, as the odds of this occuring are about 1 in 3 billion.

And the most famous instance in recent history is that of Ashley Revell. Revell took what many consider to be a legendary roulette spin. He sold everything he owned (even most of his clothes) and even changed his name Ashley "Blue Square" Revell when a UK online bookmaker offered to contribute to the fund. He raised $135,000, flew to Las Vegas and risked it all on one spin, betting on red. Red 7 hit and he doubled his money to $270,600. He is now a partner in an online casino venture.