From: Lee Daniel Crocker (lee@piclab.com)
Date: Mon Feb 10 2003 - 14:35:32 MST
> (Gary Miller <garymiller@starband.net>):
>
> >> There is now, however, a financial incentive for creating better
> programs: internet casinos.
>
> Where's the financial incentive when the program can look at your cards,
> and the deck if it wants to and you'd be none the wiser. Their biggest
> problem is not winning but letting the suckers who play them win often
> enogh to keep them coming back with more money!
I'm not talking about the management of the casino itself: I'm talking
about bots acting as players in a reputable casino. Although I do not
play online myself, there are indeed quite reputable places that go to
great pains to ensure fairness and honesty, mainly by implementing
total transparency: every hand played by all players is logged, and the
logs of cards shown are available to the public so that they can do
statistical analysis and evaluate individual plays. If any player
raises suspicion about any particular play, the management has a log
of the cards not shown as well, and can easily investigate. Cheaters
have been caught and barred, and real people such as Mike Caro and
Phil Hellmuth do put their personal and professional reputations on
the line to vouch for the integrity of the places they sponsor.
Yes, it's possible that a casino could add cheating shills to game;
but it would be very difficult for them to get away with anything
obvious, or even less-than-obvious things for very long. Poker
players have been dealing with cheats for years and know how to spot
them.
I do not play online, but a number of my professional and semi-pro
friends do, and they have about the same earning rate as they do in
brick-and-mortar casinos, which is itself statistical evidence that
they are probably run fairly (of course they only play in one of the
three or four well-known reputable casios, not the random ones you
get spam ads for).
-- Lee Daniel Crocker <lee@piclab.com> <http://www.piclab.com/lee/> "All inventions or works of authorship original to me, herein and past, are placed irrevocably in the public domain, and may be used or modified for any purpose, without permission, attribution, or notification."--LDC
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