Page 49«..1020..48495051..»

Category Archives: Roulette

Union claims DWP is putting lives at risk by forcing people to attend interviews – Stoke-on-Trent Live

Posted: October 7, 2020 at 8:56 am

Union reps have spoken out after claiming job-seekers are being needlessly forced to attend Jobcentre interviews - when they could be conducted over the phone.

Civil Service Union PCS says the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) is playing 'Russian roulette' with the health and lives of some of the most vulnerable members of society - especially in areas which are seeing an increase in Covid-19 infections.

The call comes as the number of people claiming benefits across Staffordshire increased last month, as a result of the pandemic.

Latest figures from the Office of National Statistics (ONS) show that 13,155 people living in Stoke-on-Trent claimed benefits last month (August) - compared to 12,820 in July.

At the same time, the number of claimants living in Newcastle has increase from 3,955 in July to 4,060 in August.

While the number of job-seekers in Stafford and the Staffordshire Moorlands have increased to 2,975 and 1,820 from 2,845 and 1,710 respectively over the month-long period.

Throughout the pandemic, job centres have continued to operate to ensure those who are unemployed can get help.

Until now, most of the contact has been digitally or by telephone, with ability to see those most vulnerable and who are unable to use these forms of communication face-to-face.

But from this week DWP bosses are demanding that members of the public turn up to job centres to conduct business.

PCS is now calling on DWP to halt the process immediately over fears it will mean job-seekers not only mixing with other people in job centres, but also with others travelling to and from - when there is no need.

PCS Midlands regional secretary, Andrew Lloyd said: "DWP appear to want to play Russian roulette with health and lives with our members and members of the public.

"There is no need get more people into Jobcentres, and not to offer the option of conducting matters over the phone from the outset defies any logic at best, at worst it needlessly puts people at risk."

As it stands, DWP will conduct telephone appointments - but only if they are specifically requested by the job-seeker.

A DWP Spokesperson said: "Staff and customer safety is our priority. Sites have been adapted to ensure they are Covid-19 secure and we have engaged and consulted extensively about the safety of our colleagues including with the PCS many of whom have continued to work in our sites throughout Covid-19.

"We are actively engaged with PCS and other unions about how to ensure the continued safety of our employees and support the most vulnerable in society."

Recruitment company boss Claire Leigh believes the DWP need to be flexible.

Claire, who runs Brampton Recruitment in Newcastle, said: "What is the need to go into branch? it's risking the job-seeker and the employee when there isn't a need. I understand some people might not have the technology to be able to have a virtual meeting but surely a phone call can be had if they can't see them via a video call. It is about adapting to the situation."

Want a free daily bulletin - plus breaking news alerts direct to your inbox? Then sign up to our email newsletter service by clicking here.

Or you can type your email address into the 'sign up to free daily alerts' box. It's at the top of this article.

It's also on any stories on the website - simply click 'subscribe' and you can expect your first newsletter at the next release.

Want to know more before you sign up? Click here.

Decide later that you no longer wish to receive the emails? No problem - you can just follow the unsubscribe link.

She added: "We are working in the office but we are all distanced we can work from home if needed as well so we can be flexible. We've adapted to virtual registrations and have produced a new application form on our website as well for people to complete and upload to us, then we have the virtual meeting to go through it. It's working really well and it's saving time for the job-seeker."

Read more from the original source:

Union claims DWP is putting lives at risk by forcing people to attend interviews - Stoke-on-Trent Live

Posted in Roulette | Comments Off on Union claims DWP is putting lives at risk by forcing people to attend interviews – Stoke-on-Trent Live

Nobel prize in medicine awarded to US-UK trio for work on hepatitis C – The Guardian

Posted: at 8:56 am

Two Americans and a British scientist have won the 2020 Nobel prize in physiology or medicine for their groundbreaking work on blood-borne hepatitis, a health problem that causes cirrhosis and liver cancer around the world.

Harvey J Alter at the US National Institutes of Health in Maryland, Charles M Rice from Rockefeller University in New York, and Michael Houghton, a British virologist at the University of Alberta in Canada, were honoured for their joint discovery of the hepatitis C virus, a major cause of liver disease.

The award, announced on Monday by the Nobel assembly from the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, is worth 10m Swedish kronor (870,000), which will be shared among the winners.

Thanks to their discovery, highly sensitive blood tests for the virus are now available and these have essentially eliminated post-transfusion hepatitis in many parts of the world, greatly improving global health, the Nobel committee said.

Speaking of how he heard the news, Alter said he ignored the phone twice when it rang before 5am local time. The third time I got up angrily to answer it and it was Stockholm. Its a weird experience, he said. Its the best alarm clock Ive ever had. Rice said he was absolutely stunned on receiving the call, adding it is a success story for team science.

The prize may prove controversial. In 2013, Houghton refused a major award for his hepatitis C work because it excluded two former co-workers, George Quo and Qui-Lim Choo, who helped him identify the virus. Houghton, who received his PhD from Kings College London in 1977, said his colleagues did not get the recognition they deserved.

David Pendlebury, a citation analyst at Clarivate, a scientific data firm, said he was surprised the Nobel committee had made the award. Theres no question about the importance of this work and the worthiness of this prize, but one assumes the Nobel committee tries to avoid controversy where possible, he said. The award threw into high relief the perennial issue of the Nobels rule of three, he added, where no more than three researchers can be named for discoveries that have often been team efforts.

Houghton accepted the Nobel but said he hoped future award committees would recognise larger groups of scientists. Great science, often, is a group of people and I think going forward we somehow need to acknowledge that, he said. Asked for his advice to students, he said: If you have the passion you are likely to be successful. Find your passion.

The scientists work transformed the understanding and treatment of hepatitis C, a virus that infects more than 70 million people, and kills 400,000 a year, according to the World Health Organization.

In the 1940s, doctors knew there were two main types of infectious hepatitis. The first, transmitted by the hepatitis A virus, spread via contaminated food and water and tended to have little long-term impact on people. The second, spread by blood and body fluids, was more insidious. Patients could be silently infected for years before serious complications emerged liver cancer and liver scarring known as cirrhosis.

Researchers discovered hepatitis B in the 1960s, but it quickly became clear that it was not the only cause of the blood-borne infections. While studying hepatitis spread by blood transfusions, Alter found that some patients were being infected by an unknown agent. Having a transfusion at the time was like Russian roulette, the Nobel committee said. Alter later showed that blood from the patients could transmit the disease to chimpanzees.

The next breakthrough came from Houghton and his colleagues at Chiron. Through a new and untested strategy, they used human antibodies from patients to help identify the mystery pathogen and sequenced the genetic code of what became the hepatitis C virus.

The final step in the effort came from Rice, then at Washington University in St Louis, who demonstrated that the virus alone could cause hepatitis, explaining the remaining infections spread by blood transfusions. The advent of sensitive tests for hepatitis C and antiviral drugs to treat the infection soon followed, saving millions of lives.

The discovery was crucial in defining the fact that there was this other virus that was so important, particularly for transfusion-related infections, said Graham Cooke, the NIHR professor of infectious diseases at Imperial College London. Since then weve seen a tremendous explosion in our understanding of the virus, to the point that we are now talking about eliminating hepatitis C.

The physics prize will be announced on Tuesday and the prize for chemistry on Wednesday, both from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

Excerpt from:

Nobel prize in medicine awarded to US-UK trio for work on hepatitis C - The Guardian

Posted in Roulette | Comments Off on Nobel prize in medicine awarded to US-UK trio for work on hepatitis C – The Guardian

Ladbrokes Casino bonus: how good is the 2020 welcome offer? – Telegraph.co.uk

Posted: at 8:56 am

Ladbrokes Casino is the stylish, substantial, Playtech-powered casino offering from one of the UKs best known and most established sports betting and gaming brands.

The Ladbrokes Casino bonus offer for new customers gives you an impressive amount of bang for a modest amount of your buck. Already signed up to their famous sportsbook? No problem, as long as you havent previously staked money at Ladbrokes Casino, you can still claim your welcome bonus.

New customers can take advantage of this Ladbrokes Casino bonus offer.

Our detailed Ladbrokes Casino review reports on what you will find there beyond the bonus. It includes analysis of their games offering, existing customer promotions, customer service, live casino, software and deposit and withdrawal methods.

This Ladbrokes Casino bonus is a very nice welcome offer that gives you a bonus of 50 in return for your first 10 stake on the casino part of the site.

True, there are online casino bonus offers out there with more eye-catching bonus figures attached, but these are often matched-deposit offers, meaning you only get the same bonus as the amount you are willing to deposit.

However, at Ladbrokes Casino you get a very nice welcome bonus without having to deposit and stake a large amount before you have tried the site, meaning a smaller initial commitment for you.

IMPORTANT: Deposits via Envoy, PayPal, Skrill, Neteller, Paysafe, Moneybookers, prepaid cards and certain debit cards will NOT qualify.

Like all casino bonus welcome offers, you will need to play through your Ladbrokes Casino bonus winnings until you have satisfied the wagering requirements before they turn into funds you can withdraw from your account.

The wagering requirements for the offer were looking at here are 40x, meaning you have to play through 2,000 worth of stakes on qualifying games within the 30 days before you can take cash from your account.

Wagering requirements of 40x are towards the lower end of the scale when it comes to casino welcome offers, with requirements of 50x or 60x not uncommon for new customer bonuses on UK online casino sites.

As mentioned above, you have to satisfy the wagering requirements of the offer before you can withdraw any winnings associated with your bonus. Once you have done so you can withdraw your winnings using one of the following methods:

The Ladbrokes Casino bonus offer for new customers is a generous promotion that gives new players the opportunity to play with bonus funds worth a generous five times their qualifying bet.

A relatively low qualifying bet of 10 means new sign-ups dont need to spend too much to gain enough bonus funds to give the casino a comprehensive tryout.

The goal of withdrawing bonus-associated winnings feels more realistic than some of Ladbrokes Casinos rivals thanks to relatively low wagering requirements and having 30 days to satisfy them in order to withdraw any bonus-associated winnings.

If you like the sound of this welcome offer, Paddy Power Casino and Ladbrokes sister brand Coral Casino have similar welcome bonus offers that are also worth a look.

18+. New Casino players only. Deposit required. Min stake 10 on qualifying games. 40x wager reqs (bonus only) on selected games. 24hrs to accept. Bonus valid for 48hrs. Certain deposit types excluded. Bets covering >70% of Roulette table excluded. T&Cs apply.

The following Casino games are excluded from the Ladbrokes Casino Welcome Bonus discussed in this article and any bets placed on any of these games will not count as a qualifying bet:

A Girls Night Out Scratch, Atlantis Queen, Blankety Blank Scratch, Blazin Hot 7s, Block Bashers, Cash Stampede, Cashpoint, Codfather, Craps, Daring Dave & The Eye of Ra, Darts, Deuces Wild, Dice Twister, Dolphin Reef, Doubleplay Superbet Slot, Dr Love On Vacation, Dragon Drop, Dragon Kingdom, Emperors Garden, Extra Cash, Flame, Football Fans, Funky Monkey, Gold Mine, Golden Tour, Gorilla Gone Wild, Great Wild Elk, Hat Trick, Haunted House, Head or Tails, Highway Kings, Irish Eyes, Irish Eyes 2, Irish Luck EY, Jack or Better, Jackpot Jester Wild Nudge, Jacks Beanstalk, Joker Poker, Jungle Boogie, Key Bet Roulette, Knights Of Gold, Legacy Of The Wild, Let Them Ride, Lightning Gems, Live Baccarat, Lucky Blackjack (all variations), Mafia Millions, Marilyn Monroe, Marine Mayhem, Medusa II, Merlins Magic Respins, Merlins Millions, Merlins Millions Sc, Miss Midas, Neptunes Kingdom, Ocean Princess, Pai Gow, Pet Luck, Pigasus, Play Your Cards Right, Pontoon, Pots of Gold, Red Dog, Renegades, Rock N Roller, Rock Paper Scissors, Roller Coaster, Rubiks Riches, Samurai Split, Scratch 4 Cash, Shangri La, Side Bets, Silver Bullet, Slingo Deal Or No Deal, Slingo Extreme, Slingo Fortunes, Slingo Rainbow Riches, Slingo Reveal, Slingo Showdown, Soccer Wives, Spin A Win, Wheel, Spin, Sorceress, Springtime, Stampede, Stravaganza, Sugar Train, Sultan's Gold, Teddy Bears Picnic, The Jazz Club, The Spin Lab, Tres Amigos, Ugga Bugga, Vacation Station, Valhalla, Wheel of Light, Wild Games, Wild Play Superbet, Wild Vikings, Wild West, Wings of Gold, Witch Pickings, Club Night, Enchanted Prince, Double Up/Gamble Features within Slots (where offered), Blackjack Switch, Spin A Win, Lucky Lucky Blackjack, Baccarat (any variant), Sic Bo, Pontoon, Red Dog, Blackjack Surrender, Spin A Win/Lucky.

See the original post here:

Ladbrokes Casino bonus: how good is the 2020 welcome offer? - Telegraph.co.uk

Posted in Roulette | Comments Off on Ladbrokes Casino bonus: how good is the 2020 welcome offer? – Telegraph.co.uk

Choosing Between Slots and Roulette – What’s the Best Casino Game? – BestUSCasinos.org

Posted: September 26, 2020 at 6:57 am

Walk into almost any casino on the planet, and youre sure to see roulette tables and slot machines.

Its no surprise how often I get asked, Youre the expert, slots or roulette?

I will reply 99.9% of the time with a simple, It depends. And it does depend on several factors.

Lets break down the variables and see if you can answer for yourself.

If you are a novice casino gambler preparing for a trip, youre probably hearing a lot of chatter about how you need to take it easy and stick to the large banks of slot machines.

Then there will be the other half of the semi-pro pundits that direct you to the roulette tables. Its definitely the easiest of the table games to pick up quickly.

Roulette has a bevy of different bets you can make on any given spin. Regardless, the outcome is 100% left to chance.

The skill involved in playing real money roulette is no different than youll invoke on a slot machine. The most significant difference is that youll be making a decision while playing roulette.

For a beginner casino gambler, a roulette table may seem intimidating. After all, there are a seemingly endless amount of bets you can make.

Slot machines are relatively simple to understand. A potato could roll into Caesars Palace and understand how to play a slot machine.

You just insert money, select your pay lines, and spin the reels. It wont get any easier than that. However, roulette can easily be picked up in a few rounds by most players.

i

Online casinos will typically have a free version of the game you can play on their websites to learn the ropes.

Furthermore, spend a few minutes watching the play at a casino. The watching is free. Its the playing that could cost you.

Usually, you can find a friendly face at the roulette table to show you the ropes.

Despite roulettes simplicity, slots come in as the easiest of all casino games to take a seat and pass the hours. If youre looking to spend your time destressing from the outside worlds troubles or adverse to learning new things, stick to the slots.

Theres nothing you can do to improve your payout odds on a slot machine that wont land you in jail. You spin the reel via pressing a button or pulling a lever, and the results happen.

Most of the time, the payout percentage on a slot machine in a Las Vegas casino will be between 85-94%. Yet, you may see devices as low as 80% or as high as 98%. This RTP (Return to Player) is set before the slot machines ever hit the casino floor.

Slot machines have random number generators to ensure that any given spin results are as unpredictable as possible. There is no way for you to influence these results, short of cheating.

The only real power a player has on the slots is how many pay lines to bet and denomination. It should be evident that activating maximum pay lines will provide the highest RTP.

Unfortunately, playing max bet and max lines has apparent drawbacks. While you will have a theoretical chance of winning more money with this aggressive approach, youre also opening yourself up to much more significant losses at a more rapid rate.

If youre going to play slots for real money, I recommend playing max lines 100% of the time.

Roulette gives gamblers a much better opportunity at affecting their odds. Only by understanding how the game works and employing a conservative system, you might be able to decrease the house odds below 1.5%.

My best advice for roulette is to stick to even money bets. Remember that even money implies (mostly) equal probability. So, while 500,000 out of 1,000,000 red should come up, it doesnt guarantee that 170 out of 200 cant be black.

This has led many gamblers to go broke remarkably fast. I see this truth as the most fatal flaw of so-called betting systems.

In the end, youll get better-sustained odds by playing smart roulette.

Roulette is generally offered in three different forms. Youll fair best playing American, European, or French roulette depending on where youre doing your casino gaming.

By far, the American and European variations are the most popular. The differences between the two are subtle but may make a significant impact on your bottom line.

For that reason, its essential to understand what variation youre playing. Online casinos have introduced many more roulette variations and could offer three or more types of roulette.

Knowing the rules for each takes time, but better time than money.

Most casinos are going to offer American or European. If you can stick to one of those, youll pick up the game much quicker.

Perhaps you quickly lose interest in repetitive games. You may not love roulette. The variety comes in the outcome.

Roulette provides an avenue for you to mix it up with other players as you collectively try to outsmart the house. I certainly wouldnt advise adding variety to the game in the form of wildly unpredictable bets.

This kind of loose betting will drain your bankroll as rapidly as anything in the casino.

Slot machines offer a unique variety. The advancement of technology, specifically high-resolution video screens, has brought a new era of slot machines.

Video slot machines can range in theme to outer space to the old west and anything in between. While the gameplay is somewhat monotonous, there are added bonus levels to these games that, when activated, offer not only a massive shot of adrenaline but increased winnings potential.

Slots machine banks in any casino worth their salt will provide a plethora of different slot machines, all with varying levels of bells and whistles.

In the world of slots, there really is something for everyone.

Lets be real, most people trekking to the casinos are looking to strike it rich. They cant be bothered by things like math or reality.

These people are going to the casino for one reason, the slots jackpots. You can keep the measly $400 you won over four days at the roulette table.

Jackpot slots are a massive draw at casinos around the world. The reasons should be abundantly clear. Who couldnt use a years salary or more in one fortunate spin?

Some of the more enormous jackpots can be in the millions. You are never going to see that kind of money being tossed around at a roulette table.

Lets imagine you set your sights on one of the insanely massive progressive jackpots for slotsfor example, the Megabucks slots jackpot offered by IGT.

Today, the jackpot sits at over $15.1 million. That is life-changing money. Hitting such an enormous payday would likely change the financial situation for generations of a family.

For only $3, gamblers can fire their shot at over 750 of these machines in 125 different Nevada casinos. Sounds great until you look at the sobering numbers.

Your chances of hitting the Megabucks are roughly 50,000,000 to 1. In other words, it probably isnt going to happen.

Dont lose hope yet. Many gamblers play with full knowledge that they arent going to have Lady Luck on their side.

The entertainment of spending hours daydreaming about allocating their winnings is well worth the $3 investment.

If you are in it for the imagination factor, I am not here to stomp on your dreams. Go wild, and I wish you all the luck youll need.

However, if you are looking to make a few dollars to spend on gifts for friends to commemorate your trip to Sin City or just want to spend as much time as possible on the casino floor, I recommend playing roulette and doing so wisely.

Slots or roulette?

Its a question with no right answer. I enjoy the slow burn of an hour-long session at the roulette table. Im able to sometimes extend my bankroll for days because the house advantage is so low.

Occasionally, Im even able to take home some of the casinos moneypossibly the best feeling in Las Vegas.

On the other hand, my mother-in-law has no interest in putting forth much thought in the casino. She would much rather sit at a slot machine and imagine how shell spoil her grandkids when she hits a massive jackpot.

Whether you prefer slots or roulette will significantly depend on your unique personality. Dont let anyone tell you that one is right and the other is wrong.

View original post here:

Choosing Between Slots and Roulette - What's the Best Casino Game? - BestUSCasinos.org

Posted in Roulette | Comments Off on Choosing Between Slots and Roulette – What’s the Best Casino Game? – BestUSCasinos.org

A Brief Look Through the History of Roulette – Euro Weekly News

Posted: at 6:57 am

As of 2020, roulette is theoretically over 365 years old, but it could be even older than that in reality. The ancient casino games origin is not totally understood or established, but in this article we will follow the most popular and widely accepted beginning of roulette, and its progress through the many centuries.

There could be older origins, but the most convincing theory is that French scientist Blaise Pascal (yes, the same person after which the unit of internal pressure is named) accidentally invented a crude form of the casino game in 1655, while he was trying to build a machine of perpetual motion.

Other than the Pascal theory, there are also suggestions that the idea in its crudest form might have originated at separate times in separate cultures which are thousands of years older. While Greek and Roman soldiers might have been only playing a betting game on their shields and chariot wheels, ancient Chinese civilizations may very well have been playing a more standardized and advanced variant of roulette that closely resembles the modern-day casino game. Either way, none of these theories have more credence or proof than the Pascal theory.

It was not until the mid-1790s that roulette managed to gain enough popularity in Europe. Once it did gain popularity as one of the more interesting casino games, it became so popular that we can find mention of roulette in European literature of the time.

It wasnt until the year 1842 that the roulette wheel received a major rehaul. Before the new wheels came into being and managed to become even more popular than their predecessors, all roulette wheels in Europe had two zeros on them.

In 1842, Francois and Louis Blanc changed the history of casino games forever by making a single, game changing modification to the old roulette wheel. They simply removed the double zero from old wheels and that was pretty much all it took for European roulette to become more popular across the continent than even before.

They brought the new wheels and the game of roulette to Humbug from France, then to all of Germany and later on, pretty much the whole of Europe. The fact that these new wheels decreased the house edge in roulette down to 2.7%, as compared to 5.26% with the old wheels, only fuelled the popularity of roulette amidst European gamblers even more.

It was, of course, the French settlers that brought roulette to Louisiana first, but American roulette wheels are not the same ones that we see in European casinos. Two differences in the American gambling communitys attitude should be noted here as these explain the reasons why American roulette wheels are different.

As a result of these attitudes, American roulette players continue to use the ancient double zero roulette wheel, which is now known only as the American roulette wheel. It should be noted that this is why roulette is not as popular in America as it is in Europe.

The introduction of online roulette came in roughly around the beginning of the 21st Century, which was quite a few years after the first online casino was launched in 1996. Online roulette changed everything and for the better. While there were some initial issues with fair play, that has been sorted out now. If you have never played roulette online, or you are looking to learn the rules that govern the game, get to know all the rules on this site.

Players can not only play any version of the game that they want today, but they can practically play anywhere they want to. Smartphones, tablets, laptops, desktops and even some smart TVs are now capable of streaming live casino roulette games, or letting the player try their luck in a virtual version of American/European roulette. Wherever you might be located, if its legal to gamble online in your country, we suggest playing European roulette for a significantly higher chance of winning.

View post:

A Brief Look Through the History of Roulette - Euro Weekly News

Posted in Roulette | Comments Off on A Brief Look Through the History of Roulette – Euro Weekly News

Weekend Outlook: Join me at the weather roulette table – SooToday

Posted: at 6:57 am

Forecasting the weather involves a lot of science, a little intuition, and, honestly, a touch of luck. This weekend may require more luck than usual. I'd typically look to weather events upstream of the overall flow pattern over central North America and figure out how things will evolve when they hit the Sault region. However, the features that will(might) hit the Sault region this weekend have yet to develop - making it more challenging.

I suspect that a cold front crosses the region early Saturday morning, then a warm front arrives in the evening, followed by a cold front Sunday morning and then possibly a Texas Low on Tuesday. Any or all of these features could change intensity and timing(or not develop at all!) to make a mess of the forecast. The best weather forecast this weekend might be the view from the kitchen window. If you are the gambling type, you could move all your chips onto my prediction below and spin the weather roulette wheel.

Friday morning brings a 30-40% chance of an isolated shower, and then cloudy skies linger for the middle of the day before partially clearing later in the afternoon. Temperatures climb back into the low 20s on a southerly breeze.

Scattered thunderstorms should move through the region early Saturday morning with cloudy skies for the rest of the day.Daytime highs should reach 20C with a weak southerly wind. Scattered showers and storms move in sometime around sunset and linger overnight.

Sunday will bring a mix of sun and cloud with temperatures close to the 18C mark.Periods of light rain are likely in the afternoon. Watch for a change in the weather pattern for next week as colder air returns to the region.

Read this article:

Weekend Outlook: Join me at the weather roulette table - SooToday

Posted in Roulette | Comments Off on Weekend Outlook: Join me at the weather roulette table – SooToday

The Fall of Roulette Wheel Bias – John Huxley and Advantage Play – BestUSCasinos.org

Posted: at 6:57 am

Roulette isnt the first game that people envision when they think of beating the casino. Instead, blackjack (card counting), video poker (skill), and poker (also skill) come to mind.

Nevertheless, gamblers used to beat roulette through a technique called wheel bias. The latter enables gamblers to more-accurately predict where the ball lands and bet accordingly.

Wheel bias was once a valid way to beat the house. However, its no longer practical thanks to the work of John Huxley.

Who is John Huxley and how did he render advantage play useless? Ill discuss more on wheel bias, how it works, and why Huxleys invention has made it all but obsolete.

Roulette games used to run on basic wooden wheels. Manufacturers did their best to make these wheels looked polished and elegant.

However, they didnt take many precautions to make the wheels last. As a result, the wheels experienced wear and tear fairly quickly.

The fretsdividers in between the pocketswere often the first parts to break down. Theyd gradually become looser and allow the ball to drop into the corresponding pockets more easily.

The wheel shaft was another part that could become worn down. When a shaft is loose, it causes the wheel to tilt and favor certain pockets.

Usually, these imperfections are impossible to spot with the naked eye. But one can detect wheel bias by observing and recording results.

The vast majority of gamblers back then didnt realize that roulette games could show bias. However, a few wise players figured this out over time.

Joseph Jager gets credit for being the first gambler to uncover wheel bias. The English engineer travelled to Monte Carlo and made what amounts to several million dollars by finding defective wheels.

Ever since Jagger, several other players have become rich and famous by beating roulette. They all benefited from certain conditions that allowed them to win serious profits.

Even when armed with knowledge of wheel bias, people need to put lots of work into beating the game. Here are a few individuals who put this work in and won fortunes as a result.

Born in Germany in 1931, Richard Jarecki spent the early part of his life running from Nazis. His Jewish family moved from Germany to the United States to escape persecution.

Jarecki attended Duke University, got married, and moved back to Germany. Here, he continued studying in the medical field en route to becoming a doctor.

While pursuing a medical degree, Jarecki also found time to gamble at European casinos. Throughout the 1960s, Jarecki and his wife began recording results on roulette wheels.

After recording tens of thousands of spins and analyzing the results, Richard Jareckis and his wife discovered some biased wheels. They then proceeded to earn big profits from casinos.

They particularly targeted Sanremo Casino in Italy. Sanremo management would eventually ban Jarecki and describe him as a menace to casinos.

They networked with other European casinos to get the word out on Richard Jarecki. But by this time, he had already won $1.2 million, which amounts to $9 million when adjusted for inflation.

Bill Walters is known first and foremost as a great professional sports bettor. Before he became a betting legend, though, he was a wheel bias master.

Walters worked with other gamblers who were collectively known as the Computer Team. In 1986, they started recording roulette results in Atlantic City.

Billy Walters and his team discovered a biased wheel at the Atlantic Club Casino. They put down a $2 million deposit and began playing for high stakes on that specific wheel.

Based on previous research, they knew that the wheel favored 7, 10, 20, 27, and 36. The Computer Team spent the next 38 hours betting on these numbers and winning $3.8 million.

By this point, the Atlantic Club decided to ban the gamblers. However, Walters had already earned enough money to increase his sports gambling bankroll and later become a betting guru.

Gonzalo Garcia Pelayo is a Spanish music producer. While hes attained some fame through his music career, Pelayo is more notable for what hes done in gambling.

The Spaniard gambled quite a bit in the 1990s as a hobby. He especially liked playing roulette for real money at Casino Gran Madrid.

While playing at Casino Gran Madrid, he began speculating that some wheels werent completely impartial. So, he recruited his family members to help him record spins.

The family proceeded to win a fortune from Casino Gran Madrid before being banned. Afterward, they took their act on the road and hit other casinos throughout Europe.

All of these casinos gradually identified and banned the Pelayos from their properties. However, Gonzalo and family won 1.5 million before being essentially blacklisted from European casinos.

Not much information is available on John Huxleys life. What is known, though, is that he started a gaming supply company in 1979.

Located in Stoke-on-Trent, TSC Huxley started by supplying card tables, card shufflers, and more to local casinos.

Huxley was the brains behind this operation when it opened. Apparently, he lives a rather private life due to the lack of available info on him.

But his company continues to be one of the most-notable in terms of gaming supply. They not only serve UK casinos, but also many other gambling establishments worldwide.

In the 1980s, British casinos realized that they were getting decimated by certain roulette players. They looked into the matter and learned that gamblers were using wheel bias against them.

Many of the same casinos would move wheels around at night and/or ban suspected advantage gamblers. These moves proved mildly successful.

However, wheel bias experts still continued to make money. They often identified small marks or other imperfections in a wheel so they could recognize it later.

This way, they didnt need to worry if wheels switched places at night.

Casinos began to realize that they needed a more-permanent method of dealing with their problem. Some gambling establishments went to TSC Huxley in search of sturdier roulette wheels. The company granted their wishes by releasing the Starburst wheel.

Unlike the common all-wooden wheels at the time, Starburst wheels feature metal frets and pockets. These two changes reduce wear and tear on wheels and minimized bias.

TSC Huxleys designs have only gotten better since then. This company continues upgrading roulette wheels to make them last longer and be more resistant to bias.

Gonzalo Garcia Pelayo is the last person to become famous by beating roulette. If anybody has successfully used wheel bias since Pelayo did in the 1990s, then theyve done so discreetly.

Huxleys Starburst wheel marked the beginning of the end for roulette advantage players. Wheels are now much less likely to wear down thanks to the metal pockets and frets.

Im sure that somebody, somewhere effectively used wheel bias since Pelayo. If they did, though, then they either werent as successful or kept a low profile when doing so.

If you had a time machine, you could easily go back and beat roulette. Up until the 1980s and 90s, wheels were much more susceptible to bias.

However, this situation began changing when British casinos commissioned TCS John Huxley to design better roulette wheels.

The company came up with the Starburst wheel, which doesnt break down as easily as wooden wheels. Starburst and other variations are now common at many roulette tables worldwide.

Given the prevalence of Starburst wheels, youre unlikely to beat roulette today. Your only chance to win involves finding the rare casinos that still offer all-wooden wheels.

Of course, you could also try using a roulette computer. These wearable devices help you determine where the ball will land based on the balls and wheels velocity.

The big problem, though, is that roulette computers are outlawed in every gaming jurisdiction and you could get busted by the casinos for cheating.

Realistically, roulette is no longer beatable by legal means. The number of wheels that are susceptible to bias have been reduced drastically.

You could always wear a mini computer under your clothes to clock the wheels and balls velocity. Some companies even sell these computers online.

However, every jurisdiction has outlawed such devices. This means that you need to break the law to win with a computer.

Your only legal route for winning long-term roulette profits is to find an old wooden wheel. Unfortunately, such wheels are extremely rare these days.

You still have a decent chance to win with European roulette (2.70% house edge) or French roulette (1.35%). All you need is a little luck on your side. But the days of you being able to win millions of dollars with wheel bias appear to be gone.

Visit link:

The Fall of Roulette Wheel Bias - John Huxley and Advantage Play - BestUSCasinos.org

Posted in Roulette | Comments Off on The Fall of Roulette Wheel Bias – John Huxley and Advantage Play – BestUSCasinos.org

The problem of prediction in casino – fingerlakes1.com

Posted: at 6:57 am

Almost all gamblers believe that there is a system of signs that may show the way to the prize. They try to outsmart the casino by monitoring the games and making calculations whether their bet will be successful or not. If the player wants to win, he or she makes a prediction about the lucky number in roulette, slot machine, or dice game. Many players believe that there exists a lucky slot machine, roulette wheel, poker table or specific ritual that helps to win. In this article, we will discuss the problem of calculations and rituals aimed at predicting game outcomes in casinos.

Casinos cannot allow the players to take all the money they bet. Otherwise, they will not be able to pay their employees and cover the bills. It makes them introduce a house edge, which is an advantage that the casino takes of you in a long-term run. The house edge is established by the casino, making its complete bankruptcy impossible. Every time you win a prize, the establishment receives a certain percent back. The house edge is also relevant when it comes to digital casinos. Its size usually differs throughout various digital gambling platforms.

Surely, the existence of the house edge does not mean that you cannot win money while gambling at digital platforms. If you choose a casino properly, no house edge will spoil your experience. It is difficult to predict the amounts of money taken from you with the house edge, but you should definitely read relevant reviews about the chosen casino and its house edge practices. It will prepare you for either pleasant or unpleasant surprises. If you have certain expectations on the house edge, you will play much more conveniently.

Physical casinos apply mathematical calculations in order to ensure that the winnings will be distributed randomly. For example, slot machines have an inbuilt computer programmed to make random combinations. The casino achieves such a result due to the Random Number Generator, which provides the results of each bet. The program chooses the symbols and presents them on the screen. The casinos use the computer to generate random numbers, both winning and losing. In this way, they guarantee that one player will not take all the money, and everyone will get equal chances of winning.

Many experienced gamblers believe in different rituals that will help them to place a successful bet or choose a winning slot machine. They try to predict the future by relying on the signs that, according to their calculations, matter much. For example, the players who want to win in blackjack search for the dealers who fail several times in a row. Online players can choose a specific combination of symbols that they consider as winning. The most devoted enthusiasts even try to conduct mathematical calculations while observing the game.

Those who managed to win with the help of such an approach or probably with a mere luck may face the problem of withdrawing money or paying big fees. It is hard to choose a good online casino, but Fukurocasinos.com will help you by providing the best reviews of online gambling platforms that apply Venus Point Casino ( ) payment system. You will find useful information about the online casinos that use Venus Point, which as an important indicator of a casinos credibility. The reviews give you a chance to withdraw more money after you win in online games.

Those who prefer slot machines choose the one which provides frequent wins. It may seem that winning in such attractions completely depends on luck, but some payers have a different opinion. They spend time while other users play and observe the behavior of the device. People believe that if the machine lets the player win, then it is a lucky one. Some players developed a different approach. They think that if the machine is greedy for long time, it will soon give the user a desired jackpot. Such an approach is especially popular among some users of online casinos.

Each player has a different opinion based on his or her experience. In reality, their manipulations do not influence the way of the game. Nobody can make an accurate prediction because people dont know when they will have a lucky moment in life. Players think that fate gives them signs of future success, but casinos show that only a random mathematical principle measures losses and winnings. A program installed on the slot machine can either offer ten prizes in a row or do not allow the player to win money for dozens of minutes.

All our gambling predictions are often ruined by the rules of casinos. While making predictions on prizes, mind the house edge that works for physical and online casinos. When you are betting, the computer generates the numbers or symbols which are winning or losing, Everything depends on a random principle instead of specific winning schedules. If you are lucky, you have to be secure about the withdrawal of the prize, which means that you have to read reviews of online casinos that use Venus Point. Just remember that luck and rational betting strategies mean much more than predictions in gambling!

Excerpt from:

The problem of prediction in casino - fingerlakes1.com

Posted in Roulette | Comments Off on The problem of prediction in casino – fingerlakes1.com

Will iGaming in the US ever hit the heights they have in the UK? | GWW – Geeks World Wide

Posted: at 6:57 am

This article is written and contributed by Justine Shaw and published in accordance with our disclosure policy.

As recently as twenty-five years ago, the concept of the iGaming was a relatively novel one. The thought that you could play casino games like roulette, blackjack, poker and even slots from the comfort of your own home was genuinely mold-breaking and extraordinary.But fast forward to 2020 and the online casino is now intrinsically woven into the fabric of many nations and cultures and it seems like its here to stay.

Of all the countries in the world, its arguably the UK that has embraced the online casino more closely than any other. The figures speak for themselves. According to the Gambling Commission, the body that has overseen the UK industry since 2007, between April 2018 and March 2019 the total gaming revenue was 14.4 billion ($17.5 billion). Of this 5.3 billion ($6.5 billion) was generated by the remote sector, the largest part of which consists of online casinos.

In terms of numbers, around 340 casinos are licensed in the UK. And if you add many more that operate under licenses from different gambling authorities including in Malta and the Channel Island of Jersey, the figure rises to well over 500.

The secrets of the UKs success

When it comes to exactly what has made online casinos so very popular in the UK, several factors have played a part. The first is that the British have a long tradition of being fans of gambling in all its forms. For example, the first horseraces took place as long ago as the 17th century under the rule of Charles II. Today, horseracing is a huge multi-million-pound industry in the UK with showpiece races like the Grand National and the Cheltenham Gold Cup attracting millions of pounds worth of bets from people drawn from all works of life.

Around a century after the first horserace, the first casinos started to appear, mainly as exclusive gentlemens clubs. But, into the 20th century, casinos became a form of entertainment open to all and today youll find the there are many in the major cities that are enjoyed by a wide range of people.

So, with a natural propensity for enjoying sports and games of chance, as well as having a strong casino culture, its no wonder that the online equivalent has proved to be so very popular.

The operators of the online casinos have also had a major role to play in their huge popularity. They have consistently used the very latest technology to offer new games and playing experiences, as well as making very generous welcome bonus offers to attract new players.

Tech leads to success

A good example of the sort of technological innovation that has been used in the UK is the so-called live casino. Instead of playing against a computer program, live roulette and blackjack action is streamed to the players PC or mobile device. The action of the roulette wheel or the dealing of the cards is then digitized to allow the games to be played online. By capturing some of the excitement of a real casino experience, including the chance to chat with live dealers, with the convenience of online play it has proved to be a winning combination.

Another major contributing factor that has elevated the success of UK online casinos to the level they have reached today has been the rise of mobile gaming. In line with the general trend towards mobile internet use, now more people play at online casinos through this medium than through PCs and laptops.

Turning to the US, its a country that undeniably has an equally strong culture of gambling as the UK and many States boast casinos, with Nevada and New Jersey leading the way. There is no question that online gambling is on the rise in the US, particularly in New Jersey, where online casinos are the preferred choice for many due to the convenience and quality of games on offer.

But whether online casinos ever become quite as successful in the US as they are in the UK is open to debate. There are points to be made on both sides of the argument and the most obvious one to suggest a bright future is that Americans like technology. For evidence of this, you only have to look at the excitement that the arrival of a new iPhone or long-awaited video game generates.

The fact that a large proportion of the population, away from the big cities, may live a considerable distance from a bricks and mortar casino also means that the ability to visit one remotely could prove to be a very good alternative. This will become especially true if the live online casino starts to take off in the big way that it has in the UK.

Going mobile

As already discussed, smartphone usage has also been key to the increasing popularity of online casinos in the UK and this could also prove to be critical in the US. With 5G now upon us, connection speeds will only get faster, and with an estimated 81% of all Americans owning smartphones a vast majority have potential access to online casinos.

On the other side of the debate, the online casino industry is at a very different stage of its development compared with the UK. There are far fewer operators to choose from and the marketing behind them is far less overt than in the UK. Over there, they are frequently advertised on TV and they are also heavily involved in sports sponsorship too. For example, the majority of soccer teams in the top two divisions of the league have online gambling companies as their shirt sponsors. Theres no denying that this level of exposure must surely have an effect.

So, looking ahead, theres a great prize in store for any online casino operators who can make it big in the US. If the UK model could be emulated, it would mean that a generous proportion of the $80 billion + that is raised by gambling revenue each year would be heading in their direction. And, with a figure like this to consider, there really is everything to play for.

Link:

Will iGaming in the US ever hit the heights they have in the UK? | GWW - Geeks World Wide

Posted in Roulette | Comments Off on Will iGaming in the US ever hit the heights they have in the UK? | GWW – Geeks World Wide

The Art of Communicating Risk – Harvard Business Review

Posted: at 6:57 am

Executive Summary

Sometimes during a crisis we dont know how bad the situation really is.Consider the following scenario involving a data privacy violations: A company discovers that sensitive data about a user is exposed in an unencrypted database for 24 hours. Has anyone accessed it? If so, what, if anything, can they glean from it? Firms facing the question of whether and how to communicate risk often err too far in either direction. When organizations alert their customers to every potential risk, they create notification fatigue. When firms wait too long to communicate in an effort to shield users from unnecessary worry customers interpret time lags as incompetence, or worse, as obfuscation. The answer is to trust that customers can process uncertainty, as long as its framed in the right way. Using techniques from behavioral science, the authors suggest better ways to communicate uncertain risks in way that will protect customers and foster trust.

Most organizations can cope with straightforward bad news, and so can most people. We absorb the shock, and move on. But what happens when we dont know how bad the news actually is?

When it comes to crises, the news companies must deliver is often potential bad news. How should a technology company react when it learns that it might have suffered a breach of your data, or a supermarket discovers it might have sold you contaminated lettuce, or a medical device maker learns that patients may have a defective hip replacement? Communicating about uncertainty what people call risk communications in practice has become one of the most important challenges faced by anyone who needs to convey or consume information.

Risk communications are more important than ever during the current pandemic. Scientists, policy-makers, and companies alike are uncertain of many basic facts about Covid-19 with crucial implications for personal and societal decisions. How infectious is this new virus? How likely is it to kill people? What will be its long-term economic, social, and cultural consequences?

Even before Covid-19 hit, communications were increasingly becoming an important part of corporate and organizational management. Consider the following scenario involving a data privacy violations: A company discovers that sensitive data about a user is exposed in an unencrypted database for 24 hours. Has anyone accessed it? If so, what can they do with it right now? What will they be able to do with it five years from now, with machine learning techniques that will be available at that time? The answers are typically, we dont really know.That is not an assessment that most organizations or individuals know how to deliver in an effective way. This has major consequences for individual firms and for firms collectively. The tech sector, in particular, has suffered a large and growing trust deficit with users, customers, and regulators, in part because tech companies struggle to communicate what they do and do not know about the side effects of their products in ways that are transparent and meaningful.

When we talked to experts across eight industry sectors, we uncovered a common dilemma: firms facing the question of whether and how to communicate risk often err too far in either direction. When organizations alert their customers to every potential risk, they create notification fatigue. Customers tend to tune out after a short while, and firms lose an opportunity to strengthen a trust relationship with the subset of customers who really might have been at most risk.

When firms do the opposite for example by waiting too long to communicate in an effort to shield users from unnecessary worry there is also a price. Customers interpret time lags as incompetence, or worse, as obfuscation and protection of corporate reputations at the expense of protecting customers. The more mis-steps firms make in either direction, the greater the trust deficit becomes, and the harder it is to thread the needle and get the communications right.

To make matters worse, individual firms have a collective effect when they communicate about uncertainty with customers and other stakeholders. The average citizen and customer is the target of many such communications coming from a variety of sources with a cumulative impact on notification fatigue and ultimately the level of ambient trust between firms and the public. Its an ugly bundle of negative externalities that compound an already difficult problem.

We believe it doesnt have to continue this way. Decision science and cognitive psychology have produced some reliable insights about how people on both sides of an uncertainty communication can do better.

The inherent challenge for risk communicators is peoples natural desire for certainty and closure. An experimental Russian roulette game illustrates this most poignantly: forced to play Russian roulette with a 6-chamber revolver containing either 1 bullet or 4 bullets, most people would pay a lot more to remove the single bullet in the first instance than to remove a single bullet in the second instance (even though the risk reduction is the same). Kahneman and Tversky called this the certainty effect, and it explains why zero-deductible insurance policies are over-priced and yet people still buy them.

But while they dont like it, people can process uncertainty, especially if they are armed with some standard tools for decision making. Consider the Drug Facts Box, developed by researchers at Dartmouth.

As far back as the late 1970s, behavioral scientists criticized the patient package inserts that were included with prescription drugs as absurdly dense and full of jargon. The drug facts box (developed in the 1990s) reversed the script. It built on a familiar template from peoples common experience (the nutrition fact box that appears on food packaging) and was designed to focus attention on the information that would directly inform decision-making under uncertainty. It uses numbers, rather than adjectives like rare, common, or positive results. It addresses risks and benefits, and in many cases compares a particular drug to known alternatives. Importantly, it also indicates the quality of the evidence to-date. Its not perfect, but research suggests that it works pretty well, both in extensive testing with potential users through randomized trials and in practice where it has been shown to improve decision making by patients.

So why arent basic principles from the science of risk communications being applied more widely in technology, finance, transportation, and other sectors? Imagine an Equifax data breach fact box created to situate the 2017 data-breach incident and the risks for customers. The fact box could indicate whether the Equifax breach was among the 10 largest breaches of the last 5 years. It would provide a quantitative assessment of the consequences that follow from such breaches, helping people assess what to expect in this case. For example: In the last five data breaches of over 100 million records, on average 3% of people whose records were stolen reported identity theft within a year.

Or, imagine a Deepwater Horizon fact box, that listed for the public the most important potential side effects of oil spills on marine and land ecosystems, and a range for estimating their severity. Weve come to the view that these two examples and countless others didnt happen that way, largely because most people working in communications functions dont believe that users and customers can deal reasonably with uncertainty and risk.

Of course, the Equifax breach and Deepwater Horizon oil spills are extreme examples of crisis-level incidents, and in the Equifax case, disclosure was legally mandated. But firms make decisions everyday about whether and how to communicate about less severe incidents, many of which do not have mandated disclosure requirements. In the moment, its easy for companies to default to a narrow response of damage control, instead of understanding risk communications as a collective problem, which, when done well, can enhance trust with stakeholders.

To start to repair the trust deficit will require a significant retrofit of existing communications practices. Here are three places to start.

Stop improvising. Firms will never be able to reduce uncertainty to zero, but they can commit to engaging with customers around uncertainty in systematic, predictable ways. A standard framework would provide an empirically proven, field-tested playbook for the next incident or crisis. Over time, it would set reasonable expectations among users and customers for what meaningful and transparent communication looks like under uncertainty, help increase the publics risk fluency, and limit the damage inflicted by nefarious actors who prey on the publics anxieties about risk. Ideally, this standard would be created by a consortium of firms across different sectors. Widespread adoption by organizations would level the playing field for all firms, and raise the bar for smaller firms that lack the required competencies in-house.

Change the metric for success, and measure results. Avoiding negative press should not be the primary objective for firms that are faced with communicating uncertainty. In the short term, the primary goal should be to equip customers with the information they need to interpret uncertainty and act to manage their risk. In the long term, the goal should be to increase levels of ambient trust and to reduce risks where possible. Communicators need to demonstrate that what they are doing is working, by creating yardsticks that rigorously measure the effectiveness of communications against both these short and long term goals.

Design for risk communications from the beginning. Consider what it would mean if every product were built from the start with the need to communicate uncertainty about how it will perform when released into the wild that is, risk communication by design. If risk communications were pushed down through organizations into product development, wed see innovation in user experience and user interface design for communicating about uncertainty with customers. Wed see cognitive psychology and decision science skills integrated into product teams. And wed see feedback loops built directly into products as part of the design process, telling firms whether they are meaningfully improving customers ability to make informed choices.

People are naturally inclined to prefer certainty and closure, but in a world where both are in short supply, trust deficits arent an inevitable fact of nature. Were optimistic that organizations can do better collectively by making disciplined use of the existing science.

See original here:

The Art of Communicating Risk - Harvard Business Review

Posted in Roulette | Comments Off on The Art of Communicating Risk – Harvard Business Review

Page 49«..1020..48495051..»