Daily Archives: February 3, 2022

Colin A. Young| State House News Service

The ads are inescapable. Some claim to offer "risk-free" betting while others tout hundreds or thousands of dollars in "free" or "bonus" play for new customers. But left unchecked, the star-studded commercials and digital ads can also open a world of trouble for young people and others at risk of irresponsible gambling, expanded gambling opponents and public health advocates warned Feb. 2.

For the operators, aggressive advertising is a fact of doing business in a growing field in which numerous deep-pocketed companies are competing to keep their existing customers and attract new ones. But for people like Mark Gottlieb, it is a warning of the consequences that could come as a result of legalizing sports betting in Massachusetts, such as bettors losing their savings, greater rates of problem gambling, exacerbated income inequalityand increased health care costs.

"We're in like the 1950s in tobacco years when it comes to the gambling industry. In states with sports betting, the advertising is absolutely saturating the market, and everyone in those markets is noticing it. It seems like it's overtaken ads for insurance, which I didn't even think was possible, cars and even beer by a considerable margin," Gottlieb, the executive director of the Public Health Advocacy Institute at Northeastern University School of Law, said Feb. 2 during an event hosted by national advocacy group Stop Predatory Gambling. "And with the big game coming up and other games coming in March, we can see it increasing even more."

New Yorkers were bombarded with ads for sportsbooks when that state launched mobile betting in early January, coinciding with the start of the NFL playoffs. Comedian Conan O'Brien tweeted Jan. 9 that it had been almost seven minutes since he had seen a betting ad. "Am I dead?" he asked.

"If you live in New York State, every single ad on social will be for sports betting. For today and forever after," Will Hershey, CEO of a New York investment firm that offers a sports betting ETF,tweeted.

Harry Levant, a gambling addict in recovery and director of education for Stop Predatory Gambling, said advertising is "the tip of the iceberg."

"It's the piece that you can see, but so much additional public harm is going on beneath the surface. We hope to use the focus on advertising as a launching pad to begin to further educate the public on what the gambling establishment is doing and how it is completely inconsistent with public health," he said.

In 2015, it was the ubiquity of the ads for DraftKings and FanDuel on television, the internet and at places like South Station that helped daily fantasy sports break into the mainstream. But it also put the activity onto regulators' radar screens and led them to impose restrictions on it. A review of DraftKings and the industry in general launched by Attorney General Maura Healey eventually led to penalties for DraftKings and FanDuel, and consumer protection regulations for daily fantasy sports.

It was the constant presence of advertising for DraftKings during last fall's MLB playoffs that caught the attention of Gaming Commissioner Brad Hill, who voted last summeras a member of the Massachusetts House to legalize the sports wagering.

"And they pushed it and pushed it and pushed it, every single inning that we watched of the game last night," Hill said in October of the betting ads.

At that same October meeting, members of the Gaming Commission flagged their heightened interest in taking a closer look at advertising practices in both the casino gambling industry they already regulate and in the sports betting world they could come to oversee. On Feb. 2, the Gaming Commission agreed to schedule its first foray into gaming advertising practices for March 3, early in Problem Gambling Awareness Month.

A six-yearproblem gambling studyreleased in April identified demographic groups particularly at risk of experiencing gambling-related problems in Massachusetts, including males and people in lower-income groups.

Among the policy recommendations that Mark Vander Linden, the commission's director of research and responsible gaming, presented to commissioners for consideration was to "[l]imit gambling advertising and availability, especially in lower socioeconomic neighborhoodsor groups that may be at increased risk of experiencing gambling harms."

Vander Linden said there are "definitely some lessons to be learned from other jurisdictions and sports wagering advertising" and highlighted the idea of a "whistle-to-whistle" ban on sports betting advertising, like the policy in the UK that prohibits betting ads during live sporting events.

"So if we head down that path, it's something that I think should be really closely considered," he said in October.

The sports betting bill (H 3977) that the House voted 156-3 to pass in July would direct the Gaming Commission to write regulations to prohibit any ad that is "deceptive, false, misleadingor untrueor tends to deceive or create a misleading impression whether directlyor by ambiguity or omission"; any advertising or marketing that would appeal directly to people younger than 21; and "any form of advertising, marketing or branding that the commission deems unacceptable or disruptive to the viewer experience at a sports event."

The Senate has been far less interested in making it legal to bet on sports in Massachusetts.

Senate President Karen Spilka, who was among the opponents of a 2010 push to legalize casino gambling before leading the successful effort to legalize casino gambling in 2011, has for years been noncommittal about taking the issue up.

"You know, some want to do it, some are uncertain they want to do it," she said. "But we will be taking a look at it with the senators."

Sen. Eric Lesser, who has proposed his own sports betting bill and has led the Senate's consideration of the idea, said last year that protections for people with gambling addictions would be a priority area if the Senate does consider a sports betting bill.

"It is, at the end of the day, a gambling product, and we do need to remember that. We have a lot of senators that are concerned about that and want to make sure that people who might have an addiction, people who might fall prey to bad activity, are protected," he said. "So we're going to make sure that any bill ... has a lot of consumer protections in place and really sets a high standard for the quality of play."

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Relentless ad wave fueling gambling sector as regulators show more interest in industry - Wicked Local

Patrick Fosters book begins at Slough station, where he is 500,000 in debt and steeling himself to jump under a train. Foster had been a compulsive gambler for 12 years and suicide seemed the only solution.

The gambling started in his late teens, at a point when his future looked very different. He was an up-and-coming cricketer with Northamptonshire County Cricket Club, as well as a full-time student at Durham University. But this enviable combination started to slip away when he entered a betting shop for the first time.

During that first visit he won a few hundred pounds and soon he was spending most of his spare time gambling. Fosters friends knew he liked a punt, but he concealed its growing extent from everyone. He found he could not maintain focus on his cricket and Northants let him go.

Fortunately, all was not lost not yet. He managed to graduate from Durham and get a job at Lloyds of London. Much less fortunately, he continued betting. Many bets were now online via his mobile phone. They were bigger. Using digital not physical money meant it flowed faster, he says.

Foster had the sense to realise that his City job and affluent London lifestyle were seriously accelerating his gambling. To reduce temptation, he took a job at a boarding school in Oxford. He was a good teacher, but even after this fresh start he could not curb his habit. In a scenario that could be straight from St Trinians, he approached parents to lend him money, inventing pretexts to conceal that the loans were to fund his gambling.n Shortly after, apprehensive of his lies being uncovered, he moved to another school.

Gambling is an overlooked addiction. Drugs and alcohol gain much more media attention, despite an estimated million problem gamblers in the UK Reading the minutiae of Fosters descent (recorded with the help of sports journalist Will Macpherson) is itself compulsive. There is a horrible fascination in finding out just how far he will go to feed his addiction, as his habit steadily shrinks his personality down to fit the dimensions of his smartphone screen.

Thankfully, Foster finally got lucky. He stepped back from the platform edge and stopped gambling with the support of his girlfriend and family. The debt charity StepChange consolidated his debts so that he can pay them off in instalments.

Even so, while reforms of gambling legislation are due soon, they will be challenging now that online gambling is so entrenched the perils of which this book charts so deftly, along with probing why professional sportspeople may be especially vulnerable. Cricket had given me such a rush, says Foster. The only thing that I could find that came close was gambling.

If you have been affected by any of the issues mentioned in this article, you can call the Samaritans free on 116 123.

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Might Bite, by Patrick Foster with Will Macpherson, review: a deft study of gambling addiction - iNews

Let The Gambling Begin: The Olympics will draw record levels of interest from gamblers thanks to the rise of mobile sports betting in the U.S.

Gamblers have been betting on the Olympic Games since the elite sporting event first took place in ancient Greece. But the Beijing Olympics marks the second year that millions of Americans will be able to legally place bets on their favorite country or athlete from their mobile phones. And the action is expected to hit a record level this year.

There are about 30 states where sports betting is now legal, including 18 that allow online sports wagering. This means more than 100 million Americans can place a legal wager where they live. And the money gamblers have been putting up in new legal states is mind-blowing. New Yorks mobile sports betting market hit $1.17 billion in total wagers within 15 days of the programs launch, more than twice as much wagered at sportsbooks on the Las Vegas Strip in December.

Bill Krackomberger, a veteran professional sports gambler, says the rise of mobile sports betting has made it easier for anyone to put a couple of dollars on a bobsled race or a figure skating competition.

It will be the most bet Olympics ever, says Krackomberger, who is also the founder of sports betting app KrackWins. Its a different market now with new states, which will translate to ridiculous amounts of money for the sportsbooks and a catastrophe for the people betting at home in their underwear.

Johnny Avello, the head of DraftKings race and sportsbook, says the Olympics is still considered a novelty bet and the Beijing Games will only be the third Olympics DraftKings has offered. But thanks to a week-long lull in football before theLos Angeles Rams and the Cincinnati Bengals face off in Super Bowl LVI, the Olympics will fill a void.

It will be a record this year, says Avello. Theres more events, more people are aware they can bet, and now there are 18 different jurisdictions to place a wager.

Betting on Bell: Mariah Bell, a U.S. figure skater, is the oldest U.S. women's figure skater to go to the Games in nearly 100 years.

Sportsbook directors in Las Vegas say interest around the Olympics is still relatively low compared with moneymakers like the NFL. But its a new betting opportunity: it was not legal to bet on the Olympics until 2016 in Nevada and sports betting was federally illegal, except in the Silver State, until 2018.

Interest in betting on the Games has been growing. According to a report by the American Gambling Association, 20 million American adults planned to bet on any one event during the Tokyo Games last summer. Thats nearly as many people who bet on theSuper Bowl, the biggest money betting event in the U.S. Last year, gamblers bet an estimated $4.3 billion on the Super Bowl.

Duane Colucci, race and sports manager at the Rampart Casino in Las Vegas, says hes expecting good handle, but the power of patriotism might open a gamblers wallet.

Its a significant event, people are interested and theyre passionate about their country, says Colucci. Were looking for a good handle, not a superior handle, but its lucky its happening before the Super Bowl and theres not a full menu of other sports games.

Offering Olympic prop betssay, which country will win the most medalsis also a way for physical sportsbooks to keep up with their mobile counterparts.

Everyone is expanding, whether its FanDuel, DraftKings, Caesars, theyre putting out player propositions, says Colucci. To compete, we will put up Olympic events to garner some handle.

Most of the action will be from casual gamblers as professional bettors typically dont take the Olympics too seriously. There are too many unpredictable elements to the Games to entice sharps. Another damper on the action will be the fact that players from the National Hockey League will not be going to the Games this year and Chinas Zero Covid policy could take out a favorite athlete or an entire team. (On Monday, there were already119 Covid-19 casesamong athletes and personnel in the Olympic Village.)

Its a fun bet, Krackomberger says of gambling on gold medals. You want to bet America to win something. But I wouldn't recommend this for anybody. I think betting on the Olympics, like any other future betting, is for suckers.

The rest is here:

Gamblers Expected To Wager A Record Amount On Beijing Olympics - Forbes

Have you ever watched a bet movie that left you thinking about the excellent scenes and betting masterpiece that you had just witnessed? Well, several good movies do have that effect.

While Las Vegas casinos and the respective high life may be considered as the land of all possibilities when it comes to staking, bet movies, on the other hand, brings our imaginations of gambling perfection into reality. Many all-time great casino movies list features some of the greatest gambling recorded acts ever. Also, some stand out and are evergreen.

In this article, CasinoTop experts reviewed some of the best gambling movies ever produced, including the greatest casino gambling movies of all time and other sportsbook bets made with impeccable artistry and imagination. Some of the films listed in this article are winners and nominees of numerous awards, including best picture winner and lots more.

This act is portrayed by two main characters, Elliott Gould and George Segal, who played Bill and Charlie, respectively. Each of them had a gambling addiction but on different levels. Claire was far gone as an addict and placed bets on anything with odds. He also lived with two prostitutes. On the other hand, Bill was on his way to getting addicted but still had a day job.

Bill became friends with Charlie after the duo were robbed and beaten by a man that had lost on a poker bet against them. Charlie introduced Bill to gambling completely. From there, both friends kept Losing money until Bill had to quit his job and move out of his resident City. Bill and Claire continued betting on the road and were the centrepiece of many twists and turns.

They finally had a big break when Bill was up for a table-poker bet with a top wager. The first round saw Bill win $18,000. Bill continued on a hot streak and hit up to $82,000 before losing one bet. After the loss, Bill became highly withdrawn from the betting lifestyle and was generally apathetic compared to Charlie.

Both friends shared their spoils on their way out of the casino, and Bill told Charlie that he was quitting. This led to both friends parting ways and following different paths.

This movie featured James Caan as Axel Freed, an English Professor character addicted to gambling. While he was able to keep his problem away from his family, his compulsion had taken hold such that he was in serious debt to Hips, a man that admired him. Hips threatened that there would be serious consequences if Freed didnt pay his debts soon.

Freed was able to convince his mom to lend him $44,000 and travelled with his girlfriend to Las Vegas. They could make quite some fortune but Freed again squandered everything after he went on to stake on impossible games.

With loan sharks and mafias after Freed and his Girlfriend, he convinced one of his students, who was now a basketballer, to cut off points so that he (Freed) could win the bet. Everything went to plan, and Freed won a considerable sum that helped him pay back his debt.

This film pushed the main actors career into the limelight. Obviously, at the time of this act, an online casino was not a thing, and top-rated casinos such as the Yukon Gold online casino was not available. Currently, though, you can live the fantasy of these acts by going for the different slots that this digital platform offers. You can play baccarat, craps, roulettes and a series of other options here.

Many best acts have been produced, but this particular one stands out thanks to the balance between crime and gambling. This movie involved a jeweller that played different bets and was in debt. He fell into different troubles while also playing a fast one on his acquaintances. In the end, the bettor was able to gain $1.2 million but never got to use it after he was shot in the face by one of the people he had held captive.

This act featured Daniel Craig as Bond, an m16 spy on a mission to defraud Le Chiffre, a terrorist funder and professional poker player. Based on Ian Flemings novel, Bond mission was to defraud the terrorist funder in a poker game. With many manoeuvres, both men reached a climax in an all-or-nothing contest.

In this movie, many were up and down, with twists that saw many deaths. In the end, Bond discovers that even his closest allies are not so genuine.

Croupier is a story of a writer who picked up a job as a croupier in a casino. As he continued his job to coordinate stakes, he began to develop an inordinate desire to find means of defrauding the Clients without them Knowing.

After having an affair with a coworker, the croupier developed issues with his girlfriend. His girlfriend broke up with him. He was soon befriended by a lady player where he worked. The lady convinced him to help her and her gang rob his workplace.

As the story unfolds, the croupier finds out that he doesnt need the money he so much desires. There are deaths, suspense and surprises in this film.

This article has considered some of the greatest gambling blockbusters. All the names in this article were pioneers of many related acts and have remained evergreen in the hearts of fans worldwide. Several acts also stand out but were not listed among the top five. Not to worry, there is an honourable mention category for these acts following their contribution in defining history.

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5 Most Famous Gambling Movies Of All Times - Film Threat

The British Medical Journal (BMJ) has argued that the industry should not be trusted to set responsible gambling guidelines, as it examines the UK governments Gambling Act Review.

In an editorial, the organisation offered its opinion in anticipation of the Gambling Act Review, the next stage of which, a white paper outlining plans for reform, is expected to be published in the spring of 2022.

BMJ put forth the idea that allowing the gambling industry to be involved in decisions regarding the prevention of gambling harms represents a conflict of interest.

The journal criticised the industrys downstream approach to harm prevention, centred around providing support to those at risk rather than targeting the root causes of the issue.

BMJ said: We do not allow tobacco companies to design tobacco control policies, yet the gambling industry, through the organisations it funds, shapes our responses to the harms.

A public health approach would learn from the growing research on commercial determinants of health and how concepts such as corporate social responsibility are often abused.

The BMJs editorial also suggested that the law should examine gambling harm in the broader context of gambling as a whole, rather than seeing gambling as a recreational activity which only becomes a problem to those who gamble after the fun stops.

The report added: With a looming cost of living crisis, is it really acceptable for many families to contribute substantial amounts of their diminishing disposable income to gambling companies, exploited by pervasive advertising holding out illusory prospects of winnings?

As accounts emerge of families forced to choose between heating their homes and feeding themselves, we cannot stand back while their hopes are exploited to benefit the industry through the coercion of circumstance.

The publication also called on lawmakers to ensure that the gambling industry is responsible for proving lack of harm, as there is sufficient evidence to suggest that gambling is damaging to health.

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BMJ argues industry should not be involved in decisions on gambling harm - iGaming Business

By: Josh Sens February 1, 2022

Do you like Jordan Spieth this week? Our expert does.

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The West Coast Swing continues this week with a stop that needs no introduction: the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am.

What was born decades back as Bing Crosbys Clambake lives on today as part competition, part cocktail party, with Bill Murray as leading man, and a supporting cast of celebrities and Tour pros.

Daniel Berger is the defending champ, and hes in the field again. But hes not the odds-on favorite. That designation goes to Patrick Cantlay, who sits atop the betting board, just ahead of Berger, Jason Day, Jordan Spieth, Cameron Tringale and Justin Rose.

The tournament plays on a three-course rota, with Spyglass Hill and the Monterey Peninsula Country Club (Shore) in the mix over the first two days. On Saturday and Sunday, the entire field plays on Pebble only.

The current weather forecast calls for partly cloudy to sunny skies this weekend, with temperatures in the mid-60s. Scores should get into that range, too.

But who will shoot some of the lowest numbers?

For those predictions, we turn to Erick Lindgren, GOLF.coms expert prognosticator. The terms are the same as ever: we give Lindgren a $1,000 gambling budget (just play money), and he supplies us with his five top picks. Here are Lindgrens wagers for the event, which kicks off Thursday morning in Monterey.

(Looking to play any of these bets yourself? We teamed with BetMGM and the online sports book is offering a Risk-Free Bet of up to $1,000).

Lindgren was among the first last year to go all in on Spieths resurgence, and a T3 at Pebble was where the resurgent play began. There are courses and events where Jordan should not be a dog to anyone, Lindgren says. Pebble is one of those.

Jasons history here is simply too good to ignore, says Lindgren, who also likes what he saw out of Day last week at Torrey Pines. The back pain is gone (for now, anyway), and Days stellar short remains intact. Lets ride his good health, hot hand and history here, Lindgren says.

It seems like another lifetime now, but it was just two years ago that Taylor held off a fast-charging Phil Mickelson and won by four shots in this event. His game is starting to percolate, which matches up with love for this tournament, Lindgren says.

Lindgren is a banking on a repeat performance out of Lashley, who opened with six straight birdies on Pebble last year for an opening round 65. Even with a final-round triple bogey, Lashley finished T5. I look for spots to back Nate, and this is definitely a good one, Lindgren says.

Theegalas stock has been on the rise, but Lindgren still sees him as a great value. This is a bet on talent, trying to get in early on him, Lindgren says.

A golf, food and travel writer, Josh Sens has been a GOLF Magazine contributor since 2004 and now contributes across all of GOLFs platforms. His work has been anthologized in The Best American Sportswriting. He is also the co-author, with Sammy Hagar, of Are We Having Any Fun Yet: the Cooking and Partying Handbook.

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5 picks I love at the Pebble Beach Pro-Am, according to a professional gambler - Golf.com