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> A 2024 Wall Street Journal report, for example, found that 70% of the profits from one online gambling company came from less than 1% of its users. Betting p

> A 2024 Wall Street Journal report, for example, found that 70% of the profits from one online gambling company came from less than 1% of its users. Betting platforms assign highly profitable customers "concierges" who reach out and prompt them to gamble, offer incentives, and work to keep them betting. It's insidious and wrong - the platforms actively identify and take advantage of addicts. For most, a lottery ticket or an online bet is just buying entertainment - not much different from a movie ticket or steam game. Turns out, though, this majority isn't the target customer; we're just the top of the funnel as these platforms algorithmically search for personalities they can abuse, rob, and financially destroy.

OptionOfT 7mo ago
The same thing happens with in-app purchases. A friend of mine worked at Disney, and it is insane how much data they capture on their players/spenders and how they use it for the sole purpose of triggering a popup at the right time, at the right price, that would maximize spending/gambling on loot boxes.
- andrepd 7mo ago
  Algorithmic optimisation will be the death of us. Over-dramatic? Maybe, but this thought springs to my mind more and more.
- Triphibian 7mo ago
  The first time I heard "whale" mentioned in the video game space was at a GDC panel around a game called Puzzle Pirates, where the dev noted that the bulk of their in-game purchases were made by a small group of "whale" players. In 2003 purchasable skins, pets, hats, etc were pretty new.
  - fakedang 7mo ago
    I remember that one and remember being super exasperated about not being able to do anything without paying upfront for it. Ended up switching to Club Penguin instead lol.
dandanua 7mo ago
> these platforms algorithmically search for personalities they can abuse, rob, and financially destroy With the AI progress, there will be no need in a search for personalities - algorithms will make you one. And this can be applied to any company producing entertainment (e.g. social networks), not just gambling.
serf 7mo ago
>Betting platforms assign highly profitable customers "concierges" who reach out and prompt them to gamble, offer incentives, and work to keep them betting. It's insidious and wrong - the platforms actively identify and take advantage of addicts. this isn't new. a relative is an MVP at a casino she dumps cash into. The pit bosses comp all of her meals and call her on days that she doesn't show up. It's all sold to the customer as friendly-people-who-care and the people eat that up, especially lonely elderly folks. She fell at one such casino and ended up suing them, she wondered why all her friends stopped calling her, so she moved casinos and low-and-behold she was able to make friends there, too! To be fair, like another poster mentioned, they do this everywhere people spend a lot of money, not just gambling. Car dealerships are lousy with this kind of 'concierge'-ness. They, too, take advantage of elderly folks who have the money for a new car that they don't yet realize they need.
- JumpCrisscross 7mo ago
  To be fair, what you’ve describing strikes me as closer to hospitality than gambling per se. I live in a ski town. There are absolutely regulars at the Four Seasons who tip well in exchange for being “friends” with the staff. The fact that they never hang out outside work hours doesn’t seem to bother them.
  - kibwen 7mo ago
    This seems instructive for considering when a difference in degree makes for a difference in kind. Let's call this "whale potential": the amount of money that a power user can naturally funnel into a casino over a single visit is multiple orders of magnitude more than the amount of money that a power user can funnel into a ski resort over a single visit. For a casino, the act of a customer losing money is not merely a side effect of the activity, it is the primary effect of the activity.
    - postflopclarity 7mo ago
      I think you might be underestimating how much money can be spent at a ski resort.
themafia 7mo ago
> not much different from a movie ticket or steam game. Movies require an investment of your time so it's somewhat hard to become "addicted" to them. There are "steam game library" addicts though. > this majority isn't the target customer Of course they are. They just aren't prioritized for high cost user enticements. The company only exists if the majority lose. They have big losers and little losers. They aren't here to "entertain" you. Which features of their service are designed to heighten "entertainment" I wonder?
Spooky23 7mo ago
That’s like saying cigarettes are the same as scented candles because both involve flame. The difference is that gambling, like cigarettes, delivers a dopamine fix. The playbook is well aligned with cigarettes — you target brands to the population. Draft Kings is like mass market cigarettes, targeting low income males, soldiers, old people. The “most profitable customer” metric is misleading - you need mass adoption to lure in the whales. My son is 14 - sports gambling is a routine conversation among his cohort and many kids are actively gambling in school with accounts provided by parents.
PaulRobinson 7mo ago
This sort of scheme was banned in the UK - the place where bookmaking was invented, and many of the largest global brands are run from (albeit technically trading from Malta or Gibrlatar) - a few years back. Why? Well... suicides. You're going to start seeing gambling-related suicides in the next couple of years, if you haven't already. If you can learn anything from the UK, learn this: - VIP schemes kill people - Online casinos and video slots kill people faster than sports betting do - The industry will always "self-regulate" to the point where its still harmful, but palatable enough that law makers will look the other way to keep the tax raised from it coming in I have skin in the game (I write code that profitably trades on sports betting exchanges), and think it's possible to make gambling a healthy and fun thing to do, but the American market is ~5-10 years behind the UK market, and I can see it's going to get ugly before it gets better (not that the UK market is perfect yet, either).

OptionOfT 7mo ago

The same thing happens with in-app purchases. A friend of mine worked at Disney, and it is insane how much data they capture on their players/spenders and how they use it for the sole purpose of triggering a popup at the right time, at the right price, that would maximize spending/gambling on loot boxes.

andrepd 7mo ago
Algorithmic optimisation will be the death of us. Over-dramatic? Maybe, but this thought springs to my mind more and more.
Triphibian 7mo ago
The first time I heard "whale" mentioned in the video game space was at a GDC panel around a game called Puzzle Pirates, where the dev noted that the bulk of their in-game purchases were made by a small group of "whale" players. In 2003 purchasable skins, pets, hats, etc were pretty new.
- fakedang 7mo ago
  I remember that one and remember being super exasperated about not being able to do anything without paying upfront for it. Ended up switching to Club Penguin instead lol.

dandanua 7mo ago

> these platforms algorithmically search for personalities they can abuse, rob, and financially destroy With the AI progress, there will be no need in a search for personalities - algorithms will make you one. And this can be applied to any company producing entertainment (e.g. social networks), not just gambling.

serf 7mo ago

>Betting platforms assign highly profitable customers "concierges" who reach out and prompt them to gamble, offer incentives, and work to keep them betting. It's insidious and wrong - the platforms actively identify and take advantage of addicts. this isn't new. a relative is an MVP at a casino she dumps cash into. The pit bosses comp all of her meals and call her on days that she doesn't show up. It's all sold to the customer as friendly-people-who-care and the people eat that up, especially lonely elderly folks. She fell at one such casino and ended up suing them, she wondered why all her friends stopped calling her, so she moved casinos and low-and-behold she was able to make friends there, too! To be fair, like another poster mentioned, they do this everywhere people spend a lot of money, not just gambling. Car dealerships are lousy with this kind of 'concierge'-ness. They, too, take advantage of elderly folks who have the money for a new car that they don't yet realize they need.

JumpCrisscross 7mo ago
To be fair, what you’ve describing strikes me as closer to hospitality than gambling per se. I live in a ski town. There are absolutely regulars at the Four Seasons who tip well in exchange for being “friends” with the staff. The fact that they never hang out outside work hours doesn’t seem to bother them.
- kibwen 7mo ago
  This seems instructive for considering when a difference in degree makes for a difference in kind. Let's call this "whale potential": the amount of money that a power user can naturally funnel into a casino over a single visit is multiple orders of magnitude more than the amount of money that a power user can funnel into a ski resort over a single visit. For a casino, the act of a customer losing money is not merely a side effect of the activity, it is the primary effect of the activity.
  - postflopclarity 7mo ago
    I think you might be underestimating how much money can be spent at a ski resort.

themafia 7mo ago

> not much different from a movie ticket or steam game. Movies require an investment of your time so it's somewhat hard to become "addicted" to them. There are "steam game library" addicts though. > this majority isn't the target customer Of course they are. They just aren't prioritized for high cost user enticements. The company only exists if the majority lose. They have big losers and little losers. They aren't here to "entertain" you. Which features of their service are designed to heighten "entertainment" I wonder?

Spooky23 7mo ago

That’s like saying cigarettes are the same as scented candles because both involve flame. The difference is that gambling, like cigarettes, delivers a dopamine fix. The playbook is well aligned with cigarettes — you target brands to the population. Draft Kings is like mass market cigarettes, targeting low income males, soldiers, old people. The “most profitable customer” metric is misleading - you need mass adoption to lure in the whales. My son is 14 - sports gambling is a routine conversation among his cohort and many kids are actively gambling in school with accounts provided by parents.

PaulRobinson 7mo ago

This sort of scheme was banned in the UK - the place where bookmaking was invented, and many of the largest global brands are run from (albeit technically trading from Malta or Gibrlatar) - a few years back. Why? Well... suicides. You're going to start seeing gambling-related suicides in the next couple of years, if you haven't already. If you can learn anything from the UK, learn this: - VIP schemes kill people - Online casinos and video slots kill people faster than sports betting do - The industry will always "self-regulate" to the point where its still harmful, but palatable enough that law makers will look the other way to keep the tax raised from it coming in I have skin in the game (I write code that profitably trades on sports betting exchanges), and think it's possible to make gambling a healthy and fun thing to do, but the American market is ~5-10 years behind the UK market, and I can see it's going to get ugly before it gets better (not that the UK market is perfect yet, either).