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Reason #3 why the Wizard likes Bodog:
Excellent Odds
In my opinion many online casinos are too stingy when setting the odds on their games. They think they will make more money that way but I believe they are misguided, because when players lose too quickly it's not fun, and those players might not come back.
Bodog is one of the few casinos that understands this. They offer generous odds to let you play longer and get you a better chance of winning. Among their generous offerings are Full-Pay Jacks or Better returning 99.54%, six other video poker games paying over 99%, single-zero roulette, two blackjack variants with a house edge under 0.2%, and my favorite, Pick 'em Poker, returning 99.95%!
Kudos to Bodog for not being afraid to give their players a good gamble. (Visit Bodog)
Try blackjack at Bodog.
One click and you're in:
 No popups, no download, no registration, no B.S., just the game.
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 Global
Gaming Expo report
The week of the Global Gaming Expo
is always a busy one for me. This year it
was held November 14-16. The show is a gigantic
convention center filled with every imaginable
business relating to gambling: slot machines,
playing cards, uniforms, food & beverage,
magazines, table games, signage, locks, you name
it. I am particularly interested in new table
games and Internet gaming.
This year the big table game companies
were still there. Shufflemaster hired lots
of models to deal their new games. The small
mom & pops with just one or two games was
down this year. I am often hired to do the math
on new games, so it was nice to actually see
games I have worked on. The participation from
the Internet crowd was very small. There were
only one or two stands that I saw of software
companies I never heard of. Microgaming had a
non-manned empty stall. Somebody dragged some
benches to it and turned it into a smoking
lounge. Had I known I would have made an offer
to buy their space. I could have sold some
books, met some fans, and just had fun with it.
I would have brought in my blackjack table to
have something to actually do there, with some
kind of way to win a book.
There are often celebrities at the gaming
show and this year I met and had a
picture with Jimmy Walker, the
actor who played JJ or Good Times. I tried to
impress him with my knowledge of Good Times
trivia but he would have none of it. He said he
never watched the show and evidently didn't like
talking about it. I also took the usual
pictures with Playboy Bunnies and other models.
In this
picture the blonde Bunny rebuked me for
touching her tail. Michael Bluejay, my webmaster, says she was right to do so.
Elections
& Election Bets
This is a non-partisan site so I
won't get into my own political views much,
outside the area of gambling. However a few
months ago I bet $570 to win $500 that the
Republicans would maintain control of the House,
and $2290 to win $500 that the Republicans would
maintain control of the Senate. Boy did I blow
it there! In the last newsletter I bragged out
my tournament win, but this just goes to show I
don't win all the time. At this point I'm sure
a few readers will write to say they could have
told me the Republicans would lose, however it
is easy to say that after the fact, so please
don't bother unless you were so sure that you
bet on it too.
Finally, I would like to say thank you to
the 54% of Nevadans who voted yes on proposition
5. Thanks to you Nevada will join the list
of other state banning smoking in restaurants
and bars that serve food. This is an issue I
feel strongly about. I'm all in favor of the
freedom to do whatever you want, but only up to
the point that nobody else is being harmed.
Secondhand smoke is not only foul but also kills
about 3000 Americans a year from lung cancer
(source).
This was a good step in the right direction.
B3W
software update
In the last newsletter I reported
about some statistical anomalies I discovered at
B3W-brand casinos. I finally heard back from
B3W, and they said they found a "modification"
with the launch of the 10-play Jacks or Better
game. I think this modification also affected
the 1-play game but they did not confirm or deny
this. They claim both games are playing fine
now, and the overall return was always in line.
According to B3W the dates in question are October 6 to 16. If you played video poker at a B3W casino during this time, and lost, a refund may be coming your way.
Ask
the Wizard!
Here's an excerpt from the newest
Ask
the Wizard, column
#178. 
Five persons are in a
room. What is the probability that at least 2 of
them were born in the same birth month? -
Amy
To keep things simple let's assume
that each person has a 1/12 probability of
being born in each month. The probability
that all five people are born in different
months is (11/12)*(10/12)*(9/12)*(8/12) =
0.381944. So the probability of a common
month is 1 - 0.381944 = 0.618056.
What's
new on the site
New video poker analyses. I
recently noticed and analyzed three new video
poker variations. The games are Double
Draw Video Poker, Royal
Draw Video Poker, and Ace
on the Deal.
Probabilities for 1 to 25 Dice. I get
asked a lot for the probability of throwing a
total of x with y dice. Hopefully this
new section will end such questions!
Ask the Wizard columns #177 and #178.
Until next
time, set your expectations high.
From
Michael Bluejay....
How
to come out ahead on your bet, every time
The Wizard's story about betting on the
Republicans to retain control of Congress
reminded me of an interesting concept for
a way to turn every bet into a winning proposition:
Bet on whatever you don't want to
happen. For example, say you didn't want
Republicans to retain control of Congress. You'd
therefore bet that they would retain
control of Congress. If the Republicans win,
then you're unhappy with the outcome, but you win your bet so the money is a consolation prize. If the Republicans
lose, then you're happy because you got the
outcome you wanted. And if you're superstitious
you can think that the money you lost helped
to ensure that outcome. You either get some
money or you get the outcome you wanted in the
first place. You can't lose!
By the way, don't interpret this to mean
that the reason the Wizard bet on the
Republicans to retain Congress because he was
using this method. First of all, the Wizard
is fiercely independent, and I don't even know
which party he was rooting for this time, if
any. (And I don't want to know. It's
safer that way. What I don't know can't be
beaten out of me if I'm captured.) Second, the
Wizard makes bets when he thinks the odds are in
his favor, period. He doesn't bet for any other
purpose.
The Wizard points out that this idea is nothing new, and is in fact the whole concept behind insurance.
Survey:
Should external links open in a new
window?
Help us decide whether the external
links on WizardOfOdds.com should open in a new
window. By "external link" we mean a link to
another site outside Wizard of Odds. Should we
open it in a new browser window, so the Wizard
of Odds site is still behind it? Or should we
load the new site in the same window, so if you
want to get back to Wizard of Odds you use the
Back button?
This has been a burning question for
webmasters for a long time, because either
decision involves a tradeoff. If we open the
link in a new window, then you don't "lose your
place" if you want to go back to our site. You
can get back easily by just closing the new
window when you're done with it. But what if you
didn't care to come back? Then we've just
cluttered your screen with another window. Plus,
some users don't realize that the link opened in
a new window and don't understand why their Back
button no longer works.
So how should we deal with links to other
sites? Let us know.
Internet
Tip of the Month: Getting specific with
Google
In our June
11, 2005 newsletter I showed you how
to limit your Google searches to a particular
website. (e.g.,
site:wizardofodds.com
alaska). Here are a few other
tips with Google.
Phrase search with quotes. First, you
can search for a specific phrase by putting it
in quotes. Let's say you're looking for Anthony
Barbella. If you search for
anthony
barbella then you're gonna get all
pages that contain either "Anthony"
or "Barbella". That returns over 22,000
pages. But if you search for
"anthony
barbella" (surrounding it with quote
marks), then you got only pages that contain
those words right next to each other -- just 17
pages, making it a lot easier to find what
you're looking for. (Of course, you might also
want to search for
"tony
barbella" to be complete.) Using
quotes is especially handy when searching for
names, especially your own name, which is called
egosurfing. One of the nice things about
having the last name "Bluejay" is that when I
egosurf myself, I don't have to worry about
finding anyone else with the same name.
Exclude words with minus sign. Let's
say you're looking for a Michael Richards who is
not that controversial guy from Seinfeld.
You can exclude the word "Seinfeld" from your
searches, which will exclude most pages about
the more famous Michael Richards, since most
articles about him also mention Seinfeld. To
exclude a word just put a minus sign before it,
e.g.: "michael richards
-seinfeld.
Get synonyms with the tilde mark.
Let's say you're looking for an unusual
sofa. You could search for that, and then do
a separate search for unusual couch, but
doing multiple searches is cumbersome.
Fortunately Google will find synonyms for a word
if you put a ~ in front of it. So searching for
unusual
~sofa does both searches at the same
time.
See ya next time!
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WizardOfOdds.com
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