June 2009

Gambling history in Colorado

Colorado casinos are getting ready to start play with more games and higher betting limits. From the Colorado Springs Gazette: At the Colorado Grande Casino in Cripple Creek, the last security cameras are being placed over the roulette table. At Bronco Billys Casino, gamblers are laying wagers on blackjack table in the new table games

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news about gambling

New UNLV podcast: Poker and Capitalism

I’ve put up today’s Gaming Colloquium lecture as a podcast. You can listen to it here or subscribe in iTunes. You know, I don’t think Steve Cyr used the word “zeitgeist” in his talk, and Bjerg didn’t once mention boozed-up high rollers. That’s what I like about this speakers’ series–we can hear a real diversity

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what's new

Book review: Lost River Anthology

Richmond Shreve. Lost River Anthology (Rites of Passage). Cape May, New Jersey: Cape Island Press, 2009. 146 pages. This is new ground for me: the first person I’ve had in a workshop or class who’s published a book. Richmond Shreve was in my creative non-fiction workshop a few years ago at the Winter Getaway, and

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book reviews

New look

It looks like this is going to be the new look of this site for a while. I’m pretty busy with other projects so I don’t have the hours I need to work on the thorough redesign, and there’s only so much sleep you can miss before it catches up with you. I might adjust

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what's new

Our long national nightmare is over

Yes the Tropicana Atlantic City, which was “repossessed” by the Casino Control Commission over a year and a half ago, has finally been sold…to Carl Icahn. From the AC Press: Tropicana Casino and Resort, once expected to fetch $1 billion or more, was sold today for $200 million to a group of lenders headed by

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atlantic city, news about gambling

Global slot scheme

I think this story from KLAS really demonstrates what a global business gambling has become: Federal prosecutors have charged two men with conspiring to sell counterfeit video slot machines bearing the name of the Reno-based International Game Technology. The two men include a 43-year-old Cuban national accused of selling the slots in Latvia. Rodolfo Rodriguez

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news about gambling

UNLV Gaming Podcast 10 posted, Xanadu rebooted

I’ve got thrilling new podcast up over at the UNLV site: 10-June 9, 2009 Dylan Evans, University College, Cork At the 14th International Conference on Gambling and Risk-Taking, Dr. Schwartz interviews Dr. Evans, who presented a paper on the risk intelligence of expert gamblers. When it comes to assessing risk, expert gamblers are far better

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what's new

UNLV gaming talk later this month

Just in time for the World Series of Poker, we’re having a very special Gaming Research Colloquium Series talk at UNLV: June 25, 2009 Gaming Research Colloquium Series: Dr. Ole Bjerg, Copenhagen Business School "Whats in a Game? The Co-Evolution of Poker and Capitalism" Thursday, June 25, 12:15 PM Special Collections Reading Room View flyer

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what's new

Book Review: Tide, Feather, Snow

Miranda Weiss. Tide, Feather, Snow: A Life in Alaska. New York: HarperCollins, 2009. 288 pages. This memoir is an exploration of how one woman abandoned the known for the unknown–in this case, south central Alaska. Weiss, who was born and raised in flat suburban Maryland, shucked off most of her preconceptions when she moved to

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book reviews

If a red flag is flying, brazen bold against the blue…

Taking a minute from the grind of analyzing the April Nevada gaming revenues, I figured I’d post this story, which surprisingly hasn’t really been picked up by the Vegas blogosphere. From KLAS: The Raelian Movement is announcing plans to build a UFOland in Las Vegas where visitors can attend a Happiness Academy and see a

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haphazard world, life in vegas, news about gambling

Talking online gambling on KNPR

This morning I joined KNPR’s State of Nevada host Dave Berns and poker legend Howard Lederer in studio to talk about the Frank bill and the proposed legalization of online betting in the US: Americans are expected to lose $22 billion next year via Internet betting, although the practice is technically illegal in this country.

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news about gambling

New podcast up

I was lucky enough to get three good interviews with people who spoke at the 14th International Conference on Gambling and Risk-Taking last week, and I’ve uploaded the first of them: a twelve-minute chat with Dr. Douglas Walker, who spoke on how the social costs of gambling are used and abused and casino crime. You

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what's new

Casino manager murdered in AC

This story is just appalling: a disgruntled patron shot a Trump Taj Mahal casino executive in cold blood, allegedly because he was frustrated by his roulette losses. From the AC Press: Despite his claims that he racked up millions of dollars in gambling losses, the accused killer of a casino supervisor actually won $1,100 this

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atlantic city