Gambling is as pure a play as exists in the world. It’s as simple, as direct, as easy to understand — and as capitalistic — as any business that has ever been created.
It’s pretty basic, when you get right down to it. And frankly, there’s not a whole lot of “getting right down to it” that’s needed to grasp the product.
There’s not even a product.
All it is is this: You put money in in hopes of getting more money out. That’s it. That’s the whole thing.
In fact, it’s even more pure than that, because the gambling companies tell you, straight up, that you should expect to lose your money. They’re not hiding it. The odds are clear as day in the sportsbook, the RTP is right there in the casino games. If you are intellectually capable of creating a gambling account, you are aware that gambling is — mathematically speaking — a losing proposition.
I could even take this a step further: If you are not gambling with an actual, honest-to-goodness edge, you’re a complete and total schmuck (present company most definitely included).
You — and I’m talking the universal “you” — will lose your money. But it’s also, for many, super-duper fun, and that’s why gambling has existed since before history was written down.
Again though, to be crystal clear: Gambling companies exist for one reason and one reason only, and that is to take our money.
So explain to me why I’m supposed to get all twisted and discombobulated and finger-pointy when major media outlets tell me that … gambling companies are trying to take our money?
AI for evil?
I’m referring to this weekend’s piece on DraftKings in The New York Times, which states that DraftKings is using artificial intelligence to “target losing gamblers with promotions that encourage more betting, according to six former employees who worked on them.”
And for any NYT readers who don’t understand gambling, there’s a sentence earlier in the piece that explains what DraftKings does, business-wise: “DraftKings makes money when gamblers lose money.”
Are we clear on that, NYT reader? A gambling company makes money when its customers lose money. Just nod along. (By the way, CBS also contributed Sunday morning to this trend of mainstream negative press about online sports betting with a segment exploring …. well, mostly exploring one dude who bets too many parlays, but no need to drill down on specifics here, as that was just a garden-variety hit piece.)
The story alleges that the same data science/AI DraftKings is using for the above isn’t being used to try and find customers who “might” develop a gambling problem. Direct from the story: “This betting data may also contain signs that a person is headed for trouble. Yet when employees developed a machine learning model that would have assigned users ‘risk scores,’ the company sidelined it, according to two former employees who worked on that project.”
DraftKings, of course, denied the claims, saying its promotions are “directed toward customers who demonstrate sustained, engaged use of our platform, not toward customers based on their losses.” It claimed it’s not using the same tools to find potential problem gamblers because there is no evidence it works.
And everyone, of course, took to social media to cluck-cluck and clutch pearls over this expose.
So let’s assume “worst case” here: DraftKings is using AI to target customers it pegs as more likely to lose, while simultaneously not using the same AI tools to try and find people who might develop problems. This is supposed to make me mad? Sad? Outraged?
Are we saying that other companies, in other industries, aren’t doing the same thing?
In the article itself, DraftKings’ top responsible gambling officer, Lori Kalani, speaks to it, calling the promos “a marketing tool that every company out there uses.” She said that other industries face the same moral conundrum.
“Shopping can be problematic for people,” she said.
And you know what?
She’s right.
Booze, smokes, and Banana Republic
We live in a society where alcohol is legal and over 178,000 Americans die each year as a result. Alcohol is marketed as a fun and exciting thing to use. Liquor stores often run promotions on alcohol. Last I checked, the makers of Budweiser and Jack Daniels are not expected to make sure I don’t develop a drinking problem. My local booze store certainly isn’t in the business of making sure I don’t develop a drinking problem.
We live in a society where tobacco is legal and over 480,000 Americans die each year as a result. Cigarettes are marketed as a fun and exciting thing to use. The manufacturers have apps that push people to smoke. Convenience stores offer “lowest price allowed by law” deals on cigarettes. Last I checked, Philip Morris and R.J. Reynolds are not expected to make sure I don’t get addicted to Marlboros or Camels. And my local convenience store certainly isn’t in the business of making sure I don’t get addicted to cigarettes.
When my McDonald’s app offers me free medium fries with a $1 purchase, is The New York Times rushing to rip the lid off predatory tactics in the world of fast food? Should we do heart disease and obesity rates in America? If I go to McDonald’s six times a week, should McDonald’s use that information to … what? Let me know I might have a problem? Cut me off from ordering Big Macs?
They don’t and they don’t. It’s absurd to even consider. What happens instead — wild guess here, because the NYT didn’t do a deep dive — is that I keep getting come-ons in the app.
When I go to Banana Republic — that’s about the height of my “fancy” clothing knowledge — and buy a $150 pair of jeans and two $225 sweaters, does the cashier need to warn me about the dangers of shopping addiction? Do they need to run an affordability check? Nope and nope.
Instead, they drop a coupon in my bag for 25% off my next purchase to get me to come back and spend more money. And then I get the emails about the sales. With more promos attached.
Then there’s state-run lotteries.
If I walk into Wawa every morning and buy $100 worth of scratch-offs, is the cashier supposed to ask about my income? Check whether I’m behind in my mortgage? The New Jersey Lottery tells me to gamble responsibly, sure, but it’s also advertising the hell out of the product. (The lottery is also pretty keen on hiding what the actual odds are on those scratchers.) Nobody is running an affordability check before selling me another stack of tickets.
How about Amazon?
Amazon knows a terrifying amount about my shopping habits and — again, wild guess — sends me push notifications based on that information. If I’m ordering $500 worth of useless crap every other day, should Amazon recognize that my spending has increased 300% over the last six months, decide I’m exhibiting markers of harmful shopping behavior, and start declining my orders?
And yet …
I’m supposed to get all angry because a gambling company, a gambling company whose goal is as clear as day — to separate me from my money — is using AI tools to help separate me from my money?
I think I’m going to reserve my outrage, thank you very much.
Not unique
Listen, I don’t love what DraftKings is “accused” of — and I’m sure it’s not just DraftKings in the gambling space — but I don’t see why this behavior is uniquely scandalous.
To hold any gambling company to a higher standard than Anheuser-Busch, Philip Morris, Amazon, Banana Republic, McDonald’s, and state lotteries is wrong.
Are all these comparisons fair? Maybe, maybe not, but I’m just pointing out that other companies and other products — including things that are more addictive and certainly more dangerous than gambling — are using similar, if not the same, if not worse, marketing tactics.
Why have we decided gambling companies have a moral obligation to stop customers from overconsuming their product when we don’t impose that obligation on companies selling plenty of other legal, potentially harmful products?
Let’s put on our big boy pants here.
The goal of every business is to transfer our money into their coffers, and these days the companies have just insane amounts of data when it comes to how we spend our cash.
We turn the other way when booze and smokes and greasy food and expensive sweaters use this information to encourage us to keep spending, and none of these companies are using what they know about us to help us not buy their products.
Nowhere on the McDonald’s app is there a “responsible eating” tab. No liquor store in America is going to turn me away if I have $1,000 worth of $10 bottles of vodka in my cart. Cigarette brands have loyalty programs, for the love of LeBron.
So yeah, marketing can be gross. Our information being used against us to try and extract more money out of us can be gross.
But unless Congress decides to step in and do something — see fly, when pigs — that’s just the way it’s gonna be.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to go have a cocktail and some McNuggets, smoke a butt, and put on a $70 T-shirt, and then — heaven forbid! — build me a single-game parlay with a 20% boost that DraftKings gave me.
