See the top rated post in this thread. Click here

Page 1 of 5 123 ... LastLast
Results 1 to 13 of 62

Thread: AP Blackjack Is Over

  1. #1


    Did you find this post helpful? Yes | No

    AP Blackjack Is Over

    It feels to me like AP blackjack is essentially dead as a concept.

    During the blackjack decades, broadly speaking sixties through nineties, blackjack had a major appeal to smart young guys as a means to make money and avoid the rat race. Barriers to entry were minimal compared to the costs of starting a business. Good games could be found relatively easily. There was an element of myth to this-you always got overexcited nerds writing endless volumes about the subject while doing very little, as if their amazing abstract math skills would actually get them anywhere without capitalization and street knowledge (cue triggered nerds). But there was also an element of truth.

    Nowadays games have deteriorated. There are viable plays but the best opportunities are completely underground now, no one shares that stuff. And it is all so 20th century, expenses, downtime, bricks and mortar. There's so much opportunity online for kids with intelligence that requires little in the way of capitalization.

    The best numbers you hear people pulling are millions of dollars over the best part of a decade. That's going to be people on the extreme of the bell curve. By contrast you look at something utterly banal and well publicized like amazon dropshipping and there are credible, multiple stories of people pulling seven figures in the same time frame. When you look at the more advanced cutting edge stuff eg social arbitrage, you could be talking billions.

    I used to get really excited when I discovered an AP opportunity. I still do, it is intellectually absorbing. But nowadays I then look at my Tesla shares and think "Oh yeah, not worth my time".

    I'm writing this in the hope but not expectation someone will come out with a convincing refutation of all this. I kind of miss being a full-time AP, at least some aspects of it.
    Last edited by Archvaldor; 06-02-2022 at 03:57 AM.

  2. #2


    Did you find this post helpful? Yes | No
    You wrote not nobody shares stuff. Now it is so easy to find information with internet. In 60-90s without internet you have problems even to find address of a casino

  3. #3


    Did you find this post helpful? Yes | No
    Quote Originally Posted by Iwantmoney View Post
    You wrote not nobody shares stuff. Now it is so easy to find information with internet. In 60-90s without internet you have problems even to find address of a casino
    I meant high quality information about viable AP opportunities, not garden variety logistical stuff.

  4. #4
    Senior Member Gramazeka's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2011
    Location
    Ukraine
    Posts
    1,438


    Did you find this post helpful? Yes | No
    The main thing is not to stand still

    https://www.wired.com/story/meet-ale...slot-machines/
    "Don't Cast Your Pearls Before Swine" (Jesus)

  5. #5


    Did you find this post helpful? Yes | No
    Quote Originally Posted by Gramazeka View Post
    The main thing is not to stand still

    https://www.wired.com/story/meet-ale...slot-machines/
    That violates the device laws in many, if not all, countries.

  6. #6
    Senior Member BetWise21's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2016
    Location
    Southeastern USA
    Posts
    223


    Did you find this post helpful? Yes | No
    Quote Originally Posted by Archvaldor View Post
    I meant high quality information about viable AP opportunities, not garden variety logistical stuff.
    It seems to me that internet info is not that current and often unreliable, conditions can change in an instant.


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
    "between the conception and the reality, falls the shadow "

    Paraphrased: T.S. Eliot's
    The Hollow Men

  7. #7
    Senior Member Gramazeka's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2011
    Location
    Ukraine
    Posts
    1,438


    Did you find this post helpful? Yes | No
    Quote Originally Posted by 21forme View Post
    That violates the device laws in many, if not all, countries.
    This is provable only if you yourself admit it.
    "Don't Cast Your Pearls Before Swine" (Jesus)

  8. #8


    Did you find this post helpful? Yes | No
    Quote Originally Posted by Gramazeka View Post
    The main thing is not to stand still

    https://www.wired.com/story/meet-ale...slot-machines/
    Very interesting thanks. I didn't really expect anything that fascinating to emerge from this thread.

    That's actually quite an old idea. I've been experimenting with that stuff since the 90's. But the concept is one thing, if this
    guy is really pulling off that's really impressive.
    I would have thought the slot manufacturers would have essentially solved the problem by now. Wow. I can only recall one
    verifiable instance of a prng hack (on a poker room) that went public though there was more stuff going on underground.


    That said I wonder why this guy does this offline. You need people, travel expenses, have to deal with security. They use
    the same code online (literally the same code) and I'm not sure why he isn't focusing on that. You can buy up Russian id's
    real cheap.

  9. #9


    Did you find this post helpful? Yes | No
    Quote Originally Posted by 21forme View Post
    That violates the device laws in many, if not all, countries.
    If he is not interfering with the device physically it is legal in most places. Maybe you can get a clever lawyer to pull the wool over a jury's eyes or something, but device laws as they stand are pretty clear on this.

  10. #10


    Did you find this post helpful? Yes | No
    Quote Originally Posted by Archvaldor View Post
    If he is not interfering with the device physically it is legal in most places.
    That's incorrect.

  11. #11
    Senior Member Gramazeka's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2011
    Location
    Ukraine
    Posts
    1,438


    Did you find this post helpful? Yes | No
    Quote Originally Posted by Archvaldor View Post
    Very interesting thanks. I didn't really expect anything that fascinating to emerge from this thread.
    http://www.casinoboard.ru/index.php?...id=16&&start=0

    Use translator. It will be very interesting to read)))
    "Don't Cast Your Pearls Before Swine" (Jesus)

  12. #12
    Senior Member Gramazeka's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2011
    Location
    Ukraine
    Posts
    1,438


    Did you find this post helpful? Yes | No
    For example-


    "John Vaccaro was sure that he had come up with something very big. But in the world of professional casino cheaters, it's not very common to find good assistants ready to help. This is not "Ocean's Friends" for you. It's not easy to assemble a decent team.

    Vaccaro picked up the phone in a Las Vegas sports bar and complained to a Southern interlocutor, "They're arguing with people who've been doing this all their lives, you hear?"

    He later commented on the Nevada gambling industry: "Oh those @#$%! casinos!"

    That was John Vaccaro.

    At one time, Vaccaro and his accomplices took out from the President casino in Biloxi, in 1993, about $ 500,000, working on the blackjack tables. As a result, their scheme was burned and the whole gang appeared in federal court. Some pleaded guilty, getting off with a trifle, some rushed to the run. Vaccaro honestly took another blow.

    John Joseph Vaccaro Jr., a military veteran, roofer and longtime member of the Nevada Casino Blacklist, died on November 16, 2015 after a short illness. He was 75 years old.

    It's easy to blame Vaccaro for all the trouble he caused the casino and all the hardships he put his family through, but I have to give him my respect for the fact that no one could ever blame John Vaccaro for not having a big dream.

    He was born in New Orleans, and all his life he was well acquainted with members of the Marcello crime group, and law enforcement agencies connected him with the southern California subgroup of Cosa Nostra, controlled by Peter Milano.

    However, unlike most people in Milano circles, John Vaccaro was a real director, a brilliant schemer who was not at all interested in knocking down change on the streets with petty robbery.

    He served in the US Air Force for a very long time, and subsequently worked for a long time in the casino industry. And then his criminal tendencies made themselves felt.

    Although the first mention of his activities dates back to 1971, he did not come under government radar until 1983, as the leader of the largest group of scammers in the history of Nevada, engaged in "charging" slot machines. Eight people ended up with over a hundred jackpots across Nevada and amassed over 8 million before they got caught. The jackpot they won at Harrah's Tahoe casino alone was 1.7 million. The MGM Grand Casino in Reno lost over a million. The group has also hit jackpots at the Castaways, Barbary Coast, Bingo Palace and Holiday Casino in Las Vegas.

    The prosecution in this case ended in prison for Vaccaro, and turned into a huge problem for his only wife Sandra, who, along with her husband, was blacklisted by the state of Nevada in June 1986.

    But the Vaccaro family withstood all adversity, and they remained married for 48 years.

    "He was one of the smartest and most charming guys I've ever met," says former lawyer Dominic Gentile. "He could laugh out loud, but in a second he could be serious, like a heart attack. He had both sides - both light and dark. But he never lost his sense of humor. Never."

    By the time they hit the casino in Biloxi, where they pushed through the marked card scheme, Vaccaro was already well known to law enforcement. And if earlier it was easy for him and his accomplices to move from one casino to another, now improved security systems and information exchange have made it almost impossible. We all understand that "Ocean's Friends" is a fiction.

    But even the Court of Appeal had to recognize the incredible attractiveness and diversity of the line of defendants lined up before them.

    "The jury was faced with a large group of very different characters with different levels of responsibility, from performers of fraudulent stunts to liaisons with organized crime," members of the 1997 appeals court recalled.

    Vaccaro paid for his crimes with several terms in prison, and took on several of his accomplices' crimes. But that day at the sports bar, he didn't lie on the phone.

    When it came to cheating against casinos, he knew what to do and did it all his life."
    "Don't Cast Your Pearls Before Swine" (Jesus)

  13. #13


    Did you find this post helpful? Yes | No
    Quote Originally Posted by 21forme View Post
    That's incorrect.
    The article is very explicit about the legality of cracking prng's externally. That accords with my understanding of the device laws in the multiple jurisdictions I've studied.

    If you mean the part with the mobile phones clocking the decal velocity, yes that is questionable.

Page 1 of 5 123 ... LastLast

Similar Threads

  1. Replies: 6
    Last Post: 04-12-2018, 08:49 AM
  2. Replies: 0
    Last Post: 04-13-2015, 03:36 PM
  3. Replies: 5
    Last Post: 12-24-2014, 12:00 PM
  4. Replies: 18
    Last Post: 06-07-2013, 04:35 AM
  5. Replies: 9
    Last Post: 10-25-2012, 12:55 PM

Bookmarks

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •  

About Blackjack: The Forum

BJTF is an advantage player site based on the principles of comity. That is, civil and considerate behavior for the mutual benefit of all involved. The goal of advantage play is the legal extraction of funds from gaming establishments by gaining a mathematic advantage and developing the skills required to use that advantage. To maximize our success, it is important to understand that we are all on the same side. Personal conflicts simply get in the way of our goals.