C'mon Lucky Seven!

What it's like to gamble online

My quest for cybergambling action began around 6 p.m. and started at Yahoo!, where I used the site's "Recreation" heading to find almost 300 online casinos. Faced with such overwhelming choice (and $100 of REASON-supplied cash burning a hole in my pocket), I scrolled through the list of links and settled on the Kenny Rogers Casino. Yes, that Kenny Rogers - the country-singer-cum-chicken-magnate who has also portrayed a character called "The Gambler" in a series of rotten TV movies.

Such is the power of branding in cyberspace: Though I loathe Rogers - I've never forgiven him for the two hours I lost while sitting through his execrable 1982 movie, Six Pack - he was a devil I knew, as opposed to some faceless offshore operator to whom I'd otherwise be sending credit card information. Assuming his casino - technically headquartered in the wager-friendly Caribbean - ripped me off, I told myself, I could at least track The Gambler down and take it out of his ample hide.

As is typical with online operations, wagering at Kenny's place requires a free - though lengthy - download in order to play a variety of card games, slots, craps, and the like. I patiently monitored the process as my gambling jones grew stronger and my deadline crept nearer. After 40 minutes, the download was done, but my frustration with Kenny was far from over. When I went to install the program, there was a corrupted file, so I had to start all over. Finally, about an hour later, I was ready to register and buy some cyberchips via credit card. That turned out to be a nonstarter twice over. When I entered my actual U.S. address, I was told I couldn't gamble for "real money" and was kicked over to the electronic version of the kids' casino. Then, after I used a friend's address in a faraway country to get through the registration process, Kenny's e-cash setup wouldn't accept any of my credit cards - probably because they have U.S billing addresses.

It was still early in the evening - around 8 p.m. - and I was still eager to rattle them bones, so I wandered over to www.wheretogamble.com and clicked on its "#1 Best Bet," a place called the Aloha Casino & Sportsbook (www.alohacasino.com), which promised a $25 bonus for opening an account and no need to download any software. Despite some misgivings - I couldn't find any mention of a physical location for the operation, only an 800 number and an e-mail address - I was ready to play. The casino accepted my credit card information quickly and automatically e-mailed me a valid user ID, and within minutes I was figuratively sitting in front of a pile of chips and mulling over what game to start with.

Our 5-year-old son tucked away for the night, my college-professor wife joined me as we sipped wine in our family room and took our chances at slot machines, video poker games, blackjack, craps, and baccarat - all running on the same laptop she's using to write a scholarly book about 17th-century female preachers. The mechanics were simple enough: Click on a game and wait a minute or so for a Java applet to load; the graphics looked like those for any standard video game.

To be sure, much of the appeal of real-world casinos - the jazzed-up lights, the tacky decor, the very specialness of the trip - is sorely lacking at home. Still, the essential appeal of gambling - that momentary thrill that comes while the wager is alive - is there in spades. And the convenience of it all makes up for most of the razzmatazz: Living outside Cincinnati, we're a good two hours from the nearest legal casinos, a group of gaudy river boats dotting the Indiana bank of the Ohio River.

The comfort level of home is unbeatable, too. As only an occasional gambler, I'm usually intimidated from playing relatively complicated games such as craps (where wrong moves can bring down the wrath of pit bosses and fellow gamblers alike) and from staying at blackjack tables as the minimum bets rise over the course of an evening. Such concerns are absent on the Web, where you can't screw up anyone else's action and where you always set the bet (as low as 25 cents a wager at the Aloha).

Curiously, both my wife and I had confidence that the games were not rigged - or at least not any more rigged than those in real-world casinos. Our intimation of fair play was doubtless helped along by the fact that we were up over $300 at one point (due mostly to a single slots payout). As our earnings started to dwindle, the missus paraphrased Kenny Rogers, of all people, who once famously sang that a good gambler "knows when to hold 'em and knows when to fold 'em." Up about $170, we decided to cash out. We put in a withdrawal request with the cybercashier and were informed via e-mail that a check for the proper amount would be processed in a few days. If and when that happens, it's likely we'll be saying hello to the Aloha from time to time.

Nick Gillespie ([e-mail]) is executive editor of REASON.