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Jetée · 02-12-2011, 03:05 PM

Cracking the Scratch Lottery Code
By Jonah Lehrer (Wired Magazine)

excerpted:
Mohan Srivastava, a geological statistician living in Toronto, was working in his office in June 2003, waiting for some files to download onto his computer, when he discovered a couple of old lottery tickets buried under some paper on his desk. The tickets were cheap scratchers—a gag gift from his squash partner—and Srivastava found himself wondering if any of them were winners. He fished a coin out of a drawer and began scratching off the latex coating. “The first was a loser, and I felt pretty smug,” Srivastava says. “I thought, ‘This is exactly why I never play these dumb games.’”

The second ticket was a tic-tac-toe game. Its design was straightforward: On the right were eight tic-tac-toe boards, dense with different numbers. On the left was a box headlined “Your Numbers,” covered with a scratchable latex coating. The goal was to scrape off the latex and compare the numbers under it to the digits on the boards. If three of “Your Numbers” appeared on a board in a straight line, you’d won. Srivastava matched up each of his numbers with the digits on the boards, and much to his surprise, the ticket had a tic-tac-toe. Srivastava had won $3. “This is the smallest amount you can win, but I can’t tell you how excited it made me,” he says. “I felt like the king of the world.”

...

Srivastava speaks quietly, with a slight stammer. He has a neatly trimmed beard and a messy office.
When he talks about a subject he’s interested in—and he’s interested in many things, from military
encryption to freshwater fossils—his words start to run into each other.

Delighted, he decided to take a lunchtime walk to the gas station to cash in his ticket. “On my way, I start looking
at the tic-tac-toe game, and I begin to wonder how they make these things,” Srivastava says. “The tickets
are clearly mass-produced, which means there must be some computer program that lays down the numbers.
Of course, it would be really nice if the computer could just spit out random digits. But that’s not possible, since
the lottery corporation needs to control the number of winning tickets. The game can’t be truly random. Instead,
it has to generate the illusion of randomness while actually being carefully determined.”

...

That afternoon, he went back to work. The thrill of winning had worn off; he forgot about his lunchtime adventure.
But then, as he walked by the gas station later that evening, something strange happened. “I swear I’m not the
kind of guy who hears voices,” Srivastava says. “But that night, as I passed the station, I heard a little voice
coming from the back of my head. I’ll never forget what it said: ‘If you do it that way, if you use that algorithm,
there will be a flaw. The game will be flawed. You will be able to crack the ticket. You will be able to plunder the lottery.’”

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02-12-2011, 03:05 PM	#1 (permalink)
Jetée The Reforms Location: Rarely, if ever, here or there, but always in transition	[Read of Interest] "How I cracked the lottery code" Cracking the Scratch Lottery Code By Jonah Lehrer (Wired Magazine) excerpted: Mohan Srivastava, a geological statistician living in Toronto, was working in his office in June 2003, waiting for some files to download onto his computer, when he discovered a couple of old lottery tickets buried under some paper on his desk. The tickets were cheap scratchers—a gag gift from his squash partner—and Srivastava found himself wondering if any of them were winners. He fished a coin out of a drawer and began scratching off the latex coating. “The first was a loser, and I felt pretty smug,” Srivastava says. “I thought, ‘This is exactly why I never play these dumb games.’” The second ticket was a tic-tac-toe game. Its design was straightforward: On the right were eight tic-tac-toe boards, dense with different numbers. On the left was a box headlined “Your Numbers,” covered with a scratchable latex coating. The goal was to scrape off the latex and compare the numbers under it to the digits on the boards. If three of “Your Numbers” appeared on a board in a straight line, you’d won. Srivastava matched up each of his numbers with the digits on the boards, and much to his surprise, the ticket had a tic-tac-toe. Srivastava had won $3. “This is the smallest amount you can win, but I can’t tell you how excited it made me,” he says. “I felt like the king of the world.” ... Srivastava speaks quietly, with a slight stammer. He has a neatly trimmed beard and a messy office. When he talks about a subject he’s interested in—and he’s interested in many things, from military encryption to freshwater fossils—his words start to run into each other. Delighted, he decided to take a lunchtime walk to the gas station to cash in his ticket. “On my way, I start looking at the tic-tac-toe game, and I begin to wonder how they make these things,” Srivastava says. “The tickets are clearly mass-produced, which means there must be some computer program that lays down the numbers. Of course, it would be really nice if the computer could just spit out random digits. But that’s not possible, since the lottery corporation needs to control the number of winning tickets. The game can’t be truly random. Instead, it has to generate the illusion of randomness while actually being carefully determined.” ... That afternoon, he went back to work. The thrill of winning had worn off; he forgot about his lunchtime adventure. But then, as he walked by the gas station later that evening, something strange happened. “I swear I’m not the kind of guy who hears voices,” Srivastava says. “But that night, as I passed the station, I heard a little voice coming from the back of my head. I’ll never forget what it said: ‘If you do it that way, if you use that algorithm, there will be a flaw. The game will be flawed. You will be able to crack the ticket. You will be able to plunder the lottery.’” READ MORE __________________ As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world (that is the myth of the Atomic Age) as in being able to remake ourselves. —Mohandas K. Gandhi