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The large number of materials on craps
and other dice games is perhaps due to the
complexity of these games and the fact that the
house edge on some of the bets is much lower
than on others (e.g. free odds on pass line
bets). The complexity and variable house edge in
dice games promote a strong illusion of skill,
which creates the market for these books.
General books on gambling will often discuss at
length how to make free odds bets in craps. The
description will often seem to imply that such
bets allow the player to beat the house. It is
speculated that much of the material on
non-skilled games is similarly filled with
misinformation about how to beat the house.
As a validity check we also counted the number
of general, skill-oriented and chance-oriented
materials on gambling in libraries and
bookstores in the greater Toronto area. In both
libraries and bookstores, skill-oriented books
still dominated gambling-related materials, but
only made up 41% and 45%, respectively, compared
to 87% on the Web site. We suspect that the
smaller number of skill-oriented books in
libraries and bookstores is related to the less
specialized nature of the audience that seeks
out material in these venues. Interestingly we
found few books on how to bet on sports in
either the libraries or the bookstores in the
greater Toronto area.
The Web site, library and bookstore samples
together give us a picture of the types of
gambling books available. Books on games of
skill make up the bulk of material available,
but information is also available on how to play
various non-skilled games. To the serious
gambler, the Web site offers mostly books on
sports, racing and other skill-oriented games as
well as a wealth of statistical information to
help punters select their bets. By contrast, the
library and bookstore collections have a much
larger proportion of books on gambling in
general. The general books were most often about
casino games.
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