Have you seen the movie 21 about the MIT Blackjack team? That movie got you thinking that if you were a successful card counter, you could take out all the casinos in the world. Have you seen the movie 21? It’s the story about the MIT guys that took out Vegas. Well, I can definitely say movie-makers tell a story that’s true. They probably won’t admit it, but society has a mental image of who’s a gambler and who’s not. The BUFFALO BOOTS are the guys you want to be if you are a successful card counter.
If you want to take out all the casinos in the world and bring down the house, you better cut your reel by PayPaling and outsourcing your manufacturing to China. I remember when I was a kid and my parents dropped out the greatest chip-counting method there was. It was called Whirlpool. You took a pool of bills, snuck them out of the wallet, and counted them. It took you months to get an edge on the casinos. That’s how it was done back then. Now throw Whirlpool into the mix and you have yourself a system that can actually work.
Don’t get me wrong, I am not saying that the MIT team that got dubbed the “Blackjack Raiders” did it alone. Throw a baseball cap on top of a man that can count cards and I’ll bet you that the casinos wouldn’t be having their usual breakfast. They would be hiring more security to keep their wives and girlfriends from making a ran to the casinos.
Card counting is practically impossible to do nowadays since theatur of the card counting device is so complex, computerized, and sensitive to faulty card counters. Card counting is a skill that was mastered by the MIT students that Baccarat was invented by the MIT team. Card counting is the ability to determine if the next card in the shoe will help the player or the casino. A rich and powerful player will have an advantage over a poor and powerless player.
Card counting is NOT illegal to the MIT students or the establishment itself. It was a skill that was mastered by the MIT Blackjack team. When you watch the movie “21,” you will notice that the students who beat the casinos were able to learn and use card counting. The casino was afraid that card counters would win so they hired extra security to keep card counters away from their profitable blackjack tables.
Card counting was gaining popularity in the late 1960’s but it wasn’t until the 1980’s that the movie “21” set off the explosion of the card counting craze. Edward O. Thorp is the author of the book “Beat the Dealer.” His book contained the system and card counting strategies that were used by the MIT students in the movie “21.”
Are the MIT students risking their jobs and making millions of dollars by card counting in the movie “21?” Maybe, but it sure is an interesting story. One of the most exciting times I ever went to the movies was when James Bondo the MI6 code breaker stops aatic Elvis impersonator and takes a huge lump oforting cash from the King of Rock.
Did you know that MI6 had the electronic advantage over the casino with electronic devices called computers? They were absorbed into the plumbing of the future war. The movies have remained the same. They just make you think more, pay less, or both. I think we can all agree that’s just not the way it should be!
The most famous card counting strategy, or method, of the three is the Hi Lo Card Counting method. If you don’t already know how to count cards, you can learn in a few minutes. You take a deck of cards and split them into two piles. Then put half of the cards, with their faces up, in the pile of one card.
Back on nineteenth century France, the method was used to great effect during the French revolution. Those were chaotic times, and the means of fighting were so chaotic that no one could have predicted the eventual outcome, but at least there was a basic strategy and an agreed upon method. It wasn’t card counting, but at least there was a method of fighting that was known.
The phrase “agen sgp” is used to describe an outcome that can be accomplished within a given time frame. Usually, it’s battle in the street that brings about the danger. Let’s say a revolution begins in a country far too far for you to travel to. Without an effective method of fighting, the fighting will probably be brutal and People will die. Without a method of calculating the odds, sustained fighting will probably make every one of those who live suffer from poverty.
Edward O. Thorp is a Northwestern University graduate with a doctorate in statistics. These are not the kind of degrees you usually graduate with in a few years.