The deluge of gambling ads on TV during Friday night footy is absolutely appalling. There’s a very robust conduit for normalising sports gambling through advertisements around the broadcasts and it’s clearly influencing young adults. I’ve noticed a dramatic uptick in how common it is compared to when I was that age.
An argument I've heard is that by legalizing betting, it can be more easily monitored with regulation and reduce the amount of black market betting. People still bet when it's illegal, it just becomes harder to track, which makes it easier for gamblers to interfere with outcomes without detection.
It sounds kind of similar to the legalization of certain recreational drugs. For example, alcohol prohibition resulted in a massive black market with organized criminal gangs, and many places realized it's better to regulate it rather than prohibit it.
I think for gambling, we need better regulations, and the Australian government seems to think so too.
Almost nobody was betting in the black market before the legalization. Sure you obviously had some people, but friction was big enough where it was not worth it. Right now, there isn’t a single game where people are talking about the bets they made in NA.
Nothing should be black and white. Even for alcohol and drug abuse, we should look at each and evaluate.
Yep it's hard to build a large liquid market for both sides of the bet without a central platform being legal. Look at polymarket as another example of things that people wouldn't bet on if a (legal in some countries) platform didn't exist.
Very few people gambled illegally. Putting some gangster out of business (Lol if you actually believe that) at the cost of addicting the entire working class to throwing away their money is bad math!
Illegal gambling has been rife for a very long time - the bookie down the pub taking bets on horses, games, whatever
Add to that that the Costigan Commission (1984) and the Fitzgerald Inquiry (1989) proved that illegal gambling was the foundational "river of gold" for organised crime in Australia.
my grandma is not going to be looking for a black market bookie. some percentage of people will be no matter what though if you make penalties really severe you will significantly thin out this crowd.
without gambling though, pat mahomes would be making less money that I am making…
The ads are going to continue from 8:30pm on, NRL has a game starting at 8pm this evening, the gambling ads will hit just before half time under this new legislation
That's a nice start but it's really just a band aid over the real problem, kind of like how politicians don't actually want to solve the underlying issue but instead just want to be seen to do something.
The real insanity is just gambling in Australia. As the article mentioned the people in the country have the highest losses to gambling anywhere in the world. This goes beyond sports betting, as that is just the latest thing, to poker machines (slot machines for you USA people) and other online gambling (cough Kick & related companies cough).
I am old enough to remember the introduction of poker machines in pubs and clubs here in Australia and it was always framed as a personal choice and government revenue source but all it did was result in money going from families to the big corporate "entertainment venue" operators (pub and club owners). I'd love it if Australia got rid of all gambling from normal parts of society and limited it to strictly regulated casinos (at most), but the gambling industry is so firmly entrenched in politics and society that I don't see any change happening soon
I think we must be of a similar generation, I also remember being a kid seeing those stupid ads with celebrities “bending their finger”. It’s really gross to think how normalised gambling is.
There is another side to this though, and that’s our pub culture and how “big gambling” plays a role in keeping pubs financially viable with the help of pokies. In the wise words of Tim Whitlam, “Blow up the pokies”
I fashion myself a bit of a fan of football and an occasional F1 viewer, and I must say, every time I watch a live event with friends I can't help but mention how betting houses have completely taken over the advertising space. Betson, Betano, Betway, bet365,etc... that and the pervasive Crypto.com it is unbelievable how they are trying to find a niche in this demographic. The crypto ones are the best, it's like they are not even trying to hide the nature of the business any more.
> "Today it's gambling advertising, tomorrow it's alcohol, then it's sugary drinks, fast food, critical minerals and who knows what else comes next," chief executive Kai Cantwell said.
We have already learned our lesson. Prohibition doesn’t work. But advertising does work. Banning advertising also works. We should allow people the freedom to participate in vice, but ban all advertising for it. Anything harmful to society should not be advertised. No ads for cars, guns, recreational drugs including alcohol, unhealthy food, fossil fuels, or gambling.
Who knows what comes next Kai? Hopefully everything.
I gotta admit I laughed heartily at the quote. I expected the slippery slope argument, I did not expect it to be made so clumsy :)
btw. what followed is worse: <<He accused the government of blindsiding a sector that supports 30,000 jobs and "provides critical funding to sport, racing and broadcast industries".>>
Gambling business is not a positive force. It's not even zero sum. It's a negative sum game. I hope no one is nodding along to these kind of arguments, they are nonsensical.
“provides critical funding to sport, racing and broadcast industries”
I foresee that the amped-up sports gambling will destroy professional sports as all results will be tainted with the probable interference from the gambling industry and those trying to “game the system” (irony noted).
> Courtwright’s The Age of Addiction has the statistics: “Per capita consumption initially fell to 30 percent of pre-Prohibition levels, before gradually increasing to 60 or 70 percent by 1933.” That suggests a 30 percent reduction, at a minimum, in consumption — although that was less than the initial effect, as people figured some ways around the law.
> We should allow people the freedom to participate in vice.
There is literally no individual upside to gambling and don't say "winning". For sites like FanDuel and DraftKings, you get banned or your bet sizes severelyl restricted if you consistently win [2]. Why? Because it discourages the marks if they don't win occasionally.
Suicide rate is highest among gambling addicts than any other form of addiction [3]. Gambling measurably increases credit score drops, debts and bankruptcies [4]. The entire business is predatory.
At least back in the day when you had to go to a casino there was some barrier to gambling. Now? Just pull out your phone.
A great first step. I'd love to see a sin tax associated with this as well - ie, for adverts that do run, they should have to pay a % of the ad fee to the government.
I don't think people understand just how ingrained in the culture gambling is in Australia. One of the primary 3rd spaces for people in Australia are RSLs, which are technically clubs for veterans to get co-op like services, but have evolved into a 3rd space for everyone that offer food, alcohol, entertainment, and of course, sports gambling and "pokies" (poker/slot machines).
The "RSL sub-branch" is a not-for-profit welfare organisation, that looks after veterans. For the most part they are small and if they are lucky they get the use of a meeting room in the RSL club.
The "RSL Club" is a multimillion dollar commercial enterprise that looks after its own interests, conducts political lobbying, makes millions of dollars off gambling addicts and hands out token grants in the community to give the impression that they are there to benefit the community. Typically nothing to do with the RSL sub-branch.
As a West Australian this is so interesting to me, because gambling culture is extremely niche here - but WA law is that pokies are only allowed at the casino, nowhere else. And thank fuck for that.
The ability for Sportsbet to deluge your feed with gambling remains unhindered. Their TikTok/Instagram ads are clever and unrelenting.
As a consequence there is a quiet crisis in young people, 18-30, deeply in debt, working second and third jobs so that they have a bit more money to gamble.
Maybe split the difference and raise the purchasing age for cigarettes 6 months every year. Takes longer to get to nobody can smoke, but you'll get there eventually.
The (NZ) government that changed the approach is heavily loaded with Tobacco friendly Ministers - the expectation is that when the government is voted out (no government lasts forever) the age based approach will be bought back in.
US has gone to a minimum age of 21. I actually think that’s enough, along with raising the price and reducing the number of places people can smoke.
People generally start smoking by their teens or not at all. Making it hard for kids to get exposed to nicotine will stop a lot of addiction.
Also way fewer parents have cigarettes in the house so it’s harder for kids to grab them at home. And there are pretty strong taboos nowadays about giving random kids stuff they’re not supposed to have.
Can we please not keep trying to redo prohibition. Yes it costs public health. No you can’t stop adults imbibing the drugs they want, the only thing you can do is criminalise it which makes criminals of sick people. Great work.
Some companies now make advertisements of news websites that it is clear are also part of betting companies. For example, https://www.admiralbet.news/ has as other Google result the betting website. However, I do have to say it is still less than before and it's much better
I wonder how much the business of online ads and gambling gaming (so called social casino) is. What happens if they both get banned? Must cause a huge amount of loss of revenue from the cloud operators at least.
This is all I see on ad supporteed TV at night here in the UK. And half the time during the day. It's a serious problem coupled with, I assume, serious lobbyists here in the UK.
The gambling lobby in the UK is exceptionally well-organised and well-funded, and pays a good few MPs "consultancy fees" to minimise regulation.
Betfair and PaddyPower are owned by the same pair of public school chancers, who are also touted as startup thinkfluencers, and spend a fortune on "sponsorship" of various sporting events.
People reading this may not realize how pervasive gambling is in Australia thanks to poker machines ("pokies"). These are slot machines, basically. And they're everywhere with one exception: they're illegal outside of casinos in Western Australia.
In every other state, you can walk into many pubs and RSLs ("Retired Servicemen's Leagues", veteran's clubs, basically) and sit there and lose your house. Pokies can be the only thing keeping many businesses in business. They licenses are so valuable that some businesses are bought simply so the licenses can be transferred. Some state governments realize this so reduce the number of licenses on transfer (eg you buy a business wih 20 pokies and you get to transfer 16 and lose 4). This had the predictable outcome of having pokie licenses skyrocket in value.
AFAIK sportsbetting (eg DraftKings) is illegal in Australia because the government has realized how damaging it is yet pokies remain legal.
Oh it's worth adding that Stake, which is headquartered in a shack in Curacao for legal reasons, was started and run by Australians who have absolutely raked in the cash to the point of now being billionaires.
Another problematic part of all this is how gambling has been effectively used for money laundering. The casinos already got hit for allowing this to happen. Pokiies and smaller establishments remain a loophole.
Consider the case of Troy Stolz [1], who leaked documents about ClubsNSW not complying with anti-money laundering and compliance. ClubsNSW was able to bring a private criminal prosecution about this. Youtuber Jordan Shanks-Markovina had his house firebombed (allegedly over this) [2].
Youtuber Boy Boy showed how ridiculously lax AML is with gambling [3].
Finally.
The deluge of gambling ads on TV during Friday night footy is absolutely appalling. There’s a very robust conduit for normalising sports gambling through advertisements around the broadcasts and it’s clearly influencing young adults. I’ve noticed a dramatic uptick in how common it is compared to when I was that age.
I see absolutely no upside for a society to allow sports betting. The tax revenues don't justify the addiction, debts and devastated families.
An argument I've heard is that by legalizing betting, it can be more easily monitored with regulation and reduce the amount of black market betting. People still bet when it's illegal, it just becomes harder to track, which makes it easier for gamblers to interfere with outcomes without detection.
It sounds kind of similar to the legalization of certain recreational drugs. For example, alcohol prohibition resulted in a massive black market with organized criminal gangs, and many places realized it's better to regulate it rather than prohibit it.
I think for gambling, we need better regulations, and the Australian government seems to think so too.
Almost nobody was betting in the black market before the legalization. Sure you obviously had some people, but friction was big enough where it was not worth it. Right now, there isn’t a single game where people are talking about the bets they made in NA.
Nothing should be black and white. Even for alcohol and drug abuse, we should look at each and evaluate.
Yep it's hard to build a large liquid market for both sides of the bet without a central platform being legal. Look at polymarket as another example of things that people wouldn't bet on if a (legal in some countries) platform didn't exist.
Very few people gambled illegally. Putting some gangster out of business (Lol if you actually believe that) at the cost of addicting the entire working class to throwing away their money is bad math!
Sorry, but what?
Illegal gambling has been rife for a very long time - the bookie down the pub taking bets on horses, games, whatever
Add to that that the Costigan Commission (1984) and the Fitzgerald Inquiry (1989) proved that illegal gambling was the foundational "river of gold" for organised crime in Australia.
my grandma is not going to be looking for a black market bookie. some percentage of people will be no matter what though if you make penalties really severe you will significantly thin out this crowd.
without gambling though, pat mahomes would be making less money that I am making…
It's fun and increases engagement with watching sports, being invested with what happens.
As a case study look at the impact sites like CSGOLounge had on the popularity of competitive CSGO.
The ads are going to continue from 8:30pm on, NRL has a game starting at 8pm this evening, the gambling ads will hit just before half time under this new legislation
I nicknamed ESPN in the US EBetPN
That's a nice start but it's really just a band aid over the real problem, kind of like how politicians don't actually want to solve the underlying issue but instead just want to be seen to do something.
The real insanity is just gambling in Australia. As the article mentioned the people in the country have the highest losses to gambling anywhere in the world. This goes beyond sports betting, as that is just the latest thing, to poker machines (slot machines for you USA people) and other online gambling (cough Kick & related companies cough).
I am old enough to remember the introduction of poker machines in pubs and clubs here in Australia and it was always framed as a personal choice and government revenue source but all it did was result in money going from families to the big corporate "entertainment venue" operators (pub and club owners). I'd love it if Australia got rid of all gambling from normal parts of society and limited it to strictly regulated casinos (at most), but the gambling industry is so firmly entrenched in politics and society that I don't see any change happening soon
I think we must be of a similar generation, I also remember being a kid seeing those stupid ads with celebrities “bending their finger”. It’s really gross to think how normalised gambling is.
There is another side to this though, and that’s our pub culture and how “big gambling” plays a role in keeping pubs financially viable with the help of pokies. In the wise words of Tim Whitlam, “Blow up the pokies”
Ireland needs this. I don’t live there anymore, but the amount of ads literally everywhere you go there these days is insane.
Gambling ruins lives.
I fashion myself a bit of a fan of football and an occasional F1 viewer, and I must say, every time I watch a live event with friends I can't help but mention how betting houses have completely taken over the advertising space. Betson, Betano, Betway, bet365,etc... that and the pervasive Crypto.com it is unbelievable how they are trying to find a niche in this demographic. The crypto ones are the best, it's like they are not even trying to hide the nature of the business any more.
> "Today it's gambling advertising, tomorrow it's alcohol, then it's sugary drinks, fast food, critical minerals and who knows what else comes next," chief executive Kai Cantwell said.
We have already learned our lesson. Prohibition doesn’t work. But advertising does work. Banning advertising also works. We should allow people the freedom to participate in vice, but ban all advertising for it. Anything harmful to society should not be advertised. No ads for cars, guns, recreational drugs including alcohol, unhealthy food, fossil fuels, or gambling.
Who knows what comes next Kai? Hopefully everything.
I gotta admit I laughed heartily at the quote. I expected the slippery slope argument, I did not expect it to be made so clumsy :)
btw. what followed is worse: <<He accused the government of blindsiding a sector that supports 30,000 jobs and "provides critical funding to sport, racing and broadcast industries".>>
Gambling business is not a positive force. It's not even zero sum. It's a negative sum game. I hope no one is nodding along to these kind of arguments, they are nonsensical.
“provides critical funding to sport, racing and broadcast industries”
I foresee that the amped-up sports gambling will destroy professional sports as all results will be tainted with the probable interference from the gambling industry and those trying to “game the system” (irony noted).
Today it’s a ban on gambling ads, but tomorrow it’s a ban on mosquitos, cancer, and discrimination.
Listing a bunch of things a lot of people don’t like isn’t a winning argument.
I like the way he included "critical minerals" in this list, sounds like the mining industry also has contributed money to his pocket.
> Prohibition doesn’t work.
Actually, it did work [1]:
> Courtwright’s The Age of Addiction has the statistics: “Per capita consumption initially fell to 30 percent of pre-Prohibition levels, before gradually increasing to 60 or 70 percent by 1933.” That suggests a 30 percent reduction, at a minimum, in consumption — although that was less than the initial effect, as people figured some ways around the law.
> We should allow people the freedom to participate in vice.
There is literally no individual upside to gambling and don't say "winning". For sites like FanDuel and DraftKings, you get banned or your bet sizes severelyl restricted if you consistently win [2]. Why? Because it discourages the marks if they don't win occasionally.
Suicide rate is highest among gambling addicts than any other form of addiction [3]. Gambling measurably increases credit score drops, debts and bankruptcies [4]. The entire business is predatory.
At least back in the day when you had to go to a casino there was some barrier to gambling. Now? Just pull out your phone.
[1]: https://archive.ph/l8m4E#selection-885.0-889.319
[2]: https://www.elitepickz.com/blog/do-sportsbooks-ban-winners-a...
[3]: https://www.news5cleveland.com/news/local-news/problem-gambl...
[4]: https://www.nbcnews.com/business/consumer/online-sports-gamb...
> For sites like FanDuel and DraftKings, you get banned or your bet sizes severelyl restricted if you consistently win
Can confirm this in Australia too. They also give you better odds if you keep losing, to keep you coming back.
A great first step. I'd love to see a sin tax associated with this as well - ie, for adverts that do run, they should have to pay a % of the ad fee to the government.
I don't think people understand just how ingrained in the culture gambling is in Australia. One of the primary 3rd spaces for people in Australia are RSLs, which are technically clubs for veterans to get co-op like services, but have evolved into a 3rd space for everyone that offer food, alcohol, entertainment, and of course, sports gambling and "pokies" (poker/slot machines).
That's one of the myths the gambling dens propagate: that they are there for the veterans. There is no technicality about it.
https://www.rslaustralia.org/rsl-sub-branches-and-rsl-clubs-...
The "RSL sub-branch" is a not-for-profit welfare organisation, that looks after veterans. For the most part they are small and if they are lucky they get the use of a meeting room in the RSL club.
The "RSL Club" is a multimillion dollar commercial enterprise that looks after its own interests, conducts political lobbying, makes millions of dollars off gambling addicts and hands out token grants in the community to give the impression that they are there to benefit the community. Typically nothing to do with the RSL sub-branch.
As a West Australian this is so interesting to me, because gambling culture is extremely niche here - but WA law is that pokies are only allowed at the casino, nowhere else. And thank fuck for that.
Bold move limiting gambling ads to just three per hour. Next up light-touch bans on cigarettes where you can only smoke during ad breaks.
The ability for Sportsbet to deluge your feed with gambling remains unhindered. Their TikTok/Instagram ads are clever and unrelenting.
As a consequence there is a quiet crisis in young people, 18-30, deeply in debt, working second and third jobs so that they have a bit more money to gamble.
I'd strongly support a year-based ban on cigarette purchases.
Set the purchase birth year to the current age 18. So DOB 2008 if done today, if you're born 2009 or later you can't buy smokes at all ever.
Within two generations we'd largely eliminate smoking. Within three cigarettes would be amongst impossible to get. Great public health initiative.
NZ tried that cigarette ban, but walked it back so they could get juicy tax revenues. https://lite.cnn.com/2023/11/28/asia/new-zealand-smoking-ban...
Maybe split the difference and raise the purchasing age for cigarettes 6 months every year. Takes longer to get to nobody can smoke, but you'll get there eventually.
We’d just end up in the same situation as Australia - where up to one third of all cigarettes consumed are purchased on the black market.
The (NZ) government that changed the approach is heavily loaded with Tobacco friendly Ministers - the expectation is that when the government is voted out (no government lasts forever) the age based approach will be bought back in.
US has gone to a minimum age of 21. I actually think that’s enough, along with raising the price and reducing the number of places people can smoke.
People generally start smoking by their teens or not at all. Making it hard for kids to get exposed to nicotine will stop a lot of addiction.
Also way fewer parents have cigarettes in the house so it’s harder for kids to grab them at home. And there are pretty strong taboos nowadays about giving random kids stuff they’re not supposed to have.
The UK is supposedly doing exactly this. As are a few other places.
Would you support the same ban for alcohol?
Can we please not keep trying to redo prohibition. Yes it costs public health. No you can’t stop adults imbibing the drugs they want, the only thing you can do is criminalise it which makes criminals of sick people. Great work.
I smoke maybe a pack a year at best. I can’t buy smokes because some nuffies don’t like it? Take a hike.
So it would be a small personal sacrifice for huge societal benefit, and you wouldn’t even do that?
The societal downside of providing yet another revenue stream for criminal organisations seems like it might be worth taking into consideration.
I'm from italy where we have a ban.
Some companies now make advertisements of news websites that it is clear are also part of betting companies. For example, https://www.admiralbet.news/ has as other Google result the betting website. However, I do have to say it is still less than before and it's much better
I wonder how much the business of online ads and gambling gaming (so called social casino) is. What happens if they both get banned? Must cause a huge amount of loss of revenue from the cloud operators at least.
"TV ads from betting agencies will be capped at three per hour, between 6am and 8:30pm"
-----------
And thus, the ten minute Australian gambling ad was born.
Gambling ads are to Australia what Pharmaceutical ads are to the USA.
This is all I see on ad supporteed TV at night here in the UK. And half the time during the day. It's a serious problem coupled with, I assume, serious lobbyists here in the UK.
The gambling lobby in the UK is exceptionally well-organised and well-funded, and pays a good few MPs "consultancy fees" to minimise regulation.
Betfair and PaddyPower are owned by the same pair of public school chancers, who are also touted as startup thinkfluencers, and spend a fortune on "sponsorship" of various sporting events.
It's an industry of bottom feeders.
People reading this may not realize how pervasive gambling is in Australia thanks to poker machines ("pokies"). These are slot machines, basically. And they're everywhere with one exception: they're illegal outside of casinos in Western Australia.
In every other state, you can walk into many pubs and RSLs ("Retired Servicemen's Leagues", veteran's clubs, basically) and sit there and lose your house. Pokies can be the only thing keeping many businesses in business. They licenses are so valuable that some businesses are bought simply so the licenses can be transferred. Some state governments realize this so reduce the number of licenses on transfer (eg you buy a business wih 20 pokies and you get to transfer 16 and lose 4). This had the predictable outcome of having pokie licenses skyrocket in value.
AFAIK sportsbetting (eg DraftKings) is illegal in Australia because the government has realized how damaging it is yet pokies remain legal.
Oh it's worth adding that Stake, which is headquartered in a shack in Curacao for legal reasons, was started and run by Australians who have absolutely raked in the cash to the point of now being billionaires.
Another problematic part of all this is how gambling has been effectively used for money laundering. The casinos already got hit for allowing this to happen. Pokiies and smaller establishments remain a loophole.
Consider the case of Troy Stolz [1], who leaked documents about ClubsNSW not complying with anti-money laundering and compliance. ClubsNSW was able to bring a private criminal prosecution about this. Youtuber Jordan Shanks-Markovina had his house firebombed (allegedly over this) [2].
Youtuber Boy Boy showed how ridiculously lax AML is with gambling [3].
[1]: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/feb/07/clubs...
[2]: https://independentaustralia.net/life/life-display/friendlyj...
[3]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DoyH1dgj8Lo
Let's hope that they don't burn someone else's house.
https://youtu.be/ZI3zaHUsgXg
https://youtu.be/jZivPIRvi0U