Many nontraditional laws apply to the human condition. We’ve all heard of Murphy’s Law, which states things will go wrong in any given situation, if you give them a chance. It’s a popular adage in Western culture, and when things do go wrong, many of us chalk it up to old Murphy’s Law.
I know of a casino in the Midwest that brought in a network systems consultant to train staff on their internal network. This consultation was done for business systems users. Unfortunately, the consultant presumed he was working on a closed network. Also of ill fortune was that the slot system resided on that same network. Well, one thing led to another, and soon the consultant was busy making changes and modifications to the system to demonstrate what could go wrong if certain actions were taken.
While the consultant was sitting in a meeting room with his audience of business users in a remote corner of the casino, the slot department was twisting and contorting in all sorts of unusual ways as they tried to figure out why entire sections of their slot floor were mysteriously going dark during peek hours of customer play.
Needless to say, when the problem was revealed, the network consultant was promptly escorted out of the casino and asked never to return. I guess there’s no calling a Mulligan on that sort of Murphy’s Law outcome.
Another law that applies to us all is the Law of Unintended Consequences. This law applies to unpredicted outcomes, sometimes indirect outcomes of action(s) taken or not taken, in a given situation. This law differs from Murphy’s Law in that the unintended consequence may result in a positive outcome.
An example of this might be how certain states negotiated gaming compacts with tribes. In California, limiting the number of Class III machines a casino could operate was instituted. This was done in an effort to control and manage the growth of Indian Gaming. The law was applied as a blanket approach, regardless of where a particular tribe resided geographically. In certain locations, population densities were so great, the demand for Class III devices was almost immediately greater than the supply.
Anybody who has taken a basic economics class knows that when demand is greater than supply, a series of new outcomes will occur. First, prices might rise because of lack of competition. Next, market forces will likely drive ingenuity. In this case, technological changes to the marketplace occurred. Bingo, designated a Class II game, became a solution to the problem of unmet demand. Class II games are not regulated in the same way Class III games are. In fact, they are regulated exclusively by the tribes who operate them and are not subject to the same state revenue share agreements as Class III games.
What happened is that the old game of bingo, traditionally played on paper with numbers called by a person aided by a machine, drastically changed. Electronic handheld devices expanding the number of outcomes over time had already reached the market place. Prior to the early ‘90s expansion of Indian Gaming. Changing the appearance of this handheld device to resemble a Class III slot was a relatively easy modification. The first Class II games resembling Class III games were crude, but the market forces of supply and demand remedied that in a relatively short amount of time. Today these Class II devices are sleek and sophisticated. They offer players an experience almost identical to that of play on a Class III device.
Just like that unfortunate slot department, state legislators have been twisting and contorting in all sorts of unusual ways since the advent of these new machines. Now they are attempting to change the rules of the game in mid-play. This is happening for various reasons. In some cases, it’s the allure of revenues for the state. In other cases, it’s an issue of hurt pride in states not foreseeing their unintended consequences.
As we all know, the federal government is considering imposing new rules on Class II games via the National Indian Gaming Commission. Whatever the outcome of this debate, there will undoubtedly be more unintended consequences.
Peter Mead, Publisher