ALBANY, N.Y. — Differentiating between slot machines and video lottery terminals sounds like a discussion only computer nerds or gamblers could enjoy.

Yet identifying those differences, if any exist, is one of the crucial issues in a challenge to the legality of the state’s plan to set up the gambling terminals, called VLTs, at most horse racing tracks in the state.

The hundreds of millions of dollars in revenues the cash-strapped state has expected to reap from the VLT casinos since the gambling law was approved in October 2001 makes the difference one that all New Yorkers should care about.

To Neil Murray, the issue is simple – slot machines, the classic one-armed bandits that have been the backbone of casinos in Nevada, New Jersey, Connecticut and elsewhere, are indistinguishable from VLTs. To identify differences is a “classic exercise” in semantics, Murray said.

A VLT “is a device that in and of itself is a slot machine,” said Murray, who is representing anti-gambling forces in a legal challenge before a mid-level state appeals courts. “This is a slot machine because it is implemented and operated by inserting something of value and something of value is provided.”

Not so fast, caution the pro-VLT forces, whose case is being argued by state Attorney General Eliot Spitzer’s office, plus lawyers for the gaming industry and racetrack operators.

VLTs are merely a clever way of dressing up what at its core is a lottery game, the pro-gamblers argue. While statutes in New York explicitly bar slot machines, state-run lottery games have been legal since voters amended the state constitution to allow them in 1966.

VLTs merely provide access to a new lottery game, the devices’ champions say.

Frederick Martin, a lawyer representing Yonkers Raceway, …

Concern is mounting in poker forums and chat rooms about poker “bots”, is it just paranoia or the future for internet poker?

With poker topping the $1 Billion mark this year, the emergence of so called “poker bots” has many long standing online players worried. These bots, capable of playing 24hrs a day to a pre-defined strategy are rumoured to already be in place at fixed limit poker on some of the major online rooms, fleecing newbies and poorer players of their bankrolls and amassing huge sums of money for it’s owner.

Is it just paranoia? Do thee bots exist? Two questions that have been asked in many forums of late. The simple answer is yes, they do exist, a little searching on the web will turn up a program which can be purchased or used for free as a demo on three of the top internet poker rooms. Fortunately, it’s not as simple as downloading the software and leaving it to run. The user must define a strategy for the software first, so the short term work is all done by the user, however, apparently once the setup is complete, assuming the user has a solid strategy which they have known to work at low level fixed limit hold em, everything should be plain sailing from there.

Should regular players be worried? Experienced players, it seems, should have no trouble in beating a poker bot, the software is designed so the user can pick on poor players and exploit their weaknesses and right now it can only play at low level fixed limit hold em. Some argue the togel hongkong bot is cheating, other say it’s simply playing in a way that they normally would, only for 24hrs a day. Poker rooms will ban users trying to use bots …