Could this be a move to all-computerized drawings — and the death of real drawings — in Illinois?
After 20 years of perky hosts and ping pong balls, the future of live Illinois Lottery drawings on WGN-Ch.9 is up in the air.
Lottery officials said Tuesday they are considering parting ways with WGN-TV, home to daily drawings since 1994, when the current one-year contract expires in June. Advances in lottery technology, an influx of new games and the move by Tribune Co. to pull the evening drawings off of national cable channel WGN America in February are playing into the decision.
"We're in a period right now of just evaluating all these things," said Michael Jones, Illinois Lottery Superintendent. "The world has changed from 30 years ago and there are lots of way now of doing drawings."
The Lottery pays WGN $1.2 million annually to air two live broadcasts each day — during the noon and 9 p.m. newscasts. The format has been the same for decades, with glamorous hosts drawing numbered ping pong balls out of glass machines for a variety of Lotto games.
A hot commodity that sparked competitions between local TV stations for the exclusive broadcast rights in the '80s and '90s, the live local drawings have perhaps lost some of their luster in the digital age. A number of games, such as "Hit or Miss," exist entirely in cyberspace, with a random number generator housed in the Lottery's Springfield office conducting four virtual drawings each day.
Lottery officials have been weighing whether the virtual technology might be just as effective for the big jackpot Lotto drawings. The decision by WGN America to replace the "News at Nine" with national programming and cut off the drawings to downstate viewers accelerated the process to consider alternatives, according to Jones.
WGN America is in the process of reinventing itself as a national cable channel, with heavily-promoted "Salem" debuting on Sunday, the first of several original scripted dramas rolling out this year. The fees that WGN receives cover production costs, including the hosts, who are employed by WGN. The Lottery received a 40 percent reduction in fees for the last five months of the contract, corresponding with the loss of the downstate audience, according to officials.
The Lottery may look for steeper discounts going forward, or may just look in a different direction entirely, Jones said. Negotiations are ongoing; WGN officials said they are hoping to renew the longstanding agreement to air the lottery drawings.
"WGN-TV has been a proud partner with the Illinois Lottery for many years," said a WGN spokeswoman. "We look forward to a continued partnership."
This is not the first time Jones has contemplated pulling the drawings from WGN-TV. As Lottery Director from 1981 to 1985, he moved the games to WFLD-Ch.32 for a better deal.
The drawings bounced to WBBM-Ch.2 in 1992, and back to WGN on Jan. 1, 1994.
Jones was brought back as superintendent in 2011 after Northstar became the nation's first private manager of a state lottery. Revenues are growing — they hit $2.84 billion last year with net proceeds of $794 million — but Northstar has failed meet its annual targets so far.
The Lottery spent $46 million on advertising in 2013, and Jones is hoping to lure more players — especially younger ones — to play the games.
Generating the winning lottery numbers through a computer and disseminating them online may be no less appealing, and substantially more cost-effective, in reaching the new target audience.
Still, longtime players may miss the ping pong balls, and particularly,
Linda Kollmeyer, the sunshiny "Lottery Lady" who has hosted the drawings over two decades. Decked out in finery, punctuating the drawings with random, upbeat pearls of wisdom, she has developed a cult following.
Jones said that one of the virtual solutions he is contemplating would keep Kollmeyer in the game, even if the ping pong balls eventually disappear.
"In discussions with WGN, they've come up with some very imaginative things, including potentially having an avatar of Linda Kollmeyer, so that she lives forever," he said.
Yeah, I believe this is a ploy, to get people used to computer draws. So that in the future they can increase the frequency of draws. We see this trend already.
Many games that were once a day have increased to 2 times a day, or 4 times a day. Wait till they go to every 4 hours, or every hour, or every 5 minutes, or every minute. You can't do that with mechanical ball draws. This is a slippery slope that takes the lottery into the realm of real time casino gambling.(lottery quick draw Keno is already there) At that point,(or if they offer online scratch games) I believe the lottery has crossed the line and gone beyond their mandate. Is the government supposed to be in the gambling business?
They don't need to use a computer to have 4 draws a day.
The day Texas stops real ball draws is the day I stop playing Texas lottery games.
My...lots of things going on in Illinois. None of them good.
LOTTERY QUICK DRAW.
COMPUTERIZED RANDOM DRAWING.
Every 4 minutes the Lottery's computer randomly selects 20 numbers from the field of 1 through 80 and displays them on the Quick Draw monitor.
Take a look at how many people are playing Powerball today.
Computerized drawings vs real ball drawings...I don't trust digital, and I wouldn't ride a sinking boat either.
No live drawings and computer generated winning numbers seem to take out some of the excitement of the game.
Come to think of it, have not seen a live drawing of the N.J. lottery in a long while.Doubt that has hurt the lottery sales as the jackpots grow aggressively from drawing to drawing. The N.J. Pick 5 Game from last night (4/15/14) paid out $71,631. The jackpot started out at $50K and grew over $21k by the time of the drawings, later in the evening.
Illinois' decision to change the drawings will probaly have little or no effect on their buying publics' habit of playing these games of chance. The computerized drawings may produce longer periods with no winners, which will benefit their state.
Can see where folks will suspect that the computer may be progammed not to select any of the played selections, but doubt the Ilinois Lottery would want to do that, as it could affect sales.
Spending $46 million for lottery advertising seems a bit high. Spending $1.2 million for live drawings sounds like a bargain when revenues have reached $2.84 Billion,with net proceeds of $794 Million.
Replacing Linda Kollmeyer, The Lottery Lady, with an avatar is tacky, in my humble opinion.
Spending $46 million for lottery advertising seems a bit high. Spending $1.2 million for live drawings sounds like a bargain when revenues have reached $2.84 Billion,with net proceeds of $794 Million.
True...it's quite an expensive journey.
The NJ Lottery broadcasts its evening drawings live on TV, and all drawings are broadcast live on the Internet. No computerized drawings here. Maybe that's why the games continue to be so popular in the state.
I disagree with you about the probability that moving to computerized drawings would not harm sales in Illinois. Computerized drawings are horrendous, and many people (including myself) are far less inclined to play when they are used. Perhaps you are not aware that Indiana switched from computers to real drawings for all numbers games because of the general outrage that existed for so long over the computerized drawings.
Hmmmmnn....good to know.
From the OP:
Lottery officials said Tuesday they are considering parting ways with WGN-TV, home to daily drawings since 1994, when the current one-year contract expires in June. Advances in lottery technology, an influx of new games and the move by Tribune Co. to pull the evening drawings off of national cable channel WGN America in February are playing into the decision.
Couple this with the thread about Northstar not divulging everything and it's very suspicious.
"WGN America is in the process of reinventing itself as a national cable channel, with heavily-promoted "Salem" debuting on Sunday, the first of several original scripted dramas rolling out this year."
Until now WGNA has shown nothing but repeats of old programs, sports and news.
Great article Todd. Please keep me in the loop with this.
You guys think the balls are better blah the numbers they want to dall are already picked the balls are merely a concrete image we can see to represent the numbers.
Well, that's wrong.
Todd: Do you know of all the states that are not digital; A listing perhaps? Thank you..
https://www.lotterypost.com/lottery-report-card.asp
I personally agree with todd--i don't belive any routine of code that simulates ramdom activity should be used for actual drawing!
They will never be able to exactly simulate wind spun ball machines for the dailly machines. Wind vortex and shuffling are not equal ever.
They want to get rid yet of some more jobs. increase the quanity of drawings for a supposed increase in funds. I will stop playing my cash for ever when they convert to eletronic drawings.
Most do not know even the very basics of how trngs work --If they did they would not want it to be used. Even if they pass all stat tests which they never do. In some dimsion they allways fail.
But the big boys want there pockets greased and filled with new increases even if its short term.
Illinois is far in debt. And those in charge love to give themseleves raises.
That 1 percent for schools never really went to any of my local schools. teachers pensions keep increasing taxes.
it does nothing !
HAWK
You have to look no farther than Washington, D.C. Not many things good, come out of Illinois!!!!
"If you had always assumed that Chicago earned its nickname as the Windy City from the chilly gusts coming off Lake Michigan, you would be wrong. The city is windy, according to most local legends, because of the hot air bellowing from politicians."
IL Hit or Miss Game - I thought this game was Mechanical ????? Read on........
"A number of games, such as "Hit or Miss," exist entirely in cyberspace, with a random number generator housed in the Lottery's Springfield office conducting four virtual drawings each day"
How many winners have there been since Day 01 ??????? I never hear of anyone ever winning. I would like to know how many people won the 12 of 12 or the 0 of 12 prize since Day 01. As of this time, there have been 826 drawings.
Some days it takes IL over an hour to Post the winning numbers on their web page. Makes you wonder.........
If a computer can keep track of the numbers that were purchased - where, when, time, numbers played. It can also tell you what numbers were not played at the time the RNG is put into play. Would love to see the programming on this baby........................
I hope Illinois Lottery fails in it's bid to bring these awful computerized drawings. We wouldn't want other states to draw inspiration from it.
4 giving lottery player's honest service
ALL these YEAR's + giving Ill cheap lottery
great price & showmanship 4 1.2 Mil !!
but
times change & Psyko know's dare is
always a >>>BUTT>>>out DARE
Fake computer drawings?
It sounds like something that corrupt state would do.
Look for big smiles on a lot of Illinois politicians and Chicago mobsters.
Anybody who thinks those computers in Illinois won't be "adjusted" is nuts. It's a lock, guaranteed, done deal.
I hope they crash and burn right after they go to fake computer drawings.
Do not declare war on the lottery Mob. LOL
Anti gambling groups have to be celebrating all these lottery changes. LOL
Complaining that Illinois politics/affairs of their govt. stink, is like complaining that your vacuum cleaner sucks. Hint, hint, it has been that way for ages.
I like how wgn took powerball and mega millions drawing off the air so now I have to watch them on the internet when they get downloaded to powerball and mega millions website. Thanks wgn you are really great no live drawings as they happen but an hour and half old video from the internet. You rock wgn.-weshar75
Do not play the lottery, if you do not trust the lottery.
4/17/14 Thursday,
In this world of change , some things never change, people's constant attempts to improve. No one has improved on the invention of the wheel but wheels
are nothing like their original design. Now they come with motorized attachments to make us fly through time, with all kinds of modern accoutrements.
The wheel of fortune will still spin for us lottery players whether they be in Illinois or any other state .
When MM went to the 75 number matrix I said I was going to swear off of it but now I think I trust MM and PB much more than the Illinois draw games.
When we did get the drawings on WGNA (Downstate we're on national feed (as someone here pointed out) there were plenty of times that the machine malfunctioned and there was a notice on the screen:
Due to technical difficulties the results will be shown later on in the broadcast.
Northstar cares more about promoting the lottery and marketing the lottery to increase revenue than doing anything to improve the lottery.
"Don't worry 'bout nuttin', we'll tell ya what da results were later."
Yeah, ok.
wow, suspect data...
Lottery quick picks are chosen from random numbers generators.
Computerized drawings is the future. 70% of lottery players buy quick picks which are generated by computers.
four4me,
Good point but evidently the integrity of the games isn't Northstars' top priority.
Since runniong the Illinois lottery they have fallen way short of the promise of increased revenue they made to ths state and are scrambling to come up with ways to meet it.
Sad.
not pick 3 and 4 games