Illinois Lottery mulling changes to drawings

Comment #38

four4me — Tue, 22 Apr 2014 15:35:00 GMT

not pick 3 and 4 games

Comment #37

Coin Toss — Tue, 22 Apr 2014 15:10:05 GMT

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.

Comment #36

four4me — Tue, 22 Apr 2014 14:19:26 GMT

To the lottery director and staff of the Illinois lottery do not switch from ball drawings to computerized drawings you will lose money. The integrity of the games depends solely on the fact that ball drawings are the most wildly used drawings in the USA.

Computerized drawings have and will continue to fail due to software glitches that neither you nor your staff will recognize.

Comment #35

THRIFTY — Tue, 22 Apr 2014 13:47:56 GMT

Computerized drawings is the future. 70% of lottery players buy quick picks which are generated by computers.

Comment #34

THRIFTY — Tue, 22 Apr 2014 13:40:17 GMT

Lottery quick picks are chosen from random numbers generators.

Comment #33

sully16 — Mon, 21 Apr 2014 20:11:32 GMT

wow, suspect data...

Comment #32

rdgrnr — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 16:29:27 GMT

Don't worry 'bout nuttin', we'll tell ya what da results were later.

Yeah, ok.

Comment #31

Coin Toss — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 04:19:06 GMT

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... [ More ]

Comment #30

Gleno — Thu, 17 Apr 2014 14:03:07 GMT

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 .

Let's hope the powers that be don't kill the goose that... [ More ]

Comment #29

THRIFTY — Thu, 17 Apr 2014 10:57:22 GMT

Do not play the lottery, if you do not trust the lottery.

Comment #28

weshar75 — Thu, 17 Apr 2014 03:51:48 GMT

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

Comment #27

mypiemaster — Thu, 17 Apr 2014 02:06:24 GMT

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.

Comment #26

THRIFTY — Thu, 17 Apr 2014 01:24:28 GMT

Anti gambling groups have to be celebrating all these lottery changes. LOL

Comment #25

THRIFTY — Thu, 17 Apr 2014 01:18:54 GMT

Do not declare war on the lottery Mob. LOL

Comment #24

rdgrnr — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 23:55:29 GMT

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.

Comment #23

HaveABall — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 23:16:25 GMT

Comment #22

psykomo — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 22:52:41 GMT

THANK's WGN

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

Comment #21

maringoman — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 20:46:36 GMT

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.

Comment #20

butch2030 — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 20:43:30 GMT

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.... [ More ]

Comment #19

BuyLow — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 20:31:27 GMT

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.

Comment #18

CARBOB — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 17:32:09 GMT

You have to look no farther than Washington, D.C. Not many things good, come out of Illinois

Comment #17

pick4hawk — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 16:39:45 GMT

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 b... [ More ]

Comment #16

LottoBux — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 16:17:06 GMT

https://www.lotterypost.com/lottery-report-card.asp

Comment #15

Cieli Diverde — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 16:16:02 GMT

Todd: Do you know of all the states that are not digital; A listing perhaps? Thank you..

Comment #14

Todd — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 16:09:14 GMT

Well, that's wrong.

Comment #13

smooth11484 — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 15:17:11 GMT

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.

Comment #12

chrissy16 — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 15:01:31 GMT

Great article Todd. Please keep me in the loop with this.

Comment #11

Coin Toss — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 14:49:45 GMT

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 th... [ More ]

Comment #10

Marilyn222 — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 14:44:51 GMT

Hmmmmnn....good to know.

Comment #9

Todd — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 14:34:13 GMT

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 fro... [ More ]

Comment #8

Marilyn222 — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 14:27:24 GMT

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.

Comment #7

Gleno — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 14:18:43 GMT

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... [ More ]

Comment #6

Marilyn222 — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 14:05:11 GMT

Computerized drawings vs real ball drawings...I don't trust digital, and I wouldn't ride a sinking boat either.

Comment #5

noise-gate — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 13:46:00 GMT

Computerized Drawings?..... Full Bore and Into the Abyss

Comment #4

THRIFTY — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 13:11:00 GMT

Take a look at how many people are playing Powerball today.

Comment #3

THRIFTY — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 13:08:53 GMT

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.

Comment #2

rcbbuckeye — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 12:50:28 GMT

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.

Comment #1

Jon D — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 12:15:12 GMT

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... [ More ]

Illinois Lottery mulling changes to drawings

Lottery Post — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 12:07:35 GMT

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 drawin... [ More ]