Money Wired

The networks behind these monster jackpots are the essence of modern Vegas, a city already so wired, and so primed for more, that it's become a proving ground for digital tech at the crossroads of money, profit, crime, entertainment, illusion, and delusion. Surveillance systems, more tested and proven than those used against terrorists, track and trade biometric data about cheaters, hackers, and scam artists. Software monitors and rewards customer loyalty. Equipment companies tinker with concepts like digital, networked blackjack. Billboards and signs are linked, controlled by remote overseers who immediately dispatch repair technicians whenever there's a glitch. And, by most accounts, over the next several years, Vegas' obsession with technology is only going to intensify. Odd thought: Sin City could become the most wired city on Earth, as many of the now discrete networks connect, grow, and spread via the Web.




Nice to see you again, Mr. Smith, and welcome to Net Vegas.

Other than Kathleen Budz and her husband, the first to know about the $4 million payday were the on-duty monitors at the Reno, Nevada, headquarters of International Game Technology, the world's largest gaming device manufacturer and the owner of most of the MegaJackpots slots in Vegas. IGT collects the revenues, pays the winners, and gives host casinos a cut. As soon as the jackpot hit, IGT's monitors showed which machine, in which casino, at which moment, had won, and how much the payout would be.




On the playing floor, New York-New York employees—who had just received a phone call from IGT—rushed to cordon off the winning machine. Congratulations were low-key: All jackpots need to be confirmed. "We try to keep the players cool," says IGT public relations representative Connie Fox (she's responsible for getting the big jackpot winners on the front page of the local paper). Drinks were offered to the nominal millionaires. Meanwhile, one of IGT's local "jackpot response representatives" arrived at the hotel with a winner's kit that contained an oversize bank draft (for show) and a regular check (for real), along with legal documents and tax forms. With her was the key player in the drama, a technician who opened up the machine and began a 30-minute run of diagnostics. Finally the prize was verified. At IGT's headquarters, technicians rewound the progressive prize to base level: $1,000,000. The next big payout would come along in about 10 days. The odds of winning change constantly, but Fox says a single pull generates roughly the same likelihood of victory as the California lottery—about 15 million to one.




Net Vegas was conceived in the early 1980s. Linked slots didn't yet exist, but for the first time mechanical units were being replaced by electronic ones, just as Pac-Man was pushing aside pinball machines in the arcades. The era began with an attempt to dispense with traditional spinning slot machine reels in favor of video displays. It didn't go well, initially. Outside of a military battlefield, there is probably no harsher testing ground for new tech than a gambling floor. "A game," says the R&D director at IGT, Bill Wells, "needs to be productive the moment it hits the casino floor." The reel-free slots were odd-looking. Players hated them.