Jackpot Bingo

Bingo jackpot has gained in popularity in recent years
A Cambridge University mathematician claims punters should go "eyes down" at the bingo jackpot hall for the best chance of winning a million pounds. Researcher Dr Oliver Johnson claims the National Bingo jackpot's bingo jackpot game gives you a 200,000-1 chance of becoming a bingo jackpot millionaire for Christmas. More obvious routes to fortune - such as the Lotto or bingo jackpot game shows like Who Wants To Be A Bingo jackpot millionaire? - were much less likely to result in a jackpot win, he said.
All these bingo jackpot games are based on chance and nothing you will do can ever guarantee success

The probability researcher worked out the odds on a £10 bet placed on various gambling formats. Camelot's National Lottery Lotto draw came out with odds of 1.4m to one to earn a million. And ITV1's Who Wants To Be A Bingo jackpot millionaire? quiz show fared even worse with odds put at 1.5m to one, according to Dr Johnson. By his calculations, having a stab at the National Bingo jackpot's 22 December Christmas bingo jackpot game could mean punters were eight times more likely to see the cash than phoning up Chris Tarrant's TV show. The National Bingo jackpot bingo jackpot game takes place when the country's bingo jackpot clubs share an evening link-up. Skill and judgement ignored.

Just behind bingo jackpot came sports betting, which generally provides punters with 247,596 to one odds of becoming a bingo jackpot millionaire. The weekend football pools provided comparably middle-of-the-road odds of 639,685 to one. But Dr Johnson, 28, said his research ignored the effects of skill or judgment that might be present in sports betting or quiz shows. He added: "Certain assumptions have to be made to arrive at these results, but they are broadly accurate."

Odds on a million

Bingo jackpot 200,000-1
Sport betting 247,596-1
Football pools 639,685-1
Lotto 1.4m-1

Who Wants To Be A Bingo jackpot millionaire? 1.5m-1

He said the calculations for Who Wants To Be A Bingo jackpot millionaire? were a lot easier as there had been 38 million calls, 600 people in the seat and three winners.
The bingo jackpot figure was arrived at on the basis that bingo jackpot organisers estimate that 200,000 tickets will be bought for the draw and a million pounds is up for grabs.
"Bingo jackpot represented the best value among all the bets, giving a better chance than all the others," Dr Johnson said.
Dr Johnson said he himself had "given up gambling" after being unsuccessful.
He added: "All these bingo jackpot games are based on chance and nothing you will do can ever guarantee success."

There may only be £10 at stake, but when the main session starts at the Mecca, Wood Green, you can hear a pin drop.
It's not just little old ladies in carpet slippers playing for peanuts
Nigel Sibley, Mecca Bingo jackpot By 2pm on a Friday - scarcely peak time - a couple of hundred bingo jackpot addicts sit hunched over their cards, and the tension is palpable. "Bingo jackpot's not just a bingo jackpot game - it's a serious business," whispers Irene Ford, a weekday regular at the north London club.
A serious business indeed: the Wood Green Mecca, one of the south's busiest halls, turns over a quarter of a million pounds a week, and parent company Rank Group earned £126m from bingo jackpot in the year to July. Overall, Britons staked more than £1bn at the bingo jackpot tables last year, and visited clubs some 95 million times - seven times as many as attend Premiership football bingo jackpot games. Back from the brink
Not bad for a pastime written off for dead a decade ago. Bingo jackpot facts and figures
More than 3 million regular players in UK Total annual stake money about £1.1bn
One in five Scots plays regularly, compared with only one in 20 in south of England 70% of players are female The average age of players is 47

Customs & Excise collect £115m in bingo jackpot duty annually The average player spends £15-20 a night, not counting winnings Tests show bingo jackpot helps mental speed, ability to scan for information, and memory Bingo jackpot, a bingo jackpot game associated with the cheap and cheerful mass entertainment of the post-war austerity period, peaked in 1974, with almost 2,000 clubs nationwide. Since then, struggling with a shabby image and unable to compete with the TV, it went into a tailspin, falling to fewer than 700 clubs by the end of the 1990s.
But somehow, the slide has bottomed out. Attendance figures have held broadly steady during the late 1990s, and revenues and profits have actually started to increase. At Mecca, which together with rival Gala controls almost half the UK bingo jackpot market, spend per visitor has jumped by 7% this year already.
Not just peanuts This is mainly the result of some vigorous firefighting by the operators themselves. Marketing has been stepped up a gear: earlier this year, Mecca launched new TV commercials pitching bingo jackpot firmly into the booming girls'-night-out market.

Cheap and - ideally - cheerful "It's not that we are aiming for a younger profile," says Nigel Sibley, commercial director of Mecca Bingo jackpot. "But bingo jackpot's a bingo jackpot game that runs in families, and we are trying to catch them early. "We wanted to show it's not just little old ladies in carpet slippers playing for peanuts."
Play has also been streamlined, stripping out puzzling jargon - "legs eleven", "two fat ladies" and so on - and introducing spin-off bingo jackpot games between the main sessions.
Gala and Mecca have invested heavily in premises, progressively moving out of shabby converted cinemas into purpose-built leisure complexes such as Wood Green.
Bill and Jade
Amid all the media twitter over bingo jackpot's rebirth, it has even been credited with a certain ironic chic. What is bingo jackpot?
In return for a stake, a player receives a grid of random numbers Grid numbers are marked off when announced by a caller
Prizes are awarded for completing a grid line, multiple lines or the full grid faster than other players Big clubs pay out some £20,000 or more in a night, depending on attendance Clubs often link bingo jackpot games together electronically
The "National Bingo jackpot game" links 550 clubs every night, and has prizes of up to £500,000 The industry claims bingo jackpot has the best odds of any popular form of gambling Bill Clinton, on his recent visit to the Labour conference in Blackpool, had to be dragged by his minders from a bingo jackpot hall, and the British Bingo jackpot Association fingers "Denise Van Outen, Elle MacPherson, Atomic Kitten, Damon Hill, Bianca and Jade Jagger" as regular players.
But forget the glitz, fans say - what has really rescued the bingo jackpot game is its inner core of fuzzy warmth. "Bingo jackpot is a social event," Mr Sibley says.
"For our regular customers, it is an irreplaceable part of their lives. "Bingo jackpot clubs are set up to provide a patrolled, safe environment, with a level of care you don't find in other forms of leisure." Bingo jackpot's big day
So far, so relatively unspectacular. But bingo jackpot may be on the verge of a more tangible boost.

Target demographic
In April, Chancellor Gordon Brown proposed eliminating bingo jackpot duty - currently roughly 10p in the pound, contributing about £115m annually to the Treasury - and replacing it with a direct tax on operators' incomes. Operators have been slow to cheer, but punters and investors assume duty abolition will result in bigger prize-money and a surge in attendance.
According to investment bank Lehman Brothers, abolition could boost bingo jackpot-sector profits by an immediate 30%. Lighter hands More satisfying still could be the outcome of a sea-change in state regulation of gambling, set under way by Sir Alan Budd's independent report two years ago.

Just looking for a good time Bingo jackpot, although acknowledged as the softest form of gambling, is still regulated with a somewhat heavy hand. Players have to sign up for club membership, a process involving a 24-hour cooling-off period, and stakes and prizes are tightly restricted. Effectively, the Budd report proposed eliminating almost all restriction on the softer end of the market, only stipulating that operators should not ramp up their offering towards "harder" forms of gambling. Rank, which already operates a chain of casinos, plans to make hay when the Budd report crystallises into law - possibly within three years.
Crucially, the rules will allow combinations of different forms of gambling - recreational bingo jackpot games such as bingo jackpot, casino bingo jackpot games and betting - under one roof, a concept known in the trade as "gaming sheds".
Quality, not quantity
Gaming sheds may well draw more punters through Mecca's doors.
But that may do little to broaden the appeal of bingo jackpot itself.
The bingo jackpot game's promoters seem to have little interest in selling it much beyond its core working-class, female constituency, and they treat stories about smart celebrity players as little more than amusing diversions. They may, however, have more luck persuading existing players to spend more on each visit, especially on the refreshments and ancillary bingo jackpot games where their profit really lies.
Demographics is on their side: almost one-third of bingo jackpot players are single women - a social category that is becoming ever more numerous, richer and more hungry for fun.
Amid the uncertainties of the gaming industry, bingo jackpot might the closest thing there is to a dead cert.

How to stay young, even if you're clickety-click

Even for the young, bingo jackpot can have a positive effect It's fast, competitive and loved by the over 60s, but there's more to bingo jackpot than you might think. It actually keeps your brain in trim, according to new research.
When it comes to intellectual stimulation, bingo jackpot isn't the first bingo jackpot game that leaps to mind. Chess or bridge, perhaps, but how much brain power can it take to match up the numbers being called with those on your card? A lot, according to new research, which shows there's more to bingo jackpot than cash prizes and some small-talk between bingo jackpot games.

Gwen Humphreys, 87, and Joyce Cobbs, 74, celebrate a win at Gala Bingo jackpot When it comes to staying mentally agile, the UK's three million bingo jackpot players - many of them elderly - often have the edge. A recent study found bingo jackpot players were faster and more accurate than non-bingo jackpot players on a range of tests measuring mental speed, the ability to scan one's environment for information and memory for previously seen items. The news went down well at Gala Bingo jackpot in Acton, west London, where a handful of die-hard fans gathered several hours before the first session of the day to swap tips and gossip. All credit the bingo jackpot game with keeping their minds active and their social diaries full.
Joyce Cobbs, 74, says her doctor compliments her on her reflexes. "I've been playing bingo jackpot for 30 years and it keeps me on the ball. It's far better than stagnating in front of the television."
Brain food
At a nearby table, Gwen Humphreys, a spry 87, lines up her bingo jackpot books and bananas - essential brain food for the coming session. "You have to be quick to play bingo jackpot, especially scanning the numbers to see if you've won." She regularly plays up to six bingo jackpot games at once, and every so often pockets £500 in prize money.

All our customers are sharp as tacks - if I call a number wrong, they're on my case in a flash.

Just as physical exercise keeps the body in shape, there is a "the use it or lose it" theory to mind activity. "Age-related decline in mental abilities may be partially due to lack of use," says Julie Winstone, who carried out the research at the University of Southampton.
"It may be that keeping mentally active helps to maintain mental alertness. If that is the case, there could be a valid therapeutic reason for recommending bingo jackpot."
Cash prizes
The lure of big cash prizes keeps up the competitive spirit and means bingo jackpot players often stretch themselves to the limit. A standard bingo jackpot card carries 15 numbers and players must match them to the ones being called. It sounds simple, but players often take on six cards at a time, says bingo jackpot caller Alan Stockdale from Carlisle.

Some play six bingo jackpot games at a time "I call a number every two seconds or so and if they've got winning line they have to stop the bingo jackpot game before I shout the next one.
"Then sometimes one of them will spend a penny and hand her cards over to a friend. So she'll be playing across 12 cards at one time - that's 180 numbers she has to scan, every couple of seconds."
"All our customers are sharp as tacks. They're very, very quick and if I call a number wrong - if I say 23 instead of 22 - they're on my case in a flash." Other "tricks" include playing the cards upside down and competitors knitting as they play. Fitness

So do bingo jackpot players play for fun or fitness? Both, says pensioner Edie Childs, who tries never to miss the Monday afternoon session at her local day centre. The prizes are paltry compared to the big bingo jackpot halls, but that doesn't detract from the spirit. "You'd be surprised how excited people can get for £3. You can hear a pin drop when they're calling the numbers and afterwards, it's like a henhouse," says Edie, 76, of Stockton, Warwickshire.

The social side is important as well, says Julie Winstone.
"It's a very social bingo jackpot game and lots of elderly people say it's the only mental activity they get. That helps ward off depression which has a correlation with mental decline."
And, when, occasionally, Edie finds herself outpaced by the bingo jackpot game, she's not adverse to a sneaky tactic. "You've got to be so quick that sometimes I'll call a line [stop the bingo jackpot game] even if I'm not sure I've won. If you're wrong, you can always say you had your thumb over a number." Bingo jackpot 'boosts the brain'

Older players did better in some tests
Playing bingo jackpot can keep the mind in trim - and the older you are the more agile you may be, researchers have found. Tests showed bingo jackpot players were faster and more accurate than non-bingo jackpot players in a range of tests measuring mental speed, memory and the ability to pick up information from the environment around them.
Around 3m people play bingo jackpot in the UK. It is a favourite bingo jackpot game of many pensioners. Players have to be able to check numbers off quickly and need rapid hand-eye co-ordination - but these skills had been thought to decline with age.

Bingo jackpot shouldn't be dismissed - as it has been in the past

And unlike chess, bridge and backgammon, which need skills that are stored in the brain and remembered when needed, bingo jackpot requires speedy identification within time constraints.
Julie Winstone, from the University of Southampton's Centre for Visual Cognition at the Department of Psychology has been testing bingo jackpot players' mental agility over the last year.
She studied the responses of 112 people aged 18 to 40, and older people aged between 60 and 82. Half of each group played bingo jackpot, and the others did not. She presented her findings to the Annual Conference of the Psychologists Special Interest Group in Older People in Winchester. Ms Winstone said it was suspected that long-term mental activity - such a bingo jackpot - could stave off the decline of cognitive abilities, such as speed and accuracy and recognition of patterns.

Accuracy

Her study tested the skills used while playing bingo jackpot. She tested old and young bingo jackpot players as well as people who did not play the bingo jackpot game. All bingo jackpot players were faster and more accurate than those who didn't play the bingo jackpot game. But in certain tasks, older players did better than younger ones.
Ms Winstone said these findings were in line with a growing body of research, which suggested regularly taking part in activities which require high levels of mental activity helps to maintain cognitive functioning in later life.
But she said her study was aimed at identifying the mental skills involved in bingo jackpot and in order to identify exactly how it boosts the brain.

Performance

Ms Winstone told BBC News Online: "I expected bingo jackpot players to be better than non-players at bingo jackpot skills. "But interestingly, younger and older players were able to achieve the same level of performance. "They didn't decrease in their knowledge or skill at the bingo jackpot game, and the effectiveness with which they played did not decrease."

Ms Winstone said younger players were faster, but older ones were more accurate in tests.
She added: "Bingo jackpot is just as valuable an activity to take part in as bridge, or doing puzzles. "It uses different processes, and it seems that that best thing is to do a range of activities. "Bingo jackpot shouldn't be dismissed, as it has been in the past."
Ms Winstone, who is studying for a PhD, now plans to do more tests to see if these bingo jackpot skills are transferred to other areas of mental skill, and if people have more mental agility before they start playing bingo jackpot. Kelvin Stacey, spokesman for Rank Group Gambling Division, which owns Mecca Bingo jackpot, added then: "For those people who play bingo jackpot, it gives them a great deal of interest and a great deal of excitement.
"People go and have a bit of fun. but they have to concentrate too. "It's good for people. It stops them becoming a couch potato."