Recent interview with Eliot Jacobson

[Eliot]

I counted cards from 1997 to about 2001, on-and-off after that. Never a high-roller, typical max bet was 2x$100. In about 2002 or so I started primarily looking for more advanced plays. Again, a low-roller. For me, a superstar 3CP flasher was usually a $75 bet. Even given my smallish wagers, I had days winning and losing $3k or more. My best one-day win was $4,400, card counting a single-deck game. My worst day was losing slightly more than $6k, that was hole-carding 3CP. That was tough for me. I stopped all AP in 2005. It was always part time, I also had academic positions during this period.

In 2002 Stanford Wong and I had a telling conversation. He told me that I was a theorist, that "Eliot, you've proven to yourself that you can beat the games, there's really nothing more in it for you." He was right. I hated the variance, I hated the smoke & noise & everything about being in a casino. I loved the math.

Interesting. I thank you for sharing that.

My final comment is an opinion. You can comment or not, as I doubt you will change my mind.

Throughout the last number of years, it became obvious to me that you were playing one side against the other. The article kind of confirms that for me, with your desire to give your book away for nothing if you could have. You wanted to create as many AP's with the knowledge to beat the games in question, so you could then create a demand for your services to casinos to protect the games against these very AP's.

Kind of creating the demand for your protection services where there was none. Some may consider that smart. Even an AP play. I don't. And it is exactly why I have such a hard time trusting anyone in the AP community.

But to each his own. Enjoy your retirement.

That is a false narrative. I just like doing math and solving puzzles. The last few years of my career, people paid me for explaining my own results to them in seminars and on-site trainings, even though I published the very same thing for free and they could look it up and read it at their convenience on APHeat. Between that and being an expert witness, I did pretty good. If I had any business acumen, I would have monetized everything. Many did just that, some with my material. Instead, I gave everything away for free and continue to do so.

I think what people have never understood about me is that I've never been motivated by money. I drive a modest car and live a simple life without many possessions. Along the way, I was very fortunate to be the son of the man who invented the modern answering machine, a device that held 80% market share for many years (the Radio Shack Duo Phone). Dad passed away in 2007. You can figure it out from there.

https://www.prweb.com/releases/2007/04/prweb522451.htm

These days I seem to be equally famous for my climate change blog and Twitter account -- somehow I have a second life as an expert on the topic. I pretty much preach a Zen approach to life, or what's left of it -- generosity, service and kindness. If you think this is not the case, that I couldn't possibly have this approach to life, and for whatever reason you feel the need to hold onto your narrative, that's okay too.