Archive for the what’s new Category

Catch me tomorrow at the SNCCC meeting

By on February 11, 2013

Tomorrow night (2/12), at 7 PM, I’m speaking to the Southern Nevada Casino Collectibles Club. I’ll be talking about gambling history and maybe sharing some things from Roll the Bones: The History of Gambling.

I’ve known many of the collectors through the years, and I’m always energized by their passion for gambling history. But the best part about this event is that you are invited.

Yes, even if you’re not a member, the event is open to the public. Consider it your chance to check out the club, and to see if you can find that $25 Dunes chip you’ve been hunting for. And if you like what you see, you can become a member.

They start buying and trading chips and other collectibles around 6 PM. I’m on around 7 PM. I’ll have copies of Roll the Bones: The History of Gambling available if you want one signed.

The meeting is at the Marine Corps League Museum / Leatherneck Club, 4360 Spring Mountain Rd, Las Vegas, Nevada, at the northeast corner of Spring Mountain and Arville.


View Larger Map

Looking forward to seeing you there!

This entry is filed under Roll the Bones, what's new and tagged , , .

New Year, New Look

By on January 1, 2012

As you’ve noticed if you’re reading this, I’ve given the site a slightly new look. I switched WordPress themes, to Retina, and did a little light editing of my own to customize it. I’m still not totally settled on the look (I think I’m doing to tweak the header color to tie in better with the rest of the page, and maybe switch the image out), but this should be the look of the site for the foreseeable future.

One of the weaknesses the site has had has been how it displays on mobile devices. Muddling around the WordPress plug-in site, I stumbled upon WPTouch, which automatically creates a smartphone-friendly version of the site for mobile devices. I really like it, and I wish that I’d looked into this two years ago.

I’ve added something new: an Amazon store. Right now, I’ve just got a link in the navigation bar above, but I’ll integrate it better into the site in the coming days. I started by just putting my books in there, but I’m going to add books by people I interview and other friends, as well as books I review.

As always, I still want to improve the site and showcase my work better, so if you’ve got comments or problems, share them. The one issue that I’m most aware of isn’t with this site–it’s a podcast problem that, as best I can figure out, has something to do with UNLV’s server. I’m going to talk to the UNLV web folks this week and try to find a solution. But if you’ve got anything to share about this site, please let me know.

Thanks for reading!

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I’m doing a Focus Roundtable

By on May 16, 2011

Even though I’m ostensibly on leave right now, I’m still doing a surprising amount of work-related stuff. I’ve signed up to do a Focus Roundtable on Online Gambling this Thusday. Here are the details:

WHEN
May 18, 2011

WHERE
Toll-free Dial-In Number: (866) 951-1151
International Dial-In Number: (201) 590-2255
United Kingdom +44 08003581576
Conference # : 4999006

Moderator:
Michael Damphousse, CEO/CMO, Green Leads

Panelists:

David G. Schwartz, Director of Center for Gambling Research- UNLV>

Dan Michalski, Founder/Editor, Pokerati.com

John Pappas, Executive Director, PPA (Poker Players Alliance)

Greg Raymer, 2004 WSOP Champion and Lawyer

Follow the conversation:
On Focus: Follow the Economy topic page
- Submit your own question and use Economy as a topic
On Twitter: #FocusEconRT

via Focus Roundtable: The Online Gambling Industry Explained.

I’m not totally sure what to expect, not having done one of these before, but it looks like a great panel. I’m looking forward to being a part of this, and I encourage you to get involved as well.

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Birth of the Las Vegas Strip on C-SPAN

By on May 9, 2011

For those who missed the live broadcast this week, the Lectures in History show featuring me is now available via streaming video from C-SPAN:

University of Nevada-Las Vegas history professor David Schwartz specializes in the history of gambling in America. In today’s class, Professor Schwartz—who is also the director of UNLV’s Center for Gaming Research—focuses on the early history of the Las Vegas Strip in the 1940s and 1950s

via Lectures in History: Birth of the Las Vegas Strip | C-SPAN.

Here is some context: This is the sixth lecture in a 15-lecture course called “The History of Casinos” that covers, you guessed it, the development of casinos. The week before, we talk about the origins of legal gaming in Nevada and handle the growth of gambling halls in Reno, Downtown Las Vegas, and a few other places in the state. The week after, we cover the 1950s boom along the Strip.

All in all, it’s 1:36:15 of Vegas casino history that I think is pretty important. When the American History TV producers approached me about recording one of my lectures, I gave them a choice of topics and this is the one they settled on, and I agree that it’s something that is more likely to capture the public imagination than the week before.

If all goes well, my next book project will be, more or less, a print version of this class–an easy-to-understand, smart-but-not-burdened-by-jargon look at how the casino industry in America grew. If you happen to know a publisher who’d be interested in working together on a project like that, please contact me.

This entry is filed under teaching, what's new and tagged , , . | 3 Comments

Me on American History TV

By on May 3, 2011

Earlier this semester, a camera crew filmed one of my GAM 495 lectures so it could be broadcast as part of C SPAN’s American History TV series. It will air this weekend:

University of Nevada-Las Vegas history professor David Schwartz specializes in the history of gambling in America. In today’s class, Professor Schwartz—who is also the director of UNLV’s Center for Gaming Research—focuses on the early history of the Las Vegas Strip in the 1940s and 1950s.

Airing: Saturday 8PM ET & Midnight; Sunday 1PM ET

Lectures in History: Birth of the Las Vegas Strip

I’m really happy to see gambling history get a place in a forum that has some pretty important topics in history. I think that the changes that happened in Las Vegas in the 1940s and 1950s are significant not just for the Strip, but for broader American culture, and it is an honor to have the chance to share some of my work with a general history audience.

If that link doesn’t take you to the full lecture this Monday, I’ll add one that does.

I’d like to thank everyone at C SPAN, the crew from CoverEdge, and naturally everyone in my GAM 495 class.

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On hiatus

By on May 3, 2011

Well, at least for a little while. Thanks to a much-anticipated arrival, I’m taking some family medical leave time off from my job at the Center for Gaming Research. I won’t be in the office for several weeks, though if you need to get a hold of me I will be checking email. I should be back in the office by early July.

In the meantime, I’ll be posting a few links to some of my writing here, but don’t expect to see too much going on.

Though I’ve got another announcement coming up in a few minutes that will tell you how you’ll still be able to see me talk about casinos at your leisure no matter what I’m doing.

This entry is filed under what's new.

Transitions

By on March 17, 2011

As you might have read over on Two Way Hard Three, I’m going to be blogging over there from now on. I’m really excited to be joining the TWHT team–I’ve admired Hunter’s work for years, and I really like the depth and analysis that Jeff Simpson brings to his pieces over there. I think that a lot of what I have to say will reach a bigger audience over there than it has here.

When I started dieiscast.com, I was in the middle of writing Roll the Bones, and mainly wanted a site to share information about my books and my thoughts on what was going on in Las Vegas.

Since then, my writing on Vegas has really flowered–I write biweekly for the Las Vegas Business Press, have a biweekly column in Vegas Seven, and also have been writing regular feature and news pieces for Vegas Seven. That means that I don’t really have the time to focus on doing the kind of blog I started doing, where I shared and commented on other people’s news stories. Instead, I’m generating my own news stories and writing more extended commentaries about big issues in the news. The blog as I’ve been doing it just didn’t seem like the best fit for that anymore.

I’ll still be using the space to link to everything I write, and also to highlight my books with a little more intensity. I’ll also use it to share information about my speaking and consulting services.

Basically, instead of this being my version of a catch-all blog about Vegas and the gaming industry with some information about my professional work appended, it’s going to focus primarily on my professional work.

I’m renaming the site www.dgschwartz.com, since most people who come here will be looking specifically for information about me. I’ve still got dieiscast.com, so old links will still work, but you should probably change your bookmarks.

Another change is that the carpet gallery is migrating over to RateVegas.com. Again, grouped with lots of other casino photos, it’ll be a better fit there, and even though I’ll still be updating it, shifting it over there will let me concentrate on talking about my professional work over here.

So I’ve had fun with DieIsCast for the past 6 years or so, and I look forward to sharing more of my work with you on dgschwartz.com.

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March Gaming Colloquium announced

By on March 7, 2011

I can finally announce the specifics about this month’s Gaming Research Colloquium talk. Here’s the official announcement:

Please join us on Thursday, March 24, at 12:15 PM, as March Gaming Research Fellow Benjamin Min Han delivers a Gaming Research Colloquium talk entitled “We’re Right Next Door’: Televisual Las Vegas in Cold War America.”

Han, currently a graduate student in cinema studies at New York University, is looking at how television performances helped to shape perceptions of Las Vegas. Since World War II, Las Vegas has evolved into an entertainment capital of the world. While we often associate Las Vegas with gambling and casinos, many foreign ethnic talents arrived in the city to perform in hotels and nightclubs. These talented performers were instrumental in the development of televisual Las Vegas. This talk explores the migration of ethnic talent, and how such prominent Las Vegas entertainment business figures like Jack Entratter and Bill Willard envisioned transforming the city into a primary center of television production from the 1950s to 1970s.

The event is free and open to the public. Those interested in Las Vegas history, entertainment, American studies, and media studies are encouraged to attend.

The talk is being held in UNLV Special Collections’ Reading Room, on the third floor of Lied Library.

View flyer (pdf)

If you don’t want the pdf, here’s a jpg of the flyer:

Benjamin Min Han

This should be a good one.

This entry is filed under life in vegas, what's new and tagged , , , .

Darryl A. Smith podcast is up

By on February 24, 2011

It’s two podcasts in two days at the Center for Gaming Research–when it rains it pours, in a good way. Today, I posted the Gaming Research Colloquium talk given this afternoon by Darryl A. Smith:

Darryl A. Smith, Assistant Professor of Religious Studies, Pomona College
“’Dark with Excessive Bright’”: Gambling Tells and the Naming Taboo”
Within sacred language the belief has existed that the personal name is an intrinsic part of oneself. As such, its revelation threatens exposure to powers that might undo its bearer. Smith considers the relation between the detection of tells in gambling and that of so-called true names. Strategies of concealment and detection that are basic to both tell-reading and true-naming are explored in relation to post-colonial theory’s insights into using light in order to hide things.

Listen to the audio file (mp3)

View flyer (pdf)

UNLV Gaming Podcast

It’s a great academic exploration that ties to together literature, poker, and the Westside of Las Vegas, and one of the most enjoyable talks I’ve heard in a while.

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Wrapping up 2010

By on February 11, 2011

With some time to really work today, I finished several updates and created a new report that should help put 2010 in perspective. Here’s the rundown:

1. I updated and retitled the analysis of monthly and quarterly revenue changes 2007-2010:

Nevada Gaming: Charting the Recession
Analysis of Total Gaming Win, Statewide and Las Vegas Strip, 2007-2010, on monthly and quarterly bases

2. I updated the year-to-date report, which now has unaudited figures for the entire year:

Nevada Gaming Statistics: Year-to-Date Comparison
Current totals for Statewide, Las Vegas Strip, Boulder Strip, and Washoe County

3. I created a new report, which summarizes the year’s revenue trends for several reporting areas:

Nevada Gaming Win 2010
Summary of Results from Statewide, Las Vegas Strip, Downtown Las Vegas, Boulder Strip, and Washoe County reporting areas

The new report is a real improvement over the old Gaming Revenue Breakdowns, which only had state-wide info. Now, I’ve also included summaries for four major reporting areas. Four times the work as last year, but hopefully five times the enlightenment for people who actually read this stuff.

I’m now working on an annual comparison of revenues in several markets. I’m thinking it will look like:

Nevada Statewide
Clark County
Las Vegas Strip
Atlantic City
Pennsylvania
Mississippi
Connecticut
Macau

I’m pretty sure I can get yearly data for all of those (well, I already have it for five of the eight), and it will give a good where the industry is heading. I’d like to get total US vs. total Asia as well, but that’s a project for the future. I’m having a hard time finding a good source for Singapore stats, which is the main impediment to rolling out a Singapore jurisdiction page and including Singapore in the report.

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