JC / Railbird

I don’t know about that – the bet SHOULD be simpler. In fact, I’d say it’s probably the number one complaint of those who are the ‘lifeblood’ of the game.
This is across the board too. To the racetrack itself, where the machines malfunction, eat tickets, aren’t even turned on sometimes. To the ADW wars that continue to make betting from home pretty much a pipe dream in some locales.
I realize that the signal and ADW stuff is not really a tech issue, but it has been the tech itself that has enable this to be a problem.
I can’t have that passion as a resident of NJ, if my only choice is NJBETS online system (down on big days, malfunctioning on others). Further still, it’s even more of a slap in the face as I’m sitting on my couch watching both TVG and HRTV.
The tech is there. Heck, the passion from the ‘lifeblood’ is there….but the people collecting the money don’t give a hoot. The passion needs to come from those running the show.
If you don’t believe me, go down to your local track and see how you’re treated. Tech will do things regarding information and data, that I have no doubt, but passion? I don’t think so. It’s people that make that happen.

Posted by o_crunk on July 1, 2008 @ 12:32 pm

Racing is WAY BEHIND the times when it comes to some, but not all things tech.
Check out this link: http://www.3g.co.uk/PR/December2004/8839.htm
Take a look at that date again? December 2004!
Apple’s iPhone 3G is coming. You would think racing would want to jump on the bandwagon. Apple has fanatics that are young and hip, and they are going after the older folks. Racing as it seems, likes to keep things in the fold for the silver-haired, deep pockets.
Look around — you have TVGfree.net and you can watch, what, maybe one or two decent tracks’ signals. Youbet.net only works with Windows, not Apple’s Mac. The same with Youbet.com. As for Youbet.com, it is THE BEST site for wagering. You get scores of race tracks to bet on and the video is good, but again, it’s only for Windows.
Sites like Bodog.com have no doubt taken action away, and one would surmise that most of their action is from the younger crowd, not the silver haired folks who play the slots.
Racing needs to adopt 3G as in yesterday, transition to allow the free sites to be used by Macs, and work to cater to the younger crowds.

Posted by Jim on July 1, 2008 @ 1:36 pm

Most racetracks websites don’t even support firefox! Check out MTH’s homepage. When they remade their site before the BC it was like a downgrade. If they won’t even acknowledge the 25% of internet users that use FF…don’t hold your breath for 3G.
I don’t know too many people in my age group that don’t use FF at home or for their non-work use. If you’re say 25% and you went the MTH’s home page, you’re going to think it’s amateur hour.

Posted by o_crunk on July 1, 2008 @ 1:50 pm

YouBet supports firefox and has for awhile, which means it’s accessible on a mac.
However, you’ll never hear an argument from me on racing as a whole needing to “modernize” and as o_crunk suggests, get their customer experience act together… for people of all ages.

Posted by dana on July 1, 2008 @ 4:12 pm

You’d think Youbet would be accessible on a Mac, but no. From the FAQ:
> Does Youbet.com support Macintosh?
> Not at this time.
Tech is another area is which I think racing suffers from the lack of national office. Despite promising little ventures here and there (like TwinSpires TV or the NTRA Web 2.0 strategy), the industry as a whole is horribly behind the tech/web curve, whether you’re talking about the tote system or marketing. A technologist with influence and a national perch could be helpful …

Posted by Jessica on July 1, 2008 @ 4:45 pm

Perhaps not according to their FAQ, but indeed on a mac using firefox one can use it. I have an account there and I just logged in this weekend.
national perch … you are such a railbird! :)

Posted by dana on July 1, 2008 @ 5:03 pm

Wow! When did that happen? I actually tried to sign up a couple times (although, it was at least last summer that I last attempted) and was hit with an unwelcoming page that blared no Macs welcome. It’s why I went to AmericaTab turned TwinSpires and NYRA, both of which have their problems (especially NYRA) but not with systems or browsers.

Posted by Jessica on July 1, 2008 @ 5:08 pm

That’s news to me about Youbet working on a Mac. I tried it before I posted and it doesn’t work for me.
I even tried it on a new Mac using the Internet Explorer for Mac which has not been supported by MS in years. No luck there, too.
Forgot to mention — even ESPN’s site doesn’t allow you to watch races. They offer a service interwined with Youbet on ESPN’s horse racing page.
TwinSpires’ site works, but you have to pay for video and it opens in Flip 4 Mac.
I also used to have a problem with BloodhorseNow until two weeks ago. For some reason, the video of stakes races appeared as a blank area on a web page.
As I wrote before, Youbet.com is the best service. There are drawbacks, though, and that is unfortunate. Chief of them is no Mac service and having to pay a service fee to have money added to your account from a bank account. NYRA doesn’t charge for that. But, then again, NYRA doesn’t have video.
I have been living through these charades FOR YEARS now, and when will the racing brass figure this out. I’ve been committed to following the sport for all this time. Imagine a novice, or a newbie……they, no doubt, are not.

Posted by Jim on July 1, 2008 @ 6:14 pm

Yep… I happened upon it LAST august.
Jim, that’s so odd that it won’t work for you! And, what do you mean you have to pay for video on Twinspires? Do you mean extra or that you have to open/fund an account? I have an account there as well as YouBet but have never incurred any additional fees for video.

Posted by dana on July 1, 2008 @ 9:36 pm

re Twinspires, there’s no fee as such for their video, but there are wagering minimums before you can access either live feeds or the replays; to quote from the site:
“We want to continue offering the highest quality video to our customers at all times. Video streaming will be available to those account holders who have wagered:
A minimum of $50 in the last 5 days of access to the video system,
A minimum of $50 in the last 5 days or,
A minimum of $100 in the last 30 days or,
A minimum of $600 in the last 90 days or,
A minimum of $5000 in the last 360 days”

Posted by hasenji on July 2, 2008 @ 1:12 am

THanks for the info. I did see this on Youbet.com’s site under FAQ.
“Does Youbet.com support Macintosh?
Not at this time.”
Like I wrote, it’s frustrating. Yes, I know TwinSpires offers “free video,” but they do require people to wager. I imagine thousands of people who might want to watch a race or two from time to time, but they can’t unless they pony up and ante up, signing on with one of these outfits just to watch.
One of the best shows about racing is offered on Capital OTB’s site. They offer it for free. They used to offer live streaming of races, however, that was scrapped before last year’s Spa meet (or maybe it was 2006’s).
Racing seems to parallel the cable companies viewpoint of the NFL Network. The NFL wants its NFl Network offered on standard cable, not a digital tier in which the cable companies would charge extra. The wagering entities at least parallel the cable companies. Get people to sign on and pay up, then boost the fees here and there.
Why on earth can’t the NTRA work to have live streaming offered to anyone and everyone FREE of all stakes races at least?
Take a look at NYRA’s ad on the DRF site. Wager $20,000 (or 20,000 points) and get $500. It seems more and more that racing is headed to lose its older aged fans, and they won’t be winning too many younger ones. One last mention about this…take a look at what Magna did to Gulfstream Park. They took away most of the seats. Attendance has declined and most older folks are turning away. They are not even trying to watch and wager online.

Posted by Jim on July 2, 2008 @ 3:19 am

TwinSpires TV is an interesting experiment in live streaming, very much along the lines of what you’re thinking Jim. You can set four channels to show constantly, easily switch between those channels or swap out the one you’re watching for others. Unfortunately, you have to have an account. I agree — setting up an online streaming service, separate from wagering, would be a boost to the sport — but I’m not so sure that NTRA can do much to guide the creation of such a service. It’ll have to be a co-op of tracks …

Posted by Jessica on July 2, 2008 @ 1:26 pm

It’s a lot like the music business but worse, IMHO. Proprietary this and that. Instead of selling a track for 10 cents, your local record store (if you can find one) is STILL selling CD’s at 15 bucks a shot. How much longer do think that business can keep sustaining double digit drops in sales year after year?
They haven’t quite figured out that they can make a ton of money by having that co-op and distributing it very cheap to the end user. So instead of having to wager, or having to wager a certain amount to view a race, they could price at a monthly or yearly subscription of some small ammount for ALL instead of the few who wager with a particular service. They don’t understand this because they haven’t ‘opened’ it up yet.
Would you pay 20 bucks a month to see any track on your computer? How many would? And if the answer puts them at a profit just to run the thing, how do you think that would increase handle? Even with the ADW circus, I’d bet the answer would be ‘profit’!

Posted by o_crunk on July 2, 2008 @ 1:58 pm