This book develops the concept of "gamble-play media", describing how some gambling and gambling-like practices are increasingly mediated by digital technologies. Digital gambling brings gambling closer to the practices and features of videogames, as audio-visual simulations structure users’ experiences. By studying digital gambling from media studies, videogame and cultural studies approaches, this book offers a new critical perspective on the issues raised by computer-mediated gambling, while expanding our perspective on what media and gambling are. In particular, it critically analyses terrestrial, mobile and online slot machines, online poker and stock trading apps through a selection of case studies.
Reviews
"I am thrilled to recommend a book that is essential reading for students and scholars working across gambling and gaming studies. At last, we have a rigorous, creative and thought-provoking study to help us make sense of proliferating platforms and products that are blurring the lines between entertainment and investment in everyday life. Albarrán-Torres concept of digital gamble-play is quite literally a game-changer." --Fiona Nicoll , Research Chair in Gambling Policy with the Alberta Gambling Research Institute and the Department of Political Science at University of Alberta, Canada
Preface: The VIP Lounge Introduction. Digital gambling as media Part I.
Gamble-play theory
1. Towards a theory of gamble-play
2. Smoke and mirrors:
procedural rhetoric in gamble-play
3. Gamble-play media and practices of
consumption Part II. Gamble-play platforms
4. Gamble-play and popular
culture: when slots meet Hollywood
5. Gamble-play as Second Life: the case of
PKR
6. Mobile gamble-play apps: a casino in your pocket . Gambling with
markets: stock trading apps and the logic of gamble-play Postface:
Gamble-play in the societies of control
César Albarrán-Torres is Lecturer in Media and Communications at Swinburne University of Technology, Australia.
