‘Lost in the product’: How the gambling industry creates problem gamblers

This article is an instalment in a new series, Punted, on the government’s failure to reform gambling advertising.

There are different schools of thought about how to perfect casino design in ways that will disorient and mesmerise people into staying longer and spending more.

Initially the seminal thinker was Bill Friedman, a former gambling addict who put his first-hand expertise and 20 years of research into Designing Casinos to Dominate the Competition, first published in 2000, which set the template for many years. The rules his book outlines make for a depressing read: no clocks or windows so people lose track of time; no décor but the machines to monopolise attention; labyrinth-like corridors to disorient gamblers as soon as they arrive.