Gossip

Gambling opportunity? or wireless hotspot?

What might seem to be "just another hotspot announcement" to you has different implications for one industry: the announcement that a European hotel chain is going wireless, has caught the eye of the gambling community.

"Wireless Internet Coming To A Hotel Room Near You" is the report - but it's published in Gambling Magazine.

The hotel chain, Queens Moat Houses, has joined the Eurospot WiFi network, - and announced this way back in January. That was a deal with Megabeam, which has since been taken over by Swisscom. Nobody seemed to care.

Even when Mike O'Mahoney, Finance and IT director at Moat House Hotels was saying: "As a leading hotel operator, we are committed to delivering great customer service," nobody seemed to mind. "Wireless is the next generation communication media for high speed access to information, and we are confident that the rollout of the system at key hotels will provide an unrivalled service to our corporate travellers," he said, to widespread indifference.

Then last week, Gambling Magazine picked it up, and next thing, several other wireless news sites ran with the story. Is it a gambling opportunity?

Probably, since the journal "Psychology of Addictive Behaviours" has published a study about gambling and the Internet: "People who use the internet to gamble may have more serious gambling problems than those who use slot machines or play the lottery," and warning that "the explosive growth of the internet will probably lead to more on-line gambling opportunities and the health and emotional difficulties that come with gambling disorders, including substance abuse, circulatory disease, depression and risky sexual behaviours."

One report based on this article says that although internet gambling was the least common gambling activity of the study's participants, the study found that a majority of those with internet gambling experience had the most serious problems with addiction.

Is this a real recommendation for Queens Moat Houses, I wonder? Or for any Eurospot equipped hotel around Europe?