Gambling Addiction Found to Be Problem for Middle Class
The Canadian Journal of Psychiatry is expected to publish a report that shows gambling addiction, especially through the use of video lottery terminals (VLT), is a middleclass problem, despite gambling often being considered "a tax on the poor or the stupid," reports Yahoo!
"A lot of them (problem gamblers) are university educated and a lot of them have sort of what we'd call middleclass incomes, $40,000, $50,000-plus, and now they've lost everything and they're in rehabilitation," said Dr. Brian Cox from the University of Manitoba's department of psychiatry.
Nearly 90 percent of the respondents for the survey said their parents didn't have any gambling problems. Most of the problem gamblers tended to play close at home, with only 10 percent of those surveyed saying they traveled to Las Vegas or other provinces to gamble. Instead, those surveyed
said they preferred to gamble at places like the neighborhood bar, where they preferred to play VLTs several times a week or even daily.
Sci-Fi Comes True - Biometrics Gains Greater Acceptance
With the widespread use of the Internet comes a greater concern for security, hence the growing use of biometric products to protect consumers and businesses alike from fraud or theft. Researchers at Cahners In-Stat Group report that this growing need for protection will drive sales for biometrics to $520 million within the next five years.
"For many, biometrics remains a novelty; something for use only in the most extreme cases of access control. Given the early cost of these systems, there's no wonder," said Marlene Bourne, Senior Analyst for In-Stat's Emerging Semiconductor Applications Service. However, the scenario is beginning to change. "With the explosion of electronic documentation and e-commerce, security concerns have become paramount," she added. As a result, biometrics will become much more common than many would have ever expected.
Cahners' researchers also found:
- Revenues derived from biometrics sales are from a combination of hardware and services. Currently, biometrics companies are generating nearly two-thirds of their revenues from services. That ratio is not expected to change appreciably, since the service side of the industry is an important part of most biometrics technologies.
- Despite increased interest in the use of eye scans in ATMs, facial scans are likely to become very competitive technology. From a consumer standpoint, a facial scan is viewed as less intrusive, making it the
preferred technology.
- Physical access control is, and will remain, the key source of revenue for biometrics companies over the next five years since it is the type of application for which biometrics is best suited.
More information about Cahners' report, "Security Via Biometrics: It's in the Genes," which sells for $2,995, can be found on the company's website at http://www.instat.com/pr/2001/ea0103mf_pr.htm.
E-Mail Marketing Remains Successful
According to a new Aberdeen Group study, "e-Mail Marketing: Relevancy, Retention and ROI," the amount of money spent on e-mail marketing is likely to surpass US$1 billion by 2003. "As marketers have begun to embrace e-mail marketing technology and services, the market has finally displayed the growth that most leaders in the space have been accurately predicting for years," Aberdeen analyst Kent Allen told CRM Daily.
Merging e-mail with marketing automation has become one of the industry's "killer apps," a trend that's likely to continue at least through 2003, mainly due to its simplicity and cost-effectiveness, as well as its ability to retain and cultivate long-term relationships, the article said. Marketing automation is one of the fastest-growing parts of customer relationship management, having grown 270 percent from 1999 to 2000.
Bricks-and-Clicks Thrive Online
ActivMedia's "E-Survivors: Winning e-Commerce Strategies for 2001" report says that although "bricks-and-clicks" firms might not seem very sexy compared to their high-flying dot-com counterparts, each year they accrue increasing revenue from their online efforts. Adding a real thrill is that their mainstream product lines and well-established business capabilities are keeping these hybrids alive while many "dot-bombs" are failing. Research also shows that 76 percent of online companies selling offline
reported one-third of their revenues came from connections made on the Internet last year, and nearly half of all revenues next year for these companies will come from their online contacts.
"The success of online business may actually be contributing to the sense of economic decline in 2001 in many companies in the U.S. and abroad," commented Harry Wolhander, vice president of ActivMedia Research. "Such robust business gains among the online/offline vendors have to come from elsewhere in the economy. More specifically, companies that are not participating in the online growth spurt are losing share to those that are already online."
"Like it or not," he added, "the Internet is a fact of life for competitive business in the future. Mainstream businesses that create an effective synthesis of on-and-offline strategies are going to reap the
benefits. Now that the dot-com's have turned into dot-bombs, the picture of what it takes to survive is becoming much clearer."
ActivMedia's report is based on more than 500 interviews conducted with website executives responsible for strategy and development.
Too Much TV Violence Causes Memory Problems
Advertisers probably aren't getting the best bang for their buck suggest Iowa State University researchers who studied the effect of sex and violence on successful advertising. In a study of 324 people aged 18-54 who were randomly assigned to watch violent, sexually explicit or neutral (family-friendly) television programming, the results were intriguing. Those who watched neutral programming were more likely to remember the products advertised (39 percent) during those shows than participants who watched the violent or sexually explicit programming. The study's author, Dr. Brad Bushman, concluded that television programs free of sex and violence might be an advertiser's best bet.
Online Banking Attracts More UK Women
More and more women in the United Kingdom are turning to online banking, to the tune of 1 million more having signed on for online banking services during the past year as compared to 600,000 men. And even though men are still more likely to bank online, a Nationwide survey shows that that gap is swiftly shrinking.
Men banking online increased 23 percent to hit 3 million users during the first five months of 2001, while during that same time period the number of women has doubled to 2 million. Nationwide contends that if this trend continues, the number of women handling their finances over the Internet will equal that of men by early next year when more than 8 million people will be banking online.