Norwegian Lottery recuits lottery addicts

Norwegian LotteryIllustration: Lottery

Norwegian Lottery is recruiting gaming addicts

The Norwegian Lottery (Norsk Tipping) is, as the name implies, a gaming company. The fact that its a state owned commercial company is a moot point, so are Statoil, Telenor, DNB (Bank), NSB (Railroad) and quite a few others.

 

Being a gaming company, Norsk Tipping naturally want to get a big a piece of the pie as they can. So far everything is fine and dandy. There is however a few issues attached to a company which:

  • Have a monopoly on legal gaming in Norway.
  • Are state owned, so Norwegians are actually paying a voluntary tax of at least 50%, as they keep half of what people “invest” (at least for the Lottery).
  • Aggressively pay for ads to participate in their lottery on Norwegian TV, and also on SMS.
  • Widen their “offer” by offering bets on results, not only for the current Olympics, but also more dubious events. This is to mirror the competition.
  • They actively target young people in their ads by using young actors.

The points mentioned above are of course the aim of any gaming company:

“Maximize your profit at minimal cost”

There is however a large caveat attached to the profit motif:

“Norsk Tipping is to fight against game addiction and to reduce gaming in general”

 This is the reasoning behind the Norwegian Parliaments decision to disallow even NGOs to hold raffles to bring money to their coffers and uphold the monopoly.

Norway Today therefore challenges both the Norwegian Lottery Authority and other relevant governmental bodies to remind Norsk Tipping of their main reason for being.

The current Government has at least legalized wine lotteries at the workplace on Friday.

The latest commercial on Norwegian TV states that:

“we will give a million to some who hasn’t participated in our lottery before” 

Last, but not least, before you spend your hard earned money, remember that:

“The only way to make sure you win the lottery is if you run it”

 

© Norway Today