Weighing in on this discussion for the first time, and doing so (as are most of the others, I think) without first-hand knowledge of the facts of the situation - which are critically important.
(1) Illegality -- there are laws, and there are the facts of each case. Whether someone broke a particular law is determined by the facts that apply to that particular case, and often by interpretation of the wording of the law. Only if the facts of that case are not legally determined to differ from those of prior cases does precedent even apply, although the meaning of the wording of the law may have been established by precedent and/or a higher court in a previous case. So there may be (and most certainly are) laws that cover what we call "cheating" -- but whether a particular action is found to be illegal will be determined on the specifics of the case. And a good lawyer may be able to argue sufficiently well to cause the wording of the law to be interpreted in such a way, and the facts of the case to be viewed in such a way, as to get his/her client off.
(2) Immorality -- as indicated, is in the eyes of the beholder. Whether cheating requires intentional deception may even vary -- if someone is being introduced to a game and is told by his cheating friends "this is how we play it" -- and they proceed to describe a playing strategy that would usually be considered cheating -- the new player might play with that strategy with no intent of deception, but others might very well perceive that strategy as overt cheating.
In live poker, intentional deception is part of the game, and how well one deceives one's opponents may be a major determinant of how successful one may be -- but there are sometimes rules that apply -- for example, in the World Series of Poker events, it is against the rules to speak the truth about your hand to your opponent (a rule that many players find very odd). There are also more commonly applied rules about what one can do to deceive one's opponent, but intentional deception is most definitely an integral part of the game, and in most circumstances is anything but cheating.
In blackjack, if a dealer deals in such a way some / all of the time as to expose cards that are supposed to be dealt face-down, and a player sees these exposed cards some / all of the time, at what point is the player obliged to point this out to the casino - if at all? And is the player cheating on any specific such occurrence, even if they can't resist watching the dealer as he/she deals in order to see if they keep doing it (certainly the player is allowed to watch the dealer closely to assure that true dealing mistakes don't occur)?
Likewise, if the dealer mis-pays a bet, is the player obliged to point this out when it's in the player's favor? In the house's favor?
Personally, my attitude has always been that it's my responsibility to assure that the rules are observed when they serve me -- e.g., that the dealer does not UNDERpay me, or that a given machine is actually paying the amount that the paytable states it should pay for particular hands.
If, however, the dealer is over-paying me, it's my opinion that it's the responsibility of the casino to pick up on this -- that's why they have a pit boss watching the dealers, although most of them are not very vigilant at watching for dealer errors. And that's why they have technicians and others to check out machines.
The exceptions to this begin to occur when the casino posts "rules" - such as rules that a machine malfunction voids all pays, an often-seen phrase. At least here, the casino is beginning to tell us that if the machine is not working as intended, we can't make money off the malfunction. The grey area here, if any, is what constitutes a malfunction, of course, and that's for the courts to determine if it gets to that point, as you can usually be pretty sure that the player and the casino are not going to agree :)
To defend its own interests in cases of "malfunction" the casino often overtly states that it is the player's responsibility to assure that cards are "held" correctly in video poker, to the detriment of a fast player on a machine with sticky on less-than-optimally responsive buttons. While some casinos will review the tape to see if you really hit all five buttons when holding a dealt royal, and perhaps compensate for a sticky button problem, I'm sure some others will point to the posted rule about the player's responsibility. We've heard stories here about sticky button issues and how different casinos handle it - but I don't recall hearing the story on a royal, probably because everyone is very careful to check the "holds" before hitting "draw" on a royal.
--BG
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> 2b. Re: Illegality, immorality and cheating
....
> I think everyone will agree that cheating is wrong. However,
> even this with specific examples will have gray areas, but
> please let's start simple.
> Did these people cheat?
> Cheating requires intentional deception and yes what they
> did repeatedly was intentional, but the issue I have is the
> deception part. They were lying through omission to the
> manufacturer and casinos about the defective software (not
> an ATM glitch that occurs 1 in 5,000,000 times). This seems
> like a stretch that patrons are responsible for integrity
> reporting on the software code. I at least think that video
> poker is between player and machine regardless of
> manufacturer or location, so the person needs to be
> deceiving the machine. This is the crux of the issue. The
> software was doing exactly as it was programmed. This makes
> it similar to Mickey's example of a progressive reset to a
> much higher base or Bob's example of a much higher than is
> supposed to be comp rate for that game; however, in this
> instance far more money is involved and the defect was more
> difficult to find. Are any of these situations wrong, maybe.
> Are they cheating? I do not see how that can be the case.
> The software had a flaw in its programming these people did
> not cheat the machine.
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