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Hey, ProPublica reporter Jake Pearson here. I’m taking over the account to tell you about my new story. For months, I posed as a problem gambler on DraftKings to test the company's "responsible gaming" safeguards. Spoiler alert: They made me a VIP — and I lost $10K. Here's how it all went down. 🧵

2/ Why now? More people are betting on sports than ever. But as the industry soars close to $17B in revenue, calls to gambling helplines have also skyrocketed.

3/ As public scrutiny grows, DraftKings and the other big operators stress that their safeguards work. An exec told me if someone shows too many signs of problem gambling, they’ll proactively close the account — though she declined to say how many times DraftKings had done so.

4/ But over the next 10 weeks, I’d mimic the patterns of a problem gambler with the help of a panel of gambling experts and learn just how much DraftKings would encourage my recklessness — and just how little pushback I’d get as I spiraled downward.

5/ With ProPublica bankrolling me, I opened my account in April. I waved my first red flag during a Knicks game by loss chasing, or attempting to recoup my continued losses by making more and bigger bets. Soon, I was already down ~$2K — most of it blown in one night.

6/ The next day, an email popped in my inbox: 'Welcome to the DraftKings VIP Showcase.' I couldn’t believe it. My night of loss chasing was being rewarded. Reading the fine print, I was floored: The more I spent on long-odds wagers, the faster I’d advance through the ranks.

7/ An expert explained that losers like me are the bettors that sports betting companies are most interested in. A small group accounts for a large portion of revenue. And what keeps losers loyal? VIP programs. The more you bet, the more you get: free bets/swag/fancy dinners.

9/ A month in, I was betting so much that DraftKings’ quick-tap deposit buttons had increased to $500, $750 and $950, making it even easier to mindlessly transfer money into my account. I was also getting pummeled with push alerts inviting me to bet more.

10/ By late May, I was waving all the red flags of a compulsive gambler and had gambled away thousands. Yet the only pushback I got from DraftKings was “responsible gaming” prompts that required me to opt in — prompts that were easily swept away.

11/ Finally, I decided to set in-app limits on how much I could deposit and how much time I could spend on the app. I then received the first of four promotional push alerts just half an hour later.

How morally bankrupt are the data scientists taking paychecks to work on this? Wow.

"Once the rockets are up, who cares where they come down? That's not my department!" says Wernher von Braun -- Tom Lehrer, "Wernher von Braun" (1965), partially quoting W.H. Auden’s 1939 poem “September 1, 1939.”

celebrity spokesman for Draftkings is Shaquille O'Neal. Shaq signed an official partnership deal with DraftKings ahead of the 2024–2025 NBA season to star in marketing campaigns and promotions. However.. 1/1