Wired gives a plausible argument that people who play the scratch lottery and win may have found a way to improve their chances, but that still might not make it a worthwhile pursuit.

His next thought was utterly predictable: “I remember thinking, I’m gonna be rich! I’m gonna plunder the lottery!” he says. However, these grandiose dreams soon gave way to more practical concerns. “Once I worked out how much money I could make if this was my full-time job, I got a lot less excited,” Srivastava says. “I’d have to travel from store to store and spend 45 seconds cracking each card. I estimated that I could expect to make about $600 a day. That’s not bad. But to be honest, I make more as a consultant, and I find consulting to be a lot more interesting than scratch lottery tickets.”

He was thinking small-time business. Someone who wanted to hire a 1,000 mules could probably make the business model sound more lucrative. On the other hand, his target game could also be the limiting factor. Wired points to a winner who repeatedly cashed in big prizes from only a few tickets.

..then there’s Joan Ginther, who has won more than $1 million from the Texas Lottery on four different occasions. She bought two of the winners from the same store in Bishop, Texas. What’s strangest of all, perhaps, is that three of Ginther’s wins came from scratch tickets with baited hooks and not from Mega Millions or Powerball. Last June, Ginther won $10 million from a $50 ticket, which is the largest scratch prize ever awarded by the Texas Lottery.

Perhaps Ginther is simply the luckiest person on earth. (She has refused almost all requests from journalists for comment.)

The bottom-line to the story seems to be “randomness” is known to be flawed yet the industry is slow to respond and fix problems, even after players openly report they are using a key.