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iPhone app may push New York Powerball lottery jackpot to new record

If you want to play New York’s Powerball lottery without having to queue at a grocery store for a ticket, there’s now an app for that. Jackpocket allows you to use your iPhone to buy tickets – and the developer says it expects take-up to “significantly increase” jackpots. This week’s jackpot is currently sitting at a near-record $301M.

Amusingly, the process behind the scenes is entirely manual: employees are sent out to stores to buy paper tickets, which are then scanned and emailed to you to that you have a record of your numbers. Any ticket winning more than $600 is securely delivered to the owner so that they can claim the prize personally, reports the NY Post.

The app has been in beta-test for some time, and already has around 10,000 users who have so far won more than $50,000, says the developer. So far, Illinois is the only state lottery to offer direct mobile sales, so the company’s team of ticket-buyers may be in business for a while yet.

You can also play the New York Lotto and Mega Millions games, but you’ll need a NY cell number to receive a link to download the app.

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Comments

  1. dcj001 - 9 years ago

    Jackpocket, not Jackpot.

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Avatar for Ben Lovejoy Ben Lovejoy

Ben Lovejoy is a British technology writer and EU Editor for 9to5Mac. He’s known for his op-eds and diary pieces, exploring his experience of Apple products over time, for a more rounded review. He also writes fiction, with two technothriller novels, a couple of SF shorts and a rom-com!


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