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29 March 2012 - US Mega Millions Reaches a Staggering $500 Million Jackpot
By Mike Veverka
It had to happen sooner or later - the 2 national US lottery games, Mega Millions and Powerball, have been trying to outdo each other for months
and just a few hours ago, Mega Millions announced they will become the largest ever US jackpot in history at a staggering $500 million.
The draw will take place this Friday (and not available to non-US residents - sorry).
A month ago I was in Rhode Island with Brian (Jumbo's US Representative) when the Powerball reached $360 million and the winning ticket happened
to be bought in Rhode Island (no it wasn't Brian or I). The Powerball is destined to eclipse even $500 million sooner or later.
Jackpots of this size are possible in the US with a national population of over 300 million and annual lottery sales approaching $60 billion pa.
It will be interesting to see how the recently launched Illinois website will handle the volume of sales they will get this week. At Jumbo we had our
"seismic event" back in 2009 when OzLotto reached $90 million and our customer database doubled overnight. It's not easy operating a server-farm
capable of handling massive spikes in traffic caused by large jackpots, but our tech team has developed some very interesting ways to handle it.
We're all now crossing our fingers and wishing for another $100 million sized jackpot in Australia or the chance to sell the US Megamillions
or Powerball online. In the meantime, don't forget to get a ticket in this Saturday's $21 million Saturday Superdraw
(doesn't seem like much anymore, does it!).
