That's very incorrect. The reason it's different is that the honeymooners from Fresno lose (or win) based on the house playing blackjack with a known set of parameters. If the honeymooners play perfect blackjack (which is a game of chance, not a game of skill), the expected outcomes can be calculated.

If the whale negotiates the odds in his own games, he's changing the expected outcomes in his games versus the house, but he's not altering the odds for the honeymooners.

He might win physical dollars that were lost by the honeymooners, but because both players are playing the house, it's meaningless 'whose' money he's winning. He's taking money from the Casino's profit margin, really. They're gambling that he'll still lose more than he wins, and the slimmer margins will be made up in volume.

DFS is a skill game both in player selection, AND in skirting the rules, AND in getting the 'house' to tilt odds in your favor -- which directly tilt the odds even further away from the other players.

You're misunderstanding. I'm not taking a stance on whether this is an accurate analogy or not. I'm just stating that the OP is misinterpreting the author's thesis by nitpicking a small point the author make's out of its context. Reread the article, then look at the point OP is making in the full context.

Blackjack you will lose the longer you play. It's math. A top DFS player can consistently play profitably.

Poker is a better analogy then. You don't play against the house's money there, just the other fella's. DFS, from the article, is best played profitably by whales if there is bumhunting of the newbies. Not only, but the best way to generate cash and minimize the time to do so is to play newbies. DFS is not strictly predatory, but if you are not playing as a predator in the big sites, you are going to loose all your money.

This is gambling. Not strictly defined as such, but if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, guess what?

How is it gambling? The same guys with the skills consistently win? Elements of luck, sure, but the fact that the predators exist in the game demonstrates that it isn't gambling.

There are professional bettors who make money on horse racing (eg: Alan Woods). They look at historical odds of horses, jockeys, weather conditions, track conditions etc and like these 'predators' on DFS use models to predict probabilities of runners winning. When the estimated probability of the horse winning exceeds the estimated final public probability by the track take, they bet, and bet big. Lots of data, lots of modelling, algorithmic, lots of domain knowledge, and fully automated. No need to scrape websites, totes will supply the latest odds take their bets programmatically.

Do you consider betting on horse racing as gambling? To be honest, for the professionals placing bets in this way, I don't (keep in mind it's very very easy to incorrectly place yourself in this category, and you will lose). But the vast majority of people betting on DFS do not, and can not, take this approach. For them, horse racing and DFS are very much gambling.

Not if you tip the odds in your favor by counting cards. Not illegal by any means, but you have to make sure you're covert enough about it that you don't get kicked out by the casino.