Natasha Dow Schull's 'Addiction by Design' is an anthropological study of machine gambling that reveals how slot machines are engineered to maximize what the industry calls 'time on device.' Schull, who spent years conducting fieldwork in Las Vegas, shows how every aspect of machine gambling, from the ergonomics of seating to the mathematics of near-misses to the elimination of coins in favor of electronic credits, is designed to pull players into a trance-like state where they lose track of time, money, and even their own desires. The gamblers Schull interviews don't seek the thrill of winning; they seek escape into what they call 'the zone,' a state of numbed absorption where ordinary anxieties disappear. The book examines how the gambling industry has developed increasingly sophisticated techniques for maintaining this state, including personalized marketing based on player data and machine designs that exploit cognitive biases. Schull is interested not just in individual pathology but in how technology creates conditions for addiction, raising questions about many other products designed to capture attention and eliminate friction. Readers will come away with disturbing insight into how design shapes behavior and desire.