Features:
The Irish Hospitals's Sweepstake was an early example of the government-sponsored lottery in the 20th century.
For many years, it was the only legal one in the transatlantic countries, and so has a bit of historic fame as the Irish Sweeps.
Now, of course, the lottery corruption is general---but I guess it ill-behooves us in Las Vegas to throw stones.
There is, of course, no hard line between random and non-random features, and thus, among other reasons, every explanation based on the anthropic principle has to be argued.