Strange WPT Blurring

[MicroBob]

Sen. John Kyl of Arizona has been pushing anti-internet-gambling legislation for years. It always seems to run into some sort of tangle but it definitely has its backers.

On the other side...North Dakota's state legislature was trying to push forward a bill that would make them the first state to legalize internet-gambling...
thus supposedly allowing online-gambling companies to set up their servers there and also allowing ND to pull in a ton of tax money.


Also - the reason the dot-net are used now is because of the big stink the dept of justice created when they came down hard on the Discovery Networks (including Travel Channel which airs WPT) over their airing of real-money ads.
The DOJ also pressured Google and Yahoo to ban all online-gambling ads which they have been doing since March, 2004 (they will show up in a search...but there are no banner ads or 'yahoo recommends' or whatever for party-poker or pacific, etc etc on google or yahoo).



It is also increasingly difficult to deposit directly to a site via one's credit-card thanks to pressure from the american govt.


Sunnary - there's more going on than you might be aware of.

The good news is that more and more americans are accepting it through stories such as Chris Moneymaker's and through the popularity of poker and gambling in general.

[Chaos81]

[ QUOTE ]
to my knowledge the dot-net just takes you to a lobby with juust the play-money tables only.

[/ QUOTE ]
That is correct. I just downloaded it, and all it has is play money tables.

[yaw4god_emt]

I can't speak for the PGA, but I can tell you what the PBA (Professial Bowling Association) does.

They have a list of approved sponsors (i.e. Ones that pay the sponsor fee). If your sponsor is one of those, then you're clear to advertise. If your sponsor isn't on their list, either your sponsor can pay the sponsor fee or you don't advertise.

I'd assume PGA is the same way. As far as WPT and or WSOP go, I'm not sure either way.

[TransientR]

The credit cards I knew about. The banner ads I didn't. Also the Arizona/North Dakota divergent political maneuvering re. online gambling was interesting and news to me.

But I don't feel any big political pressure building, especially in regards to poker. The game is popular, television has shown there is a significant skill factor involved, and the party in power is currently polling poorly. So the usual suspects are holding their tongues.

Frank

[MrMon]

I think this shows the difference in player power. The PBA was bought up and controlled by a single entity, not the players. The PGA is controlled by the players. Tennis is controlled by the players as well. NASCAR has a huge amount of driver input.

Poker has yet to organize nearly as well. It still seems to be run for the benefit of nearly everyone BUT the players.