A month after the news of proposed online gaming legislation was announced, the state of Nevada passed gaming legislation with a unanimous vote. This makes the state the first to successfully pass poker legislation that refers to online play within their borders.
Of course its right that Nevada be the pioneers in the state based gaming legislation gig as they house the largest gambling center in the country. Las Vegas provides the state with a lot of revenue and lawmakers obviously realize the importance of supporting its main source of income as it changes and evolves.
Several Nevada based companies have applied for licenses under the new online gaming law. They include International Game Technology, Cantor Gaming and Caesars Entertainment. It seems the license application processing will open up early next year.
Many legislators have expressed concerns about legalizing online gaming at the state level and Nevada attempts to answer those concerns with the guidelines and rules [...]
The Wire Act has, for the last few years, caused online companies more than a little grief. By gambling online companies have been accused of breaking the Wire Act. The Act became law back in the 1960s when the whole Watergate thing went down. After a question of the legality of selling state lottery tickets online the federal government was forced to clarify what was actually covered by the Wire Act.
The verdict came back that the Wire Act applied to sports related betting only and had no sway over the selling of state lottery tickets. And because poker has recently been recognized as a card game of skill and so is not considered a sport in the literal or Wire Act sense. This is great news to poker players and pro poker organizations seeking passage of federal laws regarding online poker.
The Poker Players Alliance (PPA) has been working with legislators for the last few years [...]
As 2011 draws to a close we start looking at the ranks of poker professionals and where everyone stands before going into the new year. There are a number of different ranking systems out there but most folks accept the WSOP point system. The newly formed Global Poker Index (GPI) website provides a weekly look at the amount of points players from across the globe have earned. Both systems have provided a top ten this week with a few similarities but also a few differences.
The WSOP point system is based on success or failure within their organized events. Only tournaments that offer WSOP bracelets count towards a player’s score. Here are the results so far:
1. Ben Lamb 909.05
2. Phil Hellmuth 755.25
3. Chris Moorman 753.95
4. Shawn Buchanan 631.74
5. Pius Heinz 570.00
6. Brian Rast 550.00
7. Bertrand Grospellier 545.75
8. Jason Mercier 449.08
9. Martin Staszko 446.00
10. Jake Cody 445.23
Despite having won the WSOP Main Event Pius Heinz did not have enough accumulated points to lead the board. In fact Main event finalist Ben Lamb has a great year [...]
Jonathan Duhamel known to poker fans at the Canadian poker professional that snagged the 2010 WSOP Main event title was a victim of crime this week at his home I Quebec. Apparently two men entered his home, threatened his life, beat him up and stole his possessions. Duhamel is not seriously injured and no arrests have been made.
Among the items stolen from Duhamel’s home were his 2010 WSOP bracelet and a Rolex watch custom engraved with his WSOP win. Although his entire poker winnings were not just sitting around his house a few 500 Euro bills were. The police are hoping the robbers attempt to catch in the rare Euro money to give them a lead.
There has been no official statement that Duhamel was targeted because of his 2010 championship win but the fact they stole his bracelet and watch is a good indication they knew who they were robbing. The incident occurred on Wednesday [...]
The big three of the Black Friday debacle are not the only casino owners facing investigation. A subsidiary of the Vegas based Sands Casino, Sands China has been working with the Hong Kong Securities and Exchange Commission since March of this year. The investigation is part of the fall out caused by the dismissal of former CEO Steven Jacobs.
Apparently Jacobs considered his dismissal from Sands China unfair and without cause. He filed a grievance against the company. During the mud slinging Jacobs accused Adelson (head honcho at Sands) of being influenced by outsiders in the running of his Asian locations. The implied meaning was that Asian mafia or black marketers were interfering with the running of the casino.
After months of investigation the Hong Kong SEC have dropped the case. That isn’t the end of it of course. The American SEC and the U.S. Depart of Justice are still investigating the matter. This may be a [...]
The Epic Poker League (EPL) has completed its third tournament in its first year of operation. On the final day of the main event five players remained vying for the title. This time the winner was Chris Klodnicki.
The five final players were quite a formidable bunch: Chris Klodnicki, Andrew Lichtenberger, Joe Tehan, Michael Mizrachi and Scott Clements. There were originally 187 entrants with many twists and turns that narrowed the field to five. First out was Scott Clements the short stack of the day who just couldn’t get a break. He took home just shy of $90K so it wasn’t too bad.
The Grinder made a graceful exit in fourth place after Tehan called his all-in. Mizrachi walked away with $175K. Again not too bad for a few days work. Tehan himself managed to hold on for quite a while as the three players vied for dominance. He went out with an Ace-7 against Klodnicki’s [...]
Okay so we all know what happened on Black Friday back in April right? Well when the big three poker sites made an exit from the online market, other poker sites that had not been indicted but did hold a domain name in the U.S. started to worry. Bodog Poker was one of these smaller poker sites. They voluntarily withdrew from the American market in the summer but it seems they are making a return.
The problem for Bodog and other online sites was having an American domain with assets attached to it. If they didn’t have an American domain name the U.S. Department of Justice could not go in and seize their assets. Many poker sites, including Bodog, ended play for American players and moved their site to a European domain name. Now Bodog has returned to the U.S. Market offering cash money games through a new website Bovada.lv.
The domain “lv” is reserved for the [...]
Before there was TV poker, online poker and gaming software there was Doyle Brunson and players like him that made the world pay attention to the skill game that is poker. The Epic Poker League, still new on the poker tournament scene, has decided to celebrate both the old and the new. Doyle Brunson receives a lifetime membership that qualifies him for all future EPL tournaments.
The Epic Poker League was created by Annie Duke and a few other professional poker players who wanted a player oriented tournament that would offer a few new twists and celebrate a larger number of players. The EPL has unfortunately dealt with a few scandals already including having to place one of their champions on probation. Despite setbacks they do seem to keep up a positive front.
According to news sources Brunson found the gesture of lifetime membership very nice but he doesn’t expect to play a lot of tournaments in [...]
Its been a long time coming but it looks as though the Full Tilt Poker operation is being sold to Groupe Bernard Taipe (GBT). The agreement was decided between Full Tilt, Bernard Taipe and the U.S. Department of Justice. It was a two thirds majority vote and comes almost a month after the idea of asset transfer became viable. GBT takes on Full Tilt’s assets and its debts, including the paying back of American players.
Of course GBT also takes on all of Full Tilt’s other debts whether related to the American portion of their company or not. Pokerlistings.com reports a $150 million in debt owed to players outside of the United States. The American player debt will be “facilitated” by the Department of Justice. Who knows if this is some sort of loan to GBT or the use of public funds. At the moment that isn’t clear. There is a long way to go for [...]
Over the weekend the PokerStars European Tour in Prague came to a close and German player Martin Finger was named the overall winner. Winning came after a long day of poker play but came with the reward of a bracelet, a trophy, a title and of course, a little cash to sweeten the pot.
The Prague tournament lasted five days and by the fifth day the field was down to the final table eight. The first person to be eliminated was Mads Wissing from Denmark. Second out was Andreas Wiese who, already reduced to a small number of chips, was taken out by the soon to be champion Finger.
Doubling up on a short stack became the theme of the day when another player went out the same way as Wiese. Ari Engel left gracefully in sixth place. After that it was Denys Drobyna, Guillem Usero and Nicolas Levi until we got to head to head play. [...]
