Marketing Online Gambling to Politicians

HEY AMERICA! Looking for a SURE-FIRE way to fight the RECESSION BLUES?

Why not take a look at the HOTTEST TREND IN EUROPEAN BUDGET FASHION?

ONLINE GAMBLING!

STOP relying on FLAWED PRODUCTS like ECONOMIC STIMULUS PLANS* or COMPLICATED FINANCIAL BAILOUTS  to clean up your MESSY BANKING SPILLS and LEAKING BUDGET PLANS!
 
Those just get STOLEN, EMBEZZLED OR DIVIDENDED to RICH FAT-CAT CEOs!

NO MORE BREAKING INTERNATIONAL TRADE RULINGS, that just throw INTERNATIONAL TREATIES INTO QUESTION, while RUINING YOUR COUNTRY'S REPUTATION!

SMART EUROPEAN JURISDICTIONS have an additional tool in their belts... And that is REVENUE FROM LEGAL AND REGULATED ONLINE GAMBLING!

But don't take our word for it... Listen to the ISLE OF MAN!

Isle of Man: "I love ONLINE GAMBLING! I used to be a forgotten little piece of rock in the Irish Sea who was only known for mustaches and being the birthplace of the Bee Gees. Then I found out about ONLINE GAMBLING!

Now, despite the world being mired in a RECESSION, I can still table a ... [More]

How is the recession affecting the gambling industry?

As I mentioned earlier, upon entering the conference floor at the International Gaming Expo, one is immediately inundated by sensory overload... noise, colors, sex... it's all here.

What isn't here? Any sign of the looming recession.

This is an alternate universe, where down means up, excess means restraint, and the recession means opportunity.

In fact, there are only three types of people here:

- Those who pretend the recession doesn't exist.
- Those who will only talk about the recession in hushed tones, quietly accepting that there is an actual recession but it doesn't seem to be affecting them.
- Those who accept the recession with comments such a, "It's awesome! When the economy goes down, my sales go up!"

In reality, the recession seems to be affecting different industry segments quite differently.

On the one side are the companies servicing the land-based casino industry. These are the exhibitors who talk to you with uneasily broad smiles as they tout their latest amazing inventions, not knowing for sure if they will ever be able to sell it to actual casino operators. They've seen the news. Las Vegas ... [More]

Welcome to the International Gaming Expo

Well, here I am in London, attending the International Gaming Expo, which might also be known as the "ICE Show", the "ICEi Exhibition", or my personal favorite... "A Gaming Conference in a Place Where it Isn't Freakin' Snowing or ICE Cold".

Unfortunately, while it might not be snowing, it's still pretty miserable today. Drizzly, and maybe one degree above freezing. Too warm to wear a parka. Too cold to wear anything lighter. Welcome to the UK.

While I am here for wider reasons than simple blogging, the event does give me a chance to catch up on industry happenings and disperse it to those lucky enough to read my posts.

So, what have I seen so far?

Well, my first day was greatly marred by the disorganized nature of the conference.

Despite my online registration, I still had to suffer a lengthy wait to get my conference pass.

First, we waited 15 minutes in one line before somebody told us all to go wait in another line. Then, somebody else told us to go back to the first line, where a third person told us it would be faster to go back outside and walk around to another entrance where the line would be shorter... but it wasn't. After finding a third entrance, we finally made it in.

Time elapsed... one hour. I hate conferences.

Once inside, people are greeted by a sight that can only be described as the offspring of an u... [More]

Playboy Poker shuts down

Wow, I'm impressed with myself.

I actually suppressed my desire to title this post "Playboy Poker Goes Tits-Up".

I'm growing up.

Anyway, a bit of bad news here. According to Gaming Alerts, Playboy Poker has notified its users that it will be shutting down.

I don't know what is more surprising to me. The fact that Playboy couldn't make this work, or the fact that Playboy actually had a poker site and I didn't even know.

Thinking back, I guess I do vaguely remember the news that Playboy was opening a poker room, but they have been so irrelevant for so long that I just forgot about them.

This latest news marks the third time Playboy has unsuccessfully waded into the gambling business.

A few decades ago, I believe they tried to open a chain of land-based Playboy Casinos, which never found a market.

Then they tried to open an online casino in the late 90's, but got scared away by Senator Kyl's war against online gambling.

And now this.

Poor Playboy. The last decade has seen Playboy go from being a dominant publisher with bags of money, to an also-ran brand with a diminishing subscriber base that may-or-may-not b... [More]

Could the world be flat in Kentucky?

It's been a while since I've blogged, so forgive me.

The worst part about taking time off from blogging is knowing how to get back started. If a story breaks during your hiatus, then you are torn between re-hashing old news or looking like you missed the story completely. At least I've been helped by the fact that the last month has been a generally slow time for news surrounding the online gaming industry.

The biggest news of the last month has generally been coming out of two issues...

The settlement between the DoJ and PartyPoker founder Anurag Dikshit, and the seemingly never-ending saga  in Kentucky regarding the domain seizures.

Since I've already discussed the Dikshit situation, I should probably forget about it for now, although I must admit that I love typing the word "Dikshit".

Dikshit. Dikshit. Dikshit.

OK, that's enough. Let's jump right into the Kentucky story, shall we?

In case you were not aware, it all started back in September when the governor of the backwards state of Kentucky decided that he was also the governor of the Internet. Without any provocation, he filed a legal request to ... [More]