Posts Tagged ‘Online gambling’

Some Intrastate Online Gambling May Be Going Legal

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December 29th, 2011

Online poker may be back!

Legal experts say that a new opinion from the Justice Department opens the door for states to allow various forms of online gambling operated by lotteries and other gambling interests.

The country gains

Proponents of legalized online gambling say the online gambling industry could provide new sources of revenue for state coffers. But others, including large casino interests that prefer a national system limited to online poker, say that the free-flowing nature of the Internet is ill-suited for state gambling plans, which would attempt to limit online gambling to within a given state’s borders.

The 1961 Wire Act

The opinion from the Justice Department reverses a policy which held that most forms of online gambling were illegal under the Federal Wire Act; the 1961 act prohibits bets from passing through communications lines that cross state borders.

In a sweeping reversal, the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel said that such gambling within a state would no longer be considered illegal because the Wire Act, a law with contradictory language that has long been the subject of debate, doesn’t apply to any forms of gambling other than sports betting.

Indian tribes and casinos.

Online gambling experts said the change essentially gives states the green light to allow gambling within their borders. That is a victory for advocates of state-regulated online gambling, which include companies hoping to provide technology for online gambling and in some cases lotteries and others that operate gambling in states, such as Indian tribes or casinos.

Online poker

Washington, D.C., voted this year to allow its lottery to operate online poker, but the law hasn’t yet been implemented. Several state lotteries, meanwhile, already have been offering subscription services for lotteries online for the past few years.

Online gambling

Online gambling became a major industry some years back. It was the advent of the internet that grew that market and many people were quick to understand the money-making possibilities that online gambling offered. Online casinos mushroomed on the World Wide Web and the casinos flourished. There were money-making spin-offs as well. In order to gamble for money you had to establish a credit account in an online casino. To do this you had to transfer money into your account. The US tried to halt the gambling but found it impossible. What they did do was to stop the use of credit cards to transfer money and this led to the overnight birth of money transfer systems.

Other industries

Other industries benefited from the online gambling industry as well; for example the bottle shops where gamblers bought their drinks to keep them going at home while they gambled. Then came the home computer stores who sold PCs and Macs to would-be gamblers.

The downside

And there was a downside: Addiction was the worst of these. Solitary gamblers sat at home and gambled away their life’s savings in an attempt to hit the big one, the jackpot that would bring them millions. And then there were the kids who sat at home gambling their parent’s money while they were away at work.

Now it’s all coming back!

Tags: addiction, Internet gambling, Online gambling, Underage gambling
Posted in Business, Credit Cards, Economy, Employment, Lottery, Money, Personal / Internet, Technology | No Comments »

Now We Can All Gamble

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April 25th, 2011

How slot machines snuck into the malls
The slots are there along with money laundering, bribery, shootouts, and billions in profits, all with easy access to everyone, including your kids.

In a strip mall
Inside a one-story building on the edge of a strip mall in Central Florida, Joy Baker calculates the sum total of her morning bets. It’s almost noon, and she’s down $5. Not bad. Her husband, Tony, sits a few feet away. “This is the most fun we’ve had in 20 years,” says Joy, who is 78 and retired. “At our age, we can’t hike. He won’t go to the movies. This gives us a reason to get up in the morning.” Tony agrees. “We enjoy this. We will be really upset if the politicians take this away from us.”

On a Wednesday morning
It’s a Wednesday morning in mid-March, and the Bakers are sitting inside Jacks, a new type of neighborhood business that is flourishing in shopping malls throughout Florida and across America. Jacks bills itself as a “Business Center and Internet Cafe,” but it looks more like a pop-up casino. It is about the size of a neighborhood deli. There is a bar next door and a convenience store around the corner. Inside, jumbo playing cards decorate the walls. The room is filled with about 30 desktop computers. Here and there, men and women sit in office chairs and tap at the computers.

They are online
They are playing “sweepstakes” games that mimic the look and feel of traditional slot machines. Rows of symbols such as cherries, lucky sevens and four-leaf clovers tumble with every click of the mouse. “I’m wagering about 60 cents a spin,” says
John, a 50-year-old wearing a Harley-Davidson T-shirt.

The law disagrees
Local law enforcement disagrees. Jacks is located in the town of Casselberry, in the heart of Seminole County, a suburb of nearby Orlando. The cafe owners contend that what they are offering is not gambling but a form of “sweepstakes” promotions, which are currently legal under Florida state law. In January, after consulting with the sheriff’s department, the five members of the local Board of County Commissioners passed an ordinance designed to shut down the mini-casinos.

Internet sweepstakes cafes
The commissioners soon learned that getting rid of Internet sweepstakes cafes is not easy. Shortly after passing the ordinance, the commissioners were hit with multiple civil lawsuits filed in federal court.

A fight, a fight!
The fight over the legality of the pop-up casinos in Seminole County is part of a broader battle that has been fought for six years in counties across the nation from North Carolina to Texas to Massachusetts. Along the way, cops have raided numerous sweepstakes cafes, confiscated computers, and seized safes full of cash. In September, cops in Virginia Beach, Va., raided a dozen game rooms and confiscated more than 400 computers. In March, police in West Valley City, Utah, shut down two sweepstakes cafes, detained 67 people, and seized 80 computers. Lawmakers in North Carolina passed legislation last year outlawing the business model. In February, Virginia did the same. In April, the Massachusetts Attorney General submitted emergency regulations to shut down the businesses. And yet the sweepstakes cafes keep spreading.

Tags: Cafes, Internet sweepstakes cafes, Online gambling, Slot machines
Posted in Economy, Finance, Personal / Internet | No Comments »