DISQUS

V · 3 years ago

I'm not sure why nobody brings up the obvious side of this issue. When you play a game in vegas, you know that even though the odds are against you they are legitimately so. Dice have a one in six chance of landing wherever, the cards are in their physical places. Online, the site can execute whatever code it wants. The odds can be stacked against the consumer far beyond what ordinary casinos would allow.

If we're looking to protect US consumers, we shouldn't be banning internet gambling. We should be advertising how these operations work and AUDIT THEIR CODE to certify that there are no digitally weighted dice and publish the publish the results.

Derek Slater · 3 years ago

Tom,

I hope you're right that most poker players will be unaffected, but color me skeptical. Here's analysis from the Poker Players Alliance lobbying group:
http://www.pokerplayersalliance.org/alerts/Anal...



Party Gaming and 888 are going to block all transactions from customers with US addresses - at least, that's how I've read their press statements. So unless you can fake your address to Party Poker and the party that sends money to Party Poker, you're out of luck. And even though I bet some people will take the time to do this, I think many ordinary Americans will be frustrated and effectively denied access beyond the near term.


While not a knockdown argument against your view, let me note that the stocks of the poker companies were halved, and Neteller et al were hit hard to. Are you saying those stock holders were all chicken littles, mistakenly afraid of those companies losing US customers?

Tom · 3 years ago

V, there is nothing now stopping Internet casinos and the like from volunteering to undergo audits by objective and trusted third parties. And, unsurprisingly, they do so; see, e.g., this casino's promise. So while I agree that domestic bans on Internet gambling work to the disadvantage of U.S. consumers, I don't think the supposed need for audits justifies regulation.

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Bill Monroe · 2 years ago

For the best article on this subject, read "Unintended Consequences of a Monetary Control Scheme" by a U.S. lawyer and gambling writer named Mark Schopper, who wrote the book on Internet Gambling. The article is available on the Internet for free, just search for it by its title. He predicted this would happen in 2001, and the genius of his article is he also predicted the consequences, which will be devastating to the banking system because of e-cash, which money launderers will love. The U.S. Government is so ill informed it is scarry.