I am playing a PP tournament and in 30 minutes not one US player has sat at my table. I checked 4 others at random and not one US player is sitting at any of them. However half the players are now showing Canada - nowhere specific, just Canada. Canadians used to be far less common. Are these people really US citizens hiding from their overbearing government?
probably, or there was some talk of people changing the country listing to make it seem like they’re Canadian.
Of course they can just check your IP address…
Thanks, I thought it seemed odd. Land of the free, eh?
Party poker has closed down to US business. I think they have frozen or banned all us accounts as of 10/13/06 when President Bush signed the new law into place banning online gambling as it exists. Publicly traded companies(like party poker) can’t take any chances and had to shut down. Other companies that could care less what the US has to say are still up and running.
I imagine US players are setting up canadian accounts.
It might have something to do with the fact that every third commercial I see on television these days is for Party Poker. I don’t know how they’re advertising in the US, but here they are pushing hard.
What’s to prevent a third party offshore vendor from providing “chip” accounts to Americans, and providing remote terminal access; i.e., you’d apparently be playing the game from an offshore IPA.
I don’t do online gambling but this new law makes me sick. What are they playing at? What are they trying to protect us from? There are live casinos in nearly every state of the Union. Why should they care about online gaming?
I know at least one online player who actually lives in NY, but has set up an account in Canada to continue. As an aside, he declared and paid taxes a year ago on $6000 in winnings and does not think he will for this year. I believe (don’t take my word for this) that gambling (or poker) winnings are not taxable in Canada. I am quite certain that lottery winnings are not since every provincial lottery makes that clear.
When does this law go into effect?
Just to clarify, the law does not go into effect for nine months. It doesn’t ban online gaming, it just prohibits banks from transferring money to businesses with gambling operations in states
Not to hijack the OP, but this is largely unenforceable. Despite the initial decision by many online sites to cease operating in the US, I’m confident they’ll all find a way to continue operating legally by the time the ban goes into place. (See PokerNews.com, CardPlayer.com, or similar trade sites for more discussion).
And yeah, the surge of Canadian registrants is certainly US players skirting the new Party Poker policy.
–S
Well the main group that cared about it was the physical casinos in nearly every union of the state. They were lossing a ton of revinue from it. It is amazing what good lobbies can buy.
I’m not particularly well informed of all the goings on. My info comes from distant freinds who are having their incomes put in danger because they make a living playing online poker.
There has been publicity in the UK about gambling company executives being arrested in the US, so that’s why several big companies have effectively closed down US accounts.
‘The company that owns the online poker giant Paradise Poker, London Stock Market quoted Sportingbet plc, has shocked the markets with an immediate suspension of its shares following news that its non-executive Chairman, 64 year old Peter Dicks, has been arrested in the USA on anti-gaming charges.’
‘Mr Dicks was detained at JFK Airport, New York, by officers of the Port Authority of New York, whilst travelling from London to the US on non-Sportingbet related business. Mr Dicks has since attended a hearing in New York City. At this hearing he was served with a warrant for his arrest initiated by the Louisiana State Police for the alleged violation of Louisiana State laws relating to gambling by computer (LA R.S. 14:90.3(E), Gambling by Computer).’
http://uk.pokernews.com/news/2006/9/paradise-poker-sportingbet-director-arrested.htm
This is not so; the law took effect the day President Bush signed it.
What I assume you are referring to is the stipulation that the specific banking regulations mandated by the bill must be completed within 270 days. My understanding is that it is very unlikely for it to take anywhere near the full 270 days for those regulations to be published – 100-150 days is a more likely estimate.
For all the info you could ever want on this bill and it’s impact, here’s the FAQ from the Legislation Forum on the 2+2 Publishing message boards. For anyone who wants to stay up to date on developments on this front, that forum should be your first stop.
The only good thing I saw coming out of this legislation is that with PP suspending its American operations I wouldn’t have to hear that goddamn “ooooh, Pahty Poker! Pahty Poker! Bah bah bah bah bah bah bah bah bah bah bah!” music from their commercials again. Yet, they’re still advertising their free dot-net sites in America, albeit with the “this is not a gambling website” in bigger bolder letters. Why would they continue to advertise in the US if they’ve suspended their US operations? Or is this just a way of thumbing their nose at the law, since the dot-nets are nothing but feeder sites to the dot-coms?