US Online Poker Ban - Some Link Dumps

From the NY Times: Foreign Money Fueled Failed Bid to Push Online Poker

From the New York Post: Payment Processor Pleads Not Guilty...

Bill Rini's Poker Blog : The Fallout From The Full Tilt / PokerStars Pullout

For some interesting insight into the legal aspects of the case read the last few days of blog posts on my friend CK's blog CK is an attorney although currently not practicing law.

From Change100's blog read: The End of the (poker) World as we know it. Change is not only a well-established member or the poker Media but she also shipped the Ladies PCA event this year at Atlantis. A good chunk of her savings and payment for work she has done is tied up online.

Quad Jacks.com has been having a marathon session of guests on a U-Stream feed ever since news broke. Guests as diverse as Scott Matusow (Mike's brother) to CK (above) to Shane Schleger (PokerSTars TeamOnline) to Todd Terry to BJ Nemeth have all been offering insight or what little they have and their perspectives on what has been going down.

First if I were in backer with deep pockets (which I'm not) I would set up poker hostels (I prefer that name to a poker boiler room, although I image thats what it would look like) overseas say in Vancouver, Costa Rica, Toronto, London etc. Basically, anywhere online poker is regulated free of the US Govt. Offer a room, and an internet cafe/station where residents could grind out their living and a concierge to assist our grinders in the local culture. Make the players take breaks. limit their stays to no more then two months at a time. They have to leave and can come back or visit another location. Force them to see the world. Offer classes in Bank Roll Management, ie wealth management. Offer onsite massage, a life coach whatever, offer day trips to the local attractions/museums. Better yet call it a poker spa. Treat it like Poker's version of Semester at Sea.


With the above "hostels" established US Online Grinders could ex-patriate themselves for stretches of time & continue to grind out a living online. If I were a young pro who wanted to continue playing online I would move out of the country, but have a plan. Example: Make this much money and then retire or go to college. Part of that plan would also be to transition to live play if I currently didn't play live. I'd also get outside and see the freaking world while I was overseas. The structure of my poker spa would encourage a well balanced education.

As for the accusations against the Big 3, the charges of money laundering are severe. Breaking the law is breaking the law and that appears to be the biggest problem the three major sites are facing. As a friend of mine who is a NY State policeman once said to another friend who got a speeding ticket when she passed another vehicle. "If you exceeded the speeding limit, even while passing its still speeding".


I'll post more interesting links as I find them.