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Welcome to Bet Sages
Gambling News Section,
featuring the latest
breaking gambling
industry news courtesy
of InfoPowa News. This
is your one stop source
for all and any of the
latest developments
concerning leisure based
wagering activities on
the internet.
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| 2
OCTOBER 2006 : HEADLINES |
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Political
Manouevreing a feature of late night voting on Friday
U.S. Senate Majority
Leader Bill Frist last night (Friday) carried out his
promise to attach his anti-online gambling measure to any
"must pass" legislation available, regardless of relevancy.
After having earlier attempts to attach the measure to
defence bills rebuffed, the Senator focused on the Port
Security Bill and through some adroit political manouevreing
and negotiation managed to attach a compromise measure and
thus include it in voting by the House. The compromise
measure focused mainly on hampering online gambling
financial channels, and dropped amendments to the Wire Act
1961 itself. more...
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| 13
SEPTEMBER 2006 : HEADLINES |
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Years of experience
behind new online gambling portal
A respected name in
the online gambling information sector,
Dave Sawyer has announced the operational debut of a new
online casino, poker and sportsbook information site at
BetSage.com (
www.betsage.com )
Formerly with the famous UK
betting group Ladbrokes, and with years of webmastering
experience Sawyer owns the successful
OnlineCasinoReviewer portal which will continue to run
alongside the new site. more...
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| 8
SEPTEMBER 2006 : HEADLINES |
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Prosecution asks for more time to assemble tax evasion case against gambling group
The U.S. court order restraining beleaguered online gambling group BetonSports.com from taking bets from US citizens is to remain in place for a further 30 days following an extension granted this week by U.S. District Court Judge Carol E Jackson.
This is the second extension of the original order, caused by procedural difficulties in serving notice to the London based company. Federal prosecutor Marty Woelfle told Jackson a process server in London expected to complete that task soon. Government prosecutors are also thought to need more time to prepare the case against the company, which includes allegations of a failure to pay taxes on $3.3 billion in wagers.
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Poker Pro Europe on sale at 8 000 outlets
The first issue of Poker Pro Europe magazine was on the shelves at over 8000 retail outlets, bookstores, airports, casinos, card rooms and newsstands throughout English-speaking Europe this week. The new publication is backed by a rich media website in both .com and .co.uk domains launched on August 24.
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Vulcan Sports Media prepared to sell but no price disclosed
Sporting News, a weekly sports oriented publication that agreed to pay $7.2 million to settle Department of Justice allegations that it promoted illegal wagering by publishing ads for Internet gambling sites, could be changing hands soon.
The owner of several sports-business publications, American City Business Journals Inc., said this week that it will buy the Sporting News and plans to study operations before deciding whether to keep the weekly magazine's headquarters in Creve Coeur.
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A case of slow-pay that will not go away
Club Player Casino.com remains under the microscope (see previous InfoPowa reports) as one of the worst cases of slow-paying a player yet seen in the industry....and as we went to press this week the case was still unresolved and the player unpaid.
Back in July 2006 a player launched a complaint with player advocate Casinomeister.com which in summary went like this:
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Spanish language facility introduced for poker players
Pacific Poker.com, the poker arm of Gibraltar based gambling group 888.com has launched a Spanish language version of the popular sites and its games.
Players will now be able to play all poker games including Texas Hold'em, Omaha, and Seven-Card Stud in Spanish, says Mike Herea, the promotions manager for parent group 888.com: "In light of our growing Spanish speaking online poker players we felt that the Spanish version was a much needed addition and that it would be a great benefit to them," he said.
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Newport Beach's Joe Pelton beats starting field of 460 over 4 days of play
Newport Beach, California player Joe Pelton is the new champ in the 2006 World Poker Tour Legends of Poker, beating a starting field of 460 players in a 4 day tournament to take to the $1 577 170 first prize this week.
Third in chip counts at $1.1 million as the thournament entered the final table stage, Pelton fought it out in an exciting tussle with the likes of Hoyt Corkins, Randy Holland, Scotty Nguyen, Frankie O'Dell, and Kevin O'Donnell.
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Everything about this promotion was VIP
Lucky Nugget Casino.com player MarcC will probably be cruising along the US highways this week on a custom built Orange County Choppers dream machine he won this week in a promotion that was First Class all the way for the seven finalists.
Belle Rock Entertainment, parent company of the casino flew seven prize package winners from around the globe to New York for a chance to pick the right key for the main prize - an exclusive Ornage County chopper. Appropriately, the grand finale of the competition was staged at the OCC workshop in Montgomery, New York, where the "Ticket to Ride" promotion came to an end with a key turning ceremony.
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GBP 4.1 million raised in AIM placing
Mobile gambling technology company Probability Games was successfully floated on the AIM section of the London Stock Exchange this week - the first mobile gaming operator to do so.
The company started trading on 24 August following the placement of ordinary shares at a price of 76p per share. This placing raised GBP 4.1million (US$7.8 million) before expenses, an endorsem,ent of the company which operates casino, bingo and lottery games and payment services for mobile phones. It offers minimum stakes of ten pence, and aims to appeal to casual gamblers.
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Blue Square revenues up 50 percent and active customer numbers rise 12.5 percent to 261 000.
The UK gambling group Rank can be proud of the performance of subsidiary Blue Square this week following the release of its interim results, which saw the company achieving ambitious targets.
Trading since the end of June has been broadly in line with expectations with Blue Square maintaining an impressive growth rate, the group said. Blue Square revenues were up 50 percent on 2005 and active customer numbers had risen 12.5 percent to 261 000.
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Interim results lower
32Red, the Gibraltar-based casino, sportsbook and poker operator, reported disappointing interim results to the end of June.
Announcing the results, the company said that trading has been mixed and could result in market expectations for the full year not being met. Casino performance had been slower than anticipated in recovering from the distractions of the FIFA World Cup and despite an increase of 60 percent in the number of active players, the average value of each player declined to GBP 523.
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WPT Ladies Night IV another success
Joanne "JJ" Liu took the winner's prize in this weeks World Poker Tour Ladies Night IV tournament held at the Bicycle Casino in Bell Gardens, California, earning herself a $25,000 seat into the WPT's Championship Event and a WPT ring.
Defending Ladies Night champion, actress/player Jennifer Tilly was the first player out, eliminated by amateur Kelli Griggs. Vanessa Rousso also fell to Griggs' aggressive play when she pushed all-in from the big blind on a flop of T-T-6, thinking her K6 was good, but ran right into Griggs' flopped trip tens.
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New poker software will be supplied by in-house technology
The parting of the ways of Betfair Poker and Canadian software provider Cryptologic is not expected to have an adverse material effect on the latter, Cryptologic management said this week, revealing that even without Betfair revenues, the fees from Cryptologic's licensees have grown by 47 percent in the second quarter of 2006 compared to the same period in 2005.
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New multi-week online poker promo announced for a claimed 65 million U.S. poker players - and it's legal!
Poker Creations has announced a multi-week, online poker promotion with Milwaukees Best Light Beer and Casino Media Group, a multi-media agency with offices in Toronto, New York and Las Vegas.
In terms of the agreement, Poker Creations will provide online logistics for its second nationwide promotion sponsored by Milwaukees Best Light Beer, a Miller Brewing product.
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Discussions in "...a very preliminary stage"
The corporate site at Sportingbet plc this week carries an announcement indicating that a $56.6 million all share offer may be in the wind for gambling software developer World Gaming plc.
The announcement stresses that the boards of directolrs at World Gaming and Sportingbet are in very preliminary discussions which "...may or may not result in Sportingbet making a recommended all share offer for World Gaming."
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A useful address for players with a problem that cannot be resolved at online casino level
Change that Montana Disputes email address for the following new channel next time you have a beef with a Realtime Gaming powered casino that cannot be resolved with casino management:
Players with problems will now need to go to http://disputes.realtimegaming.com to submit disputes.
The new channel will hopefully speed up this essential service.
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47 percent increase in profits...and less reliance on US business
Online gaming group PartyGaming reported a 47 percent increase in its first-half profit this week and revealed that recent acquisition, Gamebookers was exceeding expectations.
Reuters reported that Party Gaming Chief Executive Mitch Garber said the main focus was expanding internationally to reduce the group's dependence on the risky U.S. market, where some politicians are trying to ban online gaming. "The most fundamental part of our strategy is to develop our non-U.S. business," he told reporters.
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Paddy Power reports first half profits up
Aided by good World Cup football returns, Ireland's top bookie group Paddy Power PLC reported an 11 percent gain in first-half net profit this week. Growth in the group's Internet, telephone and over-the-counter gambling markets was also encouraging.
The Dublin-based company said its net profit from January to June rose to Euro 17.5 million (US$22.4 million) from Euro 15.8 million over the same period in 2005. It took a total of Euro 877.6 million (US$1.12 billion) in bets over the period, up 27 percent from last year's Euro 690.1 million.
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Partners agree to call it a day on disappointing business
Online casino players and affiliates alike were receiving bad news from the one year old Hammer's Casino this week as the partnership between Imperial E-Club and the West Ham United football club decided to call it a day after disappointing business results.
The closure is being effected amicably, with a seamless transfer of players accounts over to the Vegas Red online casino. The heavily customised West Ham United online casino site is to be closed, and the HammersCasino domain will go into escrow for several years in terms of the original agreement between the parties.
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And Blackburn Rovers finds an online friend, too
The business partnership between Imperial E Club and West Ham United football club may have ended (see earlier InfoPowa reports) but the footballers have almost immediately signed up another online casino partner to take Imperial E's place.
West Ham United management today (Thursday) announced the selection of Pinnacle Casino.com and Blue Chip Games as the East London club's official online casino partners.
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Inaugural event being publicised as the biggest European tour yet
There are now only days left before the start of the inaugural European Poker Masters poker tour, which is set to launch September 9 and is being marketed as the largest pan-European poker tour yet. The organisers, All In Sport promise that the tour will feature some of poker's top pros battling for a GBP 1 million prize pool.
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154 countries now show the World Poker Tour games
Asian poker fans will get to see the World Poker Tour action following a deal signed this week between World Poker Tour Enterprises and Macau Cable in Macau and MediaCorp in Singapore.
WPT shows now air in 154 territories across the globe.
Macau is one of the highest volume gaming regions in the world where Macau Cable will air the WPT's Season One while MediaCorp, the largest broadcaster in Singapore, will feature Season Two for its viewers.
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The strange tale of the billboard vault and how it rained money in Vegas
Police in Las Vegas were this week investigating a bizarre theft from an even more bizarre location - a giant Las Vegas billboard.
It all started with a bit of a billboard gamble by online sportsbook, Sportsbook.com which recently erected a billboard on the Strip in front of the Stardust Hotel. This was a billboard with a difference, however - it included a transparent security box that contained $100 000 in one dollar bills with the slogan "Win This Cash Free, Only at Sportsbook.com". And just in case anyone missed it, a giant bright yellow arrow indicated the box of greenbacks, supported by the notice '$100 000 real cash - and real guards below!"
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Asia Pacific and Europe will fuel increase in business to 2011
Another bullish assessment of the mobile gambling market has been published by the respected research house Juniper Research this week, predicting that revenues in the Asia-Pacific region could rise from $966 million in 2006 to $8.8 billion by 2011.
Juniper postulates that the region will become the largest geographic market for all aspects of mobile gambling involving casinos, lotteries and betting, trailed by Europe, with North America, South America and other regions lagging behind.
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Law professor asks valid questions on US banning attempts
Respected online gambling legal authority, university professor I. Nelson Rose published an interesting article this week, starting with the provocative view that the United States Congress has lost sight of a fundamental fact about gambling: It is up to the states, not the federal government, to decide what forms of gambling should be legal.
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The biggest online gambling players study ever attempted kicks off this week
The CEO at player protection and standards body eCommerce Online Gaming Regulation and Assurance (eCOGRA) is clearly determined to spread the eCOGRA survey response net as widely as possible. This week Andrew Beveridge appealed to portal owners to help assemble the survey's target of at least 20 000 respondents by spreading the word.
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Trash analysed, cars followed, banks and phone records inspected in major police action against poker star's activities
Over the weekend more news emerged on the police raid on poker personality Richard Lee's home in San Antonio last week (see previous InfoPowa reports) which indicated that the raid was the culmination of an intense police investigation that has been running since February this year.
Police applications for a search warrant showed that officers had rifled through trash, tailed luxury cars, gambled online and sorted through a string of local bank accounts and phone records in an effort to gather evidence against Lee and others.
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But this group's sportsbook operations apparently continue to prosper
The online poker room Pokertropolis.com advised players this week that it would close with effect from September 1. Fortunately the owners, Horizon 20 Group out of Costa Rica appear to be carrying this exercise out in a professional manner, communicating with their players and advising them that support facilities would remain open until September 7.
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The UK future of online gaming is bright, with revenues and customers doubling by 2010
The Screen Digest.com site reports that the companys recently completed online gambling study looked at 30 operators , including the global market leaders in key sectors such as sports betting, poker, gaming, exchange and spread betting.
Screen Digest claims the report includes 11 years of historical and forecast data for gross margin and active clients between 2000 to 2010 and detailed historical data for individual operators.
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Online poker site closing its doors
Hot on the heels of the Pokertropolis closure comes news this week that All In Poker, an online poker room which attracted hundreds of players via it's controversial multi-level marketing program, is to close. Members were informed of the action by email last week.
All In Poker allowed it's members to refer other players with the promise of "a significant monthly income stream". Players were led to anticipate that a significant percent of net revenues generated at the poker room would be returned to them, and affiliates could expect to generate income from seven levels of downline referrals.
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But that title could cause confusion
There are now two VIP Lounge online casinos following the launch this week of Jackpot Factory's new Microgaming powered venue aimed at the group's VIP players. InfoPowa recently reported on the launch of the Realtime Gaming powered VIP Lounge Casino.com, and the prefix "jf" in the url of the Jackpot Factory venture is the distinguishing factor.
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Now's your chance - place your vote for the best of the best in online gambling
Voting in the inaugural Bluff Magazine's Annual Readers Choice Awards has been open for some months now but will close on October 20, and readers are being urged to make their choices count whilst there is still time.
Categories for the 2006 Bluff Readers Choice Awards include: Most Entertaining Player to Watch, Best All-Around Online Poker Room, Best Online Customer Service, Best Live Poker Tournaments and Best Poker Commentary.
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UK bingo site plans a new venture with added excitement
Jersey-based Independent Technology Ventures, a well established UK bingo site operator plans to add a little slots excitement to a new bingo site planned for launch in the British market soon.
The group, which owns Think Bingo and the more recently launched (see earlier InfoPowa reports) Bingo Scotland sites, is to brand the new standalone operation Think Bingo Plus, and it will offer the 40 000 players who frequent the group's sites a selection of online slots and other instant games
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Big names scheduled to play in Fifty Casino competition
All In Sports, formerly known as The Poker Channel, will be bringing another game of high-stakes poker to television screens in the U.K. next year with the "Million Dollar Cash Game."
UK poker fans will have more exciting poker television to watch when Sky Sports TV channel screens the event, which takes place at the Fifty Casino in London on September 12.
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100 downloads a minute on day of launch
Last week InfoPowa reported on the imminent debut of the new Microsoft Texas Hold Em game for Xbox Live Arcade, and the event proved to be every bit as popular as predicted, breaking records for Microsoft as the most in-demand download yet on the Xbox Live Arcade.
On its first day out, the game was in demand to the tune of 100 downloads a minute - the fastest ever on Xbox - over a 24 hour period.
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6 Summits in one conference
Brave the December cold in London this year to attend Bullet Business Europe (London, Dec. 6-7, 2006) where industry leaders such as John Anderson (CEO, 888), Mark Blandford (CEO, Sportingbet), Phil Fraser (CEO, Which Bingo), Matthias Hein, (Treasurer, The European Casino Association) and John Shepherd (Director of Corporate Communications, PartyGaming) are already confirmed to speak.
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The Mobile Gambling, Gaming & Lotteries Summit
Diarise October 3 - 4 for The Mobile Gambling, Gaming & Lotteries Summit in Montreal, the summit that will show you how to get the most out of the iGaming market in North America.
With recent shifts in US legislation concerning "over the wire gaming" there has never been a better time to assess your mobile operations in North America. You will hear from more than 30 mobile gambling industry leaders in North America including 777Mobile, Ongame, Progressive Gaming, PhantomFiber, ImpactMobile and more!
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| PREVIOUS NEWS ARTICLES... |
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| 17th June 2006
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| 24th June 2006
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| 1st July 2006
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| 11th July 2006
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| 23rd July 2006
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| 27th July 2006
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| 6th August 2006
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| 12th August 2006
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| 18th August 2006
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| 25th August 2006
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| 1st September 2006
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| 8th September 2006
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| 15th September 2006
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| 22nd September 2006
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| 29th September 2006
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