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It's mentioned in the article that the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 (UIGEA) this was tacked onto a must-pass safe port bill hours before a

by cowpig 11y ago

It's mentioned in the article that the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 (UIGEA) this was tacked onto a must-pass safe port bill hours before adjournment for 2006 elections. It doesn't go into much detail. From wikipedia: "... the SAFE Port Act (H.R. 4954) as passed by the House on May 4 and the United States Senate on September 14, bore no traces of the Unlawful Internet Gambling and Enforcement Act that was included in the SAFE Port Act signed into law by George W. Bush on October 13, 2006. The UIGEA was added in Conference Report 109-711 (submitted at 9:29pm on September 29, 2006), which was passed by the House of Representatives by a vote of 409-2 and by the Senate by unanimous consent on September 30, 2006. Due to H.RES.1064, the reading of this conference report was waived." The legislative branch is broken. I was a professional poker player at the time this bill was passed, and it caused a lot of pain for a lot of people. Players' funds were frozen (and a lot of professional gamblers kept essentially their entire net worth online at the time). If you want to learn more about that story, there's an excellent documentary called "Bet, Raise, Fold (2013)". Many of my friends from that world who were also into sports and sports betting have now moved over to professional fantasy sports betting. It kills me that it makes exceptions for the brands of gambling in bed with the Republican party (NFL, horse racing), and was passed without an actual vote. A friend of mine who works for the casino lobby told me that it would have been included, but because American casinos were late to the game (by 2006 the industry was dominated by two companies: one started by an Israeli group and the other by some big-name professional poker players from the USA) they wanted those companies to get squeezed out of the American markets first, so that they could come mop the industry up themselves (which hasn't worked very well, beyond some state-specific cases). My opinion on policy is that prohibition is the wrong approach, but that maybe there should be some type of regulation to protect people with gambling problems from ruining their lives. There absolutely needs to be regulation about making it clear how much of your bet is being raked (the bookmaker's vig). Many online casinos intentionally obfuscate these numbers and are able to run absolutely insane margins based on the fact that many people don't understand what they're paying to play. On the other hand, I don't hear people clamoring for regulation of Day Trading, which is exactly the same.

TheCowboy 11y ago
Another painful part was that companies sought to obtain legal clarification on how it impacted their operations. The industry essentially split in 2006 into firms willing to take the risk that poker was legal, and those who didn't want to take that risk. I believe people in government took advantage of this ambiguity to allow business to continue so they could later confiscate funds from payment processors to boost their careers and budgets. I permanently lost money in at least two instances where payment processors were shut down. I also think there should not only be a clear communication of how much is raked, but there should be a mandatory minimum % that is returned back into the pool (or a cap on the rake) so that it can be demonstrated as in fact a game of skill. Tell our friend from Australia I said HI.
cableshaft 11y ago
My father was heavily affected by this. He went from making thousands of dollars a month from online poker to making about fifty bucks a month on average in the online poker memberships (playing almost as much as he used to, but not quite). He follows the sloooow news of getting it legalized again on a state basis, which for the past several years a few states have been on the verge of doing (a couple might have already as far as I know). He went from a staunch Republican to anti-Congress pretty much overnight with the passage of this bill, and I've probably heard him complain about fifteen times about how Congress is so corrupt and a lobbyist representing Harrah's casino apparently "bought" a senator to get him to slip this into the SAFE Port Act (which in the aftermath of 911 was guaranteed to pass) for only $50,000.
swang 11y ago
No one's money was frozen. If you had money on "NETELLER" or "Moneybookers" (Skrill), they forced you to cash out and that was it. Party Poker also stopped offering play to US citizens, but they too also sent you a check. If you were on Full Tilt or Pokerstars, you could continue to play (assuming you weren't too shellshocked from the news). Agree with the rest of what you said though.

by cowpig 11y ago

TheCowboy 11y ago

Another painful part was that companies sought to obtain legal clarification on how it impacted their operations. The industry essentially split in 2006 into firms willing to take the risk that poker was legal, and those who didn't want to take that risk. I believe people in government took advantage of this ambiguity to allow business to continue so they could later confiscate funds from payment processors to boost their careers and budgets. I permanently lost money in at least two instances where payment processors were shut down. I also think there should not only be a clear communication of how much is raked, but there should be a mandatory minimum % that is returned back into the pool (or a cap on the rake) so that it can be demonstrated as in fact a game of skill. Tell our friend from Australia I said HI.

cableshaft 11y ago

My father was heavily affected by this. He went from making thousands of dollars a month from online poker to making about fifty bucks a month on average in the online poker memberships (playing almost as much as he used to, but not quite). He follows the sloooow news of getting it legalized again on a state basis, which for the past several years a few states have been on the verge of doing (a couple might have already as far as I know). He went from a staunch Republican to anti-Congress pretty much overnight with the passage of this bill, and I've probably heard him complain about fifteen times about how Congress is so corrupt and a lobbyist representing Harrah's casino apparently "bought" a senator to get him to slip this into the SAFE Port Act (which in the aftermath of 911 was guaranteed to pass) for only $50,000.

swang 11y ago

No one's money was frozen. If you had money on "NETELLER" or "Moneybookers" (Skrill), they forced you to cash out and that was it. Party Poker also stopped offering play to US citizens, but they too also sent you a check. If you were on Full Tilt or Pokerstars, you could continue to play (assuming you weren't too shellshocked from the news). Agree with the rest of what you said though.