Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Tribes Fear Legal Online Poker will Destroy Casino Business | Casino Scam Report

Note from @Gaminglawyer: Gaming in Indian Country has had years of advance notice and has been told repeatedly what they need to do to embrace online gaming so that it is additive to their business. Instead, what they have done (not everyone, but most) is bury their heads in the sand and pretend that spending enough money on DC lawyers and lobbyists can protect them from the marketplace and changes in technology. In fact even now if they embraced the technology and the right business strategy they had inherent advantages for online gaming that no other entity has. It is a shame that what they are doing is, by bad management, destroying the gaming business that was intended to help Indian Country

Tribes Fear Legal Online Poker will Destroy Casino Business | Casino Scam Report

Tribes Fear Online Poker Legalization will Destroy Casino Business

July 31, 2012 · Filed Under Casinos, Online Gambling News, Online Poker News, Poker

The revision of the ban on internet gambling is quite possibly a nightmare for many U.S. Indian tribes, who fear that it could destroy their $28 billion-a-year casino business.

Democratic Sen. Daniel Akaka of Hawaii and the chairman of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, revealed a draft of the Tribal Online Gaming Act of 2012, which would allow federally recognized tribes to apply for licenses to operate online poker. Akaka unveiled his proposal just as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, and Republican Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl made their plans to publish a legislation of their own that would legalize online poker in US, also tightening existing restrictions on other forms of Internet gambling.

“Gaming has been the single most effective form of economic development for Indian Country,” read a statement from Akaka released on Friday.

“Revenues from gaming provide essential services to tribal members including education, healthcare and housing. Indian gaming also provides jobs to members of the surrounding communities. In many counties across the nation tribes are the largest employer with nearly 75 percent of those jobs going to non-Indians.

“With these types of economic tools, comes great responsibility. Tribes are the first-line regulators for tribal gaming. We in Congress and especially on this Committee also have a responsibility to ensure that tribal views and priorities are part of any legislation that could impact tribal gaming.

“That is why I have developed a draft online gaming bill, the Tribal Online Gaming Act of 2012. This bill is intended to further the dialogue with tribes, my colleagues here in the Senate and other affected stakeholders.”

“We see legalization of Internet gambling as a direct threat to the economic growth in Indian country, and we do not support any proposals that legalize Internet gambling,” said Glen Gobin, an officer with the Tulalip Tribes in Washington state.

Reported by Maggie B.

Poker Stars Settles With DOJ and Will Take Over Full Tilt Brand Name

www.pokerstars.com/press/pdf/ps-settles-us-dispute-acquires-assets-of-ftp.pdf

Caesars-led group expected to get city casino license Tuesday - Baltimore Sun

Caesars-led group expected to get city casino license Tuesday - Baltimore Sun

Caesars-led group expected to get city casino license Tuesday
July 30, 2012|By Annie Linskey, The Baltimore Sun
After months of planning, a group led by gambling giant Caesars Entertainment Corp. is expected to get the green light Tuesday to build a 3,750 slot-machine casino ringed with restaurants a few blocks from M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore.

Maryland's slots location commission — which has been considering an application by CBAC Gaming since September — is scheduled to vote on the plan when it meets Tuesday. The Las Vegas-based gambling company has teamed up with a number of local partners, including Baltimore financier and philanthropist Eddie C. Brown.

Shuffle Master is Granted Interactive Gaming License in Nevada

Shuffle Master is Granted Interactive Gaming License in Nevada
PR Newswire
LAS VEGAS, July 30, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Shuffle Master, Inc. (NASDAQ Global Select Market: SHFL) ("Shuffle Master" or the "Company") has received a license by the Nevada Gaming Commission for interactive gaming.
(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20120304/AQ64113)
This license will allow Shuffle Master to be a business-to-business partner with land-based casino operators in order to provide online poker games in addition to play-for-fun versions of its world-renowned proprietary table games, such as Three Card Poker, Ultimate Texas Hold'em, and Fortune Pai Gow Poker.
"We are elated to have been granted one of the initial unrestricted interactive licenses in the United States," said Gavin Isaacs, Shuffle Master's Chief Executive Officer. "This license reinforces Shuffle Master's commitment to the online space and helps pave the way towards our goal of becoming a leading supplier of online and mobile casino gaming products. We believe the potential for online gaming is tremendous and we are very excited to have this opportunity to capitalize on the innovation, proprietary brands and experience we are known for in brick-and-mortar casinos and leverage them to service our customers' interactive needs."
Shuffle Master is developing its own state-of-the-art online content platform to offer its industry-leading proprietary table games for real-money gambling in legalized online markets and free-to-play on web sites, mobile devices and social networks.
About Shuffle Master, Inc.Shuffle Master, Inc. is a leading global gaming supplier committed to making gaming more fun for players and more profitable for operators through product innovation, and superior quality and service. The Company operates in legalized gaming markets across the globe and provides state-of-the-art, value-add products in five distinct categories: Utility products, which include automatic card shufflers and roulette chip sorters; Proprietary Table Games, which includes live games, side bets and progressives; Electronic Table Systems, which include various e-Table game platforms; Electronic Gaming Machines, which include video slot machines; and newly introduced iGaming, which features online versions of Shuffle Master's table games, social gaming, and mobile applications. The Company is included in the S&P Smallcap 600 Index. Information about the Company and its products can be found on the Internet at www.shufflemaster.com, or on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.
Forward Looking StatementsThis release contains forward-looking statements within the "safe harbor" provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. All statements included in this release other than statements that are purely historical are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements in this press release include, without limitation: (a) the Company's ability to enter into partnerships with land-based casino operators to provide online poker games in a timely manner, or at all; (b) the Company's belief that players on free-to-play social gaming sites will convert into customers at live casinos; (c) the Company's intent to convert its proprietary table games into proprietary online games and to receive all regulatory approvals required to provide such games on its systems; (d) the Company's belief in growth opportunities for online gaming and its plans to pursue opportunities in the online space; and (e) the Company's intention to invest in its own content platform and to consider all options for providing a business-to-business poker product. The Company's beliefs, expectations, forecasts, objectives, anticipations, intentions and strategies regarding the future, are not guarantees of future performance and are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from results contemplated by the forward-looking statements, including but not limited to: (a) the timing of the Company's entry into the online poker market; (b) the inability to predict the differences between the gaming habits of players on free-to-play social gaming sites and live casinos; (c) unanticipated technological, legal and regulatory issues that may arise with respect to the development of our proprietary online games; (d) the inability to predict the evolution, timing or potential of future online gaming opportunities and the relative risks and rewards of opportunities in the online space versus other opportunities; and (e) future possible changes in strategic direction to pursue initiatives that are more attractive than investing in our own content platform or pursuing the offer a business-to-business poker product. Additional information on risk factors that could potentially affect the Company's financial results may be found in documents filed by the Company with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including the Company's current reports on Form 8-K, quarterly reports on Form 10-Q and its latest annual report on Form 10-K, and are based on information available to the Company on the date hereof. The Company does not intend, and assumes no obligation, to update any forward-looking statements. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this press release.
SOURCE Shuffle Master, Inc.

'Sweepstakes' same as video poker | The Greenville News | GreenvilleOnline.com

'Sweepstakes' same as video poker | The Greenville News | GreenvilleOnline.com

Sweepstakes' same as video poker
3:40 PM, Jul 30, 2012 | Comments

If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it’s a duck. Increasingly, lawyers and shop owners in South Carolina are trying to turn that adage on its ears as they argue with police, in court and to the public that machines that play like video poker, pay like video poker and sound like video poker are, instead, legal promotional sweepstakes games.

The battle is taking place around the country, but is particularly vexing in South Carolina where a contentious battle was fought more than a decade ago to banish the video poker that bears such a striking resemblance to these new games. There are at least 1,000 of the so-called sweepstakes machines in the state, according to an estimate from the Attorney General’s Office that was reported recently in The Greenville News. The machines increasingly are coming out of back rooms of small establishments and into the front of convenience stores, and even are finding homes in “Internet sweepstakes” cafes in strip malls.

The machines are different from video poker, proponents say, because the people who use them are buying coupons for goods or services and are receiving free entries to play games. They can then win cash prizes playing the games. They say the games are legitimate promotional contests on the order of fast-food retailer McDonald’s well-known Monopoly contest.

However, these sweepstakes games have much more in common with video poker than they do with any contest you might find on a box of French fries. For starters, as Assistant Attorney General Adam Whitsett argued in magistrate court in Taylors, the prizes are replenishing jackpots, not one-time awards as with promotional sweepstakes games. In fact, the games have many of the characteristics of video poker that have been outlined by the state Supreme Court.

Whitsett recently argued, and rightly, in court, “Just calling a video poker machine a sweepstakes doesn’t make it any less of a video poker machine.”

The operators of the machines say the games are no different than other promotions, arguing they just provide a more fun way — playing a casino-style computer game, for instance — to determine if a sweepstakes entry is a winner. Customers can ask for an instant reveal that shows if they have won, according to reporting in The Greenville News and other newspapers around the country

Such a contention sounds like, pardon the pun, a shell game. It’s seems clear that customers are using Sweepstakes machines to gamble, not to buy Internet time, prepaid phone cards or other products, as the operators contend.

This is video poker, or the next closest thing to it.

Several communities, including Mauldin and Greer, have passed moratoriums against the machines until either the Supreme Court or the Legislature can definitively rule on whether the machines are legal.

Sen. Larry Martin is among lawmakers who are ready to turn off the machines. He recently told Greenville News reporter Paul Alongi that if the games are able to get a foothold they will be just as hard to eradicate as video poker was more than a decade ago.

South Carolina fought a long and contentious battle against video poker in the 1990s. The games became entrenched in the state because there were no rules governing their use and operation. People, many already living on the margins and lured by the prospect of big payouts, spent their much-needed income on the machines.

Video poker became a $3 billion a year industry in the state, and it made already difficult conditions worse for many people struggling to get by in an already poor state.

The temporary moratoriums are a good first step, and more communities should consider them. The Attorney General’s Office has taken the correct position that these games are the same as video poker; they serve as an outlet for people who are seeking high-stakes games of chance; and whether they’re called sweepstakes or video poker, they prey on people who can’t afford to take risks with the limited resources they have.

There are legitimate questions about whether the current gambling law bans machines or if operators are exploiting a loophole that needs to be closed. Some communities have allowed the machines, and some have allowed them but are charging higher permitting fees. There needs to be clarity on what the state law allows and, to be consistent with the law that banned video poker in South Carolina, these machines should likewise be banned.

A ruling that’s expected later this summer in Taylors by Magistrate Charles Garrett should provide some guidance for law enforcement. That case is over a sweepstakes machine that was seized from a convenience store, with the Attorney General’s Office arguing that the machine violates existing gambling law.

It probably does. But lawmakers clearly are in the best position to define exactly what Internet sweepstakes machines are, and they would do well to amend the state’s gambling laws to ban the machines. Doing it in the coming legislative session, before the games have a chance to become entrenched like video poker did, makes a lot of sense; and would best serve the people of South Carolina, many of whom can’t afford to throw money away on unregulated games of chance, no matter what they are called.

Mass Gov Patrick Signs Gaming Compact with Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe - Norton, MA Patch

Patrick Signs Gaming Compact with Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe - Norton, MA Patch

Patrick Signs Gaming Compact with Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe
Governor signs H.4261 “Resolve Relating To The Tribal-State Compact Between The Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe And The Commonwealth Of Massachusetts.”
July 30, 2012
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Governor Deval Patrick today joined legislators and members of the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe to sign H.4261 “Resolve Relating To The Tribal-State Compact Between The Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe And The Commonwealth Of Massachusetts.” Signing the Resolve is the final step in the process before the Compact can be submitted to the United States Department of the Interior for final approval. The Department of Interior will have 45 days to review and act on the Compact upon its joint submission.

“I thank the Legislature for approving the Compact with the Mashpee Wampanoags,” said Governor Patrick. “This is an important milestone and a good deal for both the Commonwealth and the Tribe. It respects the inherent rights of the Tribe while adhering to the principles set forth in the Expanded Gaming Act. Now we turn our attention to the federal government and final approval of the Compact and the Tribe's land in trust application."

The Compact, which includes significant concessions by the Commonwealth, establishes the relationship between the Tribe and the Commonwealth for the operation of a tribal casino in Taunton and sets out, in detail, a structure for the operation of such a casino. The Compact was executed on July 12, 2012 with the federally-recognized sovereign Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe and approved by the Legislature on July 26, 2012.

“I commend Governor Patrick for his negotiation with the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe on what is a very strong and fair compact,” said House Speaker Robert A. DeLeo. “While these terms are in the best interest of both the Commonwealth and the Tribe, this Compact represents another step forward for Massachusetts’ economy.”

"This is a great day in the history of the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe, the People of the First Light. We thank the Governor and the Legislature for the seriousness and cooperative spirit with which they approached this historic Compact," said Mashpee Wampanoag Chairman Cedric Cromwell. "This brings us another step closer to achieving economic self-sufficiency for the Mashpee Wampanoag people while providing much-needed jobs and revenue to Taunton, Southeastern Massachusetts and the Commonwealth as a whole."

“I would like to thank Governor Patrick’s office and the Legislature for working together with the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe to reach a completed Compact, “ said Taunton Mayor Thomas C. Hoye Jr. “This is a vital step in the process of bringing economic opportunity and employment potential to Taunton and Southeastern Massachusetts.”

The Commonwealth and the Mashpee Wampanoag negotiated the Compact over the course of several months. As a tribal government, the Mashpee Wampanoag is not subject to the recently passed Expanded Gaming Act. In exchange for several concessions from the state, the Compact establishes guidelines for a potential tribal casino that are consistent with the policies and principles outlined in the Expanded Gaming Act:

• A newly formed Tribal Gaming Commission (TGC) will be the primary regulator of the Facility’s gaming operations, subject to oversight and concurrent regulation by Massachusetts Gaming Commission (MGC) and National Indian Gaming Commission (NIGC).

• The Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA) authorizes a Tribe to conduct any gaming that is legally authorized in the state. Therefore, the Compact authorizes the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe to operate casino-style ("Class III") games allowed elsewhere in the Commonwealth, excluding live horse racing.

• The Compact agrees that the tribal facility will be non-smoking.

• The Compact includes a revenue allocation equal to 21.5 percent of gross gaming revenue from the Tribe to the Commonwealth. This allocation will address the impact costs of a new facility and is agreed to in consideration of concessions made by the Commonwealth.

• The Commonwealth will distribute any revenue allocation in a manner consistent with the Expanded Gaming Act, including dedicating funds for mitigation in communities affected by a casino.

• The Compact is for a 15-year term, with an automatic renewal for an additional 15-year term unless either party provides notice for modification or nonrenewal.

The Commonwealth agrees in the Compact to several concessions to the Tribe. First, the Commonwealth agreed to enter into the Compact before the Tribe’s federal land in trust process was completed, and will advocate for Compact approval by the Secretary of the Interior. The Administration will also actively support the Tribe’s pending land-in-trust applications for Taunton and Mashpee.

The Compact also advances the Commonwealth’s stated priority of regional economic development while protecting public safety and public health, ensuring strong regulatory oversight, supporting host and surrounding communities and providing quality employee benefits. The Compact includes the following additional provisions:

• The Commonwealth is granted jurisdiction and may prosecute under its laws and in its courts any violations of its gaming laws, other crimes against the facility's gaming operations or any other crimes occurring at the facility, just as it can for commercial facilities.

• The Tribe agrees to contribute to the Public Health Trust Fund.

• The Massachusetts Gaming Commission will have the right to inspect the facility, all gaming activity and all related records.

• The Tribe has agreed to an inter-governmental agreement with the host community to mitigate the impact of the facility’s construction.

• Pursuant to federal law, the Tribe must conduct an Environmental Impact Study (EIS) under NEPA, which includes a comprehensive analysis of the environmental, infrastructure, educational, cultural, social and economic impacts of the facility on the region.

• The Tribe must consent to jurisdiction of the agencies responsible for enforcing the state worker's compensation and unemployment insurance laws.

• The Tribe will provide employees with health care benefits that meet or exceed standards set forth in state health care laws.

The Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe has identified Taunton as a location for a gaming facility and reached an agreement with the City that was approved by voters in June. Before a facility can open at the location, the Tribe must have land placed in-trust with the United States Department of the Interior.

In November 2011, Governor Patrick signed the Expanded Gaming Act, which authorized the creation of three resort-style gaming facilities in Massachusetts, along with one slot facility. The Act allows for the gaming facilities to be built in three regions, Western Massachusetts, Greater Boston and Southeastern Massachusetts. The Act directed the Governor to negotiate a compact with any eligible, federally-recognized sovereign Tribe for a facility in the Southeastern region.

Related Topics: Casino, Deval Patrick, Wampanoag Tribe, and gaming compact

Poker refugees: Frustrated U.S. players welcomed in Costa Rica | | The Bulletin

Poker refugees: Frustrated U.S. players welcomed in Costa Rica | | The Bulletin

Poker refugees: Frustrated U.S. players welcomed in Costa Rica
By Tim Johnson / McClatchy Newspapers
Published: July 31. 2012 4:00AM PST
JACO BEACH, Costa Rica — From his oceanfront balcony, Tyler Forrester glanced out at the Pacific surf on the beach. Palm trees rustled in the breeze.

“Tough life I’m living," Forrester said, cackling at his own humor.

Forrester is 28. He has a degree in Slavic literature from Duke University, but his academic life is a thing of the past. Forrester now makes his living in a bedroom before two computer monitors playing online games of Texas Hold ’Em for hours on end. He’s a professional poker player, and a very successful one at that.

Forrester, who grew up in Dillon, Mont., is one of probably 150 American professional online-poker players who flooded Costa Rica after Black Friday: April 15, 2011, when U.S. federal prosecutors went after the founders of the three largest online-poker companies, slamming a lid on the surging business.

Many of the Americans — who are generally male and in their 20s — aren’t happy about leaving their U.S. homes. Unlike Forrester, they voice anger at being denied the chance to earn a living in their home country even while paying taxes there.

A few miles to the south in Playa Hermosa, Jimmy Doherty and Jake Wycklendt share a wooden house on pillars with their two pet pit bulls. Both men hail from towns near Milwaukee.

“I definitely resent the government," said Wycklendt, who’s 28, describing how infrequently he can visit his wife and two children, who live in Las Vegas. “I’m sick of it. This sucks," he said.

“Obviously, I’m really bitter at the fact that I have to be in another country," added Doherty, 25, who started amassing poker earnings while he was studying to become an engineer at the University of Wisconsin at Madison.

“Even playing 15 hours a week, I was making as much as an electrical engineer would at a full-time job," he said. “My parents were very grateful that they didn’t have to pay for my college anymore."

The American online poker players in Costa Rica are called “poker refugees," partly because that’s the name of a relocation service in the capital, San Jose, that helps U.S. players travel to the Central American nation, open bank accounts, find housing and start playing online quickly.

“These guys play anywhere from four to 24 games at one time," said Kristin Wilson, a former professional surfer from Florida who started the Poker Refugees relocation service.

Wilson’s company ensures that players who move to Costa Rica have nearly foolproof accommodations, to avoid the usual travails of less-developed countries.

“If the Internet or power goes out for 30 seconds, they can lose thousands of dollars. So they have to have two sources backed up to a battery. And they have a USB data card. So if the Internet goes out, they just switch over to the data card," she said.

Wilson said her clients “are not really gamblers. They are specialists at the craft of poker."

They master numbers, percentages and patterns in their opponents, exploiting weaknesses. Invariably, players are good at math, but not necessarily at reading the facial signs required for live table poker.

Brent Courson, 30, is good at both. He spends an average of three weeks each month playing online in Costa Rica, then a week either in his hometown of Grand Rapids, Mich., or traveling to tournaments. In nine years, he said, he’s made “a little under a few million" dollars.

“There’s probably 30 of us living in Jaco," he said in a Skype interview from Las Vegas, where he was playing in the World Series of Poker.

“My typical day is wake up about noon. The games have been running better at night, so I play till 4 or 5 in the morning," he said.

Courson moved to Jaco Beach four months ago and lives on the 12th floor of a high-rise. His balcony offers vistas of jungle and beach.

“The view I have in Costa Rica is a lot better than the one I have in Grand Rapids," he said. Still, he hopes that online poker will be regulated soon and back on its feet in the United States.

“I don’t envision, say, spending the next three years living in Costa Rica," he said. “I think that would be too isolated."

Many U.S. players settle in the capital, nestled amid mountain coffee-growing farms. San Jose has more urban amenities as well as direct flights to 15 U.S. cities.

Phil Murphy, a 49-year-old former pest-control agent from Seattle who switched careers to online poker, said he had strong impressions when he got off the plane recently: “Guards and gates everywhere. That’s the first thing that stuck out at me."

Murphy said he’d recommend Costa Rica to other frustrated U.S. players.

“It’s a good place if they want to play poker. The nightlife is crazy — muy bueno!" he said. “I live in like the Beverly Hills of Costa Rica. Maybe that’s why it’s all gated up."

Others said they faced culture shock on arrival.

“The roads, the infrastructure, everything was a complete shock," said Jason Webster, a 27-year-old pro from Darien, Ga. Without knowing Spanish, “you can’t communicate with people."

A former financial adviser, Webster said he now was “paying more money in taxes than my salary was at Merrill Lynch."

Webster is galled that he still feeds Uncle Sam while being forced to live abroad.

“I’m extremely angry. It’s ridiculous that the government says that we can’t do this in the land of the free," he said. Unlike lotteries, “poker’s a game of skill."

Players generally think that the U.S. casino industry is behind the shutdown of most online poker, concerned about how much revenue it draws off. They scoff at the legality and widespread nature of lotteries and racetrack gambling, and say it’s hypocritical not to act quickly to regulate online poker.

Forrester, the Duke grad, is more philosophical.

“I’m not angry about it. The system before Black Friday was unsustainable, in my opinion. The U.S. government wasn’t collecting taxes" on online poker sites, he said.

Monday, July 30, 2012

Gaming regulators find give and take is no laughing matter - News - ReviewJournal.com

Gaming regulators find give and take is no laughing matter

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Posted: Jul. 30, 2012 | 1:59 a.m.

There weren't a lot of yuks at the fourth and last scheduled meeting of the Governor's Gaming Policy Committee on Wednesday.

First, there was game designer Derek Webb tongue-lashing regulators on the committee for not having high enough standards in dealings with companies that have had problems in the past, specifically naming William Hill, Full Tilt and bwin.party.

"Nevada's licensing of William Hill is truly baffling," Webb said.

The committee members, including Gov. Brian Sandoval, Gaming Commission Chairman Pete Bernhard and Gaming Control Board Chairman Mark Lipparelli, sat stone-faced and opted not to respond directly to Webb's comments. But during a break, Bernhard said William Hill's June licensing was as a race and sports book operator in Nevada, not as an online gaming operator.

No company has received Nevada's blessing to do that, although it's likely to occur in the next three months, Lipparelli said.

Later, Bernhard and Lipparelli made it clear that the online gaming operators who are approved may not be paragons of perfection, just as the original founders of legalized gaming in Nevada mostly came from the world of illegal gambling.

"I wrestle with these issues," Bernhard said.

He doesn't want to set a hard-and-fast rule that any violation of U.S. law would prohibit a person or a company from becoming licensed in Nevada.

One conflict between committee members was more subtle, pitting regulators against legislators.

You had the regulators - Bernhard and Lipparelli - saying they needed as much flexibility as possible to deal with the fast-moving issues of online gambling and ever-evolving technology. Waiting for approval from the Legislature, which meets every other year for 120 days with an 18-month gap in between, ties their hands.

"We're capable of handling what's best for the state," Bernhard said.

But the legislative members - Assemblyman William Horne and Sen. Valerie Wiener - are reluctant to surrender legislative oversight. Horne is chairman of the Assembly Judiciary Committee, which will handle online gaming bills.

"This doesn't mean we have to go at breakneck speed," he said, urging the state to be "smart instead of fast."

Sandoval was the middleman. "Let's give regulators the flexibility to address issues and give legislators the opportunity to review."

The policy committee will remain in place while Sandoval would create yet another committee combining academia, regulators and industry members to work on making Nevada the "Intellectual Capital of Gaming," an idea pitched by UNLV's Don Snyder and Bo Bernhard.

Most of the other suggestions approved by the policy committee were more generic than specific, such as remove legislative barriers and strengthen regulatory standards. Yada. Yada.

Lipparelli is already working with unnamed other states to join together and begin online poker gaming even if the federal government doesn't pass a bill this year. He said the idea was to join other states in creating strict uniform regulations.

"The unsavory operators will seek out the weakest regulators," he said, referring to other states already working on their own online gaming laws.

While Sandoval and committee members raved about how productive the reactivation of the Gaming Policy Committee was, I still have doubts.

The gaming industry's big boys on the committee, MGM's Jim Murren and Boyd's Keith Smith, didn't even attend the last meeting. Murren was on the phone from Macau, but the connection broke early. Smith missed two of the four meetings. Aside from the governor, the regulators and legislators, only a few of the 11 asked questions or made comments.

Sandoval noticeably did not take a vote on the "give regulators flexibility" recommendation. Because legislators will be making that call in 2013, it could be contentious.

Surrendering power is rarely done willingly by Nevada legislators.

Jane Ann Morrison's column appears Monday, Thursday and Saturday. Email her at Jane@reviewjournal.com or call her at

(702) 383-0275. She also blogs at lvrj.com/blogs/Morrison

Report: China's Online Gaming Brings in $3.93 Billion, Mobile Gaming Not So Much

Report: China’s Gaming Biz Brings in $3.93 Billion, Mobile Gaming Not So Much

4 days ago by Steven Millward, in Gaming, Social Media, Web

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A brand-new report on China’s gaming industry shows that the whole sector – covering PC and mobile online games and also single-player games – shows that it has grown 18.5 percent in the past year, hitting sales revenues of 24.84 billion RMB (US$3.93 billion) in 2012 H1.

As for mobile gamers, the report counted up 78 million players of mobile online games up to the end of last month, which is up 70.9 percent year-on-year. That’s predicted [1] to rise to 98 million by the end of 2012. But the mobile online games sector in China saw relatively pitiful revenue, brining in just 126 million RMB ($19.94 million) of that marquee total. Little wonder that Chinese iOS developers are thought to earn, on average, a mere 3 cents per download.

First, here’s a summary in graph form:

China gaming market revenues in 2012 H1 graph 1

China gaming market revenues in 2012 H1 graph 3

The big bucks were brought in by MMO-style games and general PC-based (and browser-based) social gaming titles. All those raked in 23.55 billion RMB ($3.73 billion), up 16.9 percent year-on-year. Clearly, those titles – from sprawling games like Shanda’s (NASDAQ:GAME) World Zero to social network integrated games like The Sims on QZone – dominate gaming revenue in the country. In that sector, Tencent (HKG:0700) has long led the way, and runs the afore-mentioned QZone.

In good news for Chinese game developers – well, in PC-based titles – locally developed games accounted for 71.6 percent of the whole PC online games sector. Their revenue was 16.86 billion RMB (from the afore-mentioned 23.55 billion RMB slice), which was up 63 percent year-on-year at 2012 H1.

Monetizing mobile games clearly has a long way to go.

[UPDATE: Clarified in second paragraph that the 126 million RMB figure relates to the mobileonline games sector]

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