East Meets West For Online Poker?
Added: Nov. 18, 2013
In a brand new twist on the growing saga on legalizing online gambling in the United States a new shot has been figuratively fired across the bow. As you may have noticed, so far there are but a handful of states in the U.S. that have embraced some form of online gambling. Nevertheless, it looks like even the very few states involved are already scrambling to get a foothold in the online gambling market.
Here is what is going on. In a recent announcement, it was revealed that the Governors of Delaware and Nevada have been meeting behind closed doors. Apparently the two governors are discussing a possible team up for their online gambling customers. Under one such scenario, online poker players in Delaware would be allowed to directly play against online poker players in Nevada.
As you may recall, the way that online gambling works right now in the United States is only at the state level. There are no federal laws that specifically allow online casinos or any form of online gambling for that matter. At the same time, there are 37 states that allow some form of online gambling, if the games require a least a bit of skill. At the federal level, it is prohibited for banks to handle online gambling transactions and for websites to take sports bets online.
All of that confusion aside, the real issue is what the closed door meetings of these governors means for the online gambling industry in the United States. Spokespersons associated with the governor’s offices report that one concern is that of smaller states such as Delaware actually having such a small possible player pool that there would not be sufficient liquidity needed by the operators of online gambling sites.
Looked at that way, then it makes sense for the Governor of Delaware to head over to Nevada and ask for some support. It goes without saying that the player pool in Nevada is much larger than it ever could be in Delaware.
But a deeper more profound question is this: is this the beginning of the end for the confusing mish mash of laws and regulations in the United States for online gambling? Once online poker players from one state can directly compete against online poker players from a different state, then the absurdity of the current situation is glaringly obvious. One can only hope this is truly the beginning of the end and a common sense approach is chosen.
As far as online casino gambling goes it's fate is still yet to be determined in the United States. Although New Jersey will be the first to license and regulate the abilityf or licensed online casinos to operate we have yet to see what the rest of the United States will do.