Australian Casino and Poker News (March 22, 2010)
It's been a huge 24 hours in the Australian casino, employment, poker, media and social and community entrepreneur sectors.
Billionaire Inc Connection...
James Packer's Burswood Casino aka Burswood Entertainment Complex, based in Perth, Western Australia, is on a roll. Poker and online poker continue to do massive numbers, and Crown Limited (Crown Casino and Burswood Casino etc al), PartyGaming's PartyPoker, Media Man and Gambling911 are in the thick of the action.
Must be magic that Packer and Perth mining magnate, Andrew "Twiggy" Forrest are weaving. "Twiggy" have brought his infectious can-do attitude, work ethic and Aussie humour in spades to Sydney. Yep, the Billionaire, understood to now be Australia's Richest Man, still has the common touch.
Packer and Forrest were in Sydney last night, at the Overseas Passenger Terminal, joined by 500 power players in the Australian business, political and entertainment arena to officially welcome in GenerationOne. For the record, Media Man had to report from the sidelines as the event was jam packed, but did have the pleasure to speaking to some execs very close to the powers that be...and they were pleased to hear of our assistance to groups such as Githabul people, Yuggera tribe, Deadly Awards, Friends of Malabar Headland and Virgin Unite, and mentioning that we owned shares in Crown Casino didn't seem to hurt the cause!
Movie stars Cate Blanchett and Russell Crowe attended last night, where movers and shakers exchanged ideas (plus gossip) and saw their palms projected onto the sails of the Opera House in a show of support. Us Aussies are likely giving the Las Vegas Strip and Atlantic City a few free ideas!
The story that Media Man and Gambling911 collaborated on and broke worldwide, has dominated Google and Google News for the past 24 hours or so, and shows no sign on slowing down for the weekend... a favorite time for punters, both in Australia and around the globe.
The GenerationOne movement has also triggered us to open up negotiations with the state and federal government to see how we here at Media Man may qualify to take on a couple of suitable indigenous peoples as contract staff to assist our business endeavors... could be for photography, video, graphic arts or internet portal development.
Australia New Zealand Poker Tour
The event is the toast of the town in Perth, ok, that may be talking it up a notch, but you get the idea.
Burswood Casino, PokerStars and the online poker community, not to mention bars, restaurants, taxis and limousines are sure doing well out of it. All the action also means that Burswood will need to keep staff numbers high, which is good news for GenerationOne, but fortunately those infamous plastic handcuffs have yet been witnessed on site.
Insiders advise over 60 players got through day 1b at the PokerStars ANZPT Perth Main Event. Mr Yu-chang Cheng leads as the only player from the flight with over 100,000 in chips.
Many of Australia's best poker players attended with PokerStars pros Tony Hachem, Eric Assadourian and Grant Levy all surviving with pretty average chips.
Joel "Strong Play" Dodds who continues his roll with ANZPT to sit in third chip position with 97,600 and APPT Sydney champion Aaron Benton returned strongly from a short stack to concluded with 74,900 chips. ANZPT Adelaide champ Rennie Carnevale gets to Day 2 with 47,550.
The ANZPT Perth Main Event attracted 222 players, beating the previous record for a Perth event - 142 players. The top prize is $132,750.
Here's the numbers as of time to publication
Top ten chip counts:
Nik Lackovic - 104,625
Yu-chang Cheng - 101,425
Joel Dodds - 97,600
Dominic Sinagra - 93,350
Aaron Wilson - 90,950
Kelvin Beattie - 90,125
Christopher Evans - 87,600
Tu Le - 84,425
Jimmy Wong - 77,925
Aaron Benton - 74,900
So punters, be casino, poker or community assistance being your passion or poison, as you can see its been a massive period for casino, poker and entertainment news down under.
Wait, there's more!
GenerationOne - The Numbers Build
In the next report we expect to be able to give more updates on the amount of jobs GenerationOne is generating. New South Wales premier Kristina Keneally, already has 2229 jobs earmarked for indigenous people, Packer has approx 100, "Twiggy" with multiple thousands, and Media Man has put aside 2 contract jobs for locals. It's more paperwork, but the end result is worth the effort.
Mr Packer has employed 60 indigenous workers and is looking for 50 more. Like many, he had always wanted to do more in the area and Mr Forrest had shown him how.
"It's not about rich people can do more, or poor people should get off their backsides, or government should get out there ... It's about all Australians", Mr Forrest said.
"People tell me, 'This is just another campaign.' I say show me the 20,000 (promised jobs so far) in any other campaign."
Readers, have fun playing your games of preference, and be assured that we will continue to support the readership and community who support us.
Let's hear it again for the Australian - American connection... Aussie Aussie Aussie Oi Oi Oi Aussie Aussie Aussie USA USA Aussie Oi Aussie Oi USA Oi Oi Oi!
* Greg Tingle is a special contributor for Gambling911
* The writer owns shares in Crown Limitedmarily a media, publicity and internet portal development company, operating in over a bakers dozen vertical markets
