Poker Players Alliance Party for Its Leaders… Members Excluded

Gambling911.com published an article Wednesday suggesting how great it would be for the million plus Poker Players Alliance to host a Washington, D.C. party for all its members in an effort to drum up support for online poker and provide much needed networking opportunities.   Such an event would also help to stimulate the ecomony even if a mere 5 percent of members were to show up.

But it seems the PPA beat us to the punch...literally. 

Unfortunately, the "by invite only" party the Poker Players Alliance held during the inauguration in D.C. last month didn't attract a whole lot of attention and certainly did not encourage members of the PPA to attend.

The event was to "honor the new poker player in chief", making reference to news that President Obama was himself a poker player.  PPA President, John Pappas, and a few of his cronies met on Inauguration Day at a well-known local cigar bar. The fine print of the invitation, sent to some lawmakers, notes that the event "conforms with the congressional ethics committee rules."

But sources close to Gambling911.com advised that "not a whole lot of lawmakers were in attendance".

Certainly the poker players who are responsible for the PPA's very existence weren't in attendance. 

....Gambling911.com will be traveling to Costa Rica in the coming weeks to discuss progress related to the Interactive Media Entertainment & Gaming Association, among other things.

iMEGA.org claimed its first full fledged victory for i-Gaming after winning an Appeal in a Kentucky Court preventing the seizure of 141 online gambling domain names last month.

"It's a good start," said one operator.  "There is plenty more work to be done on this front."

While a number of Internet gambling companies in Costa Rica - the world's largest center for such companies - have come on board the iMEGA bandwagon, others remain resistant.

Some reference ineffectiveness of other so-called "trade organization" and attorney representation, "trust and comfort" issues and some flat out would prefer to leave the industry "as is".

Others balked at the notion that iMEGA squandered its members money away at the Ogilvy PR firm during its first few months of existence without much output generated. 

"We do want our ad partners to be more supportive of their (iMEGA's) efforts," said one sportsbook operator.

All of iMEGA's members operate under "privacy rules" established as a result of the iMEGA obtaining legal "standing" as a trade organization last year.

But the new theme these days is the "A" word - "Accountability".  Those hard nosed embedded gaming operators, many of whom are on the sports betting side, have the patience of a nat.  Winning in Kentucky was like hooking up with the best new Colombian talent at the Hotel Del Rey (long time industry observers know exactly what we are talking about here) even though you may have had to pay her more, she cooks breakfast in the morning, then she's gone until April.

.....There is strong progress on the Antigua front.  That Caribbean nation has been embroiled in a dispute with the United States for a few years regarding online gambling - Antigua's largest industry after tourism.  The World Trade Organization found in Antigua's favor that there was "protectionism" on the part of the United States. 

Gambling911.com had an opportunity to sit down with Antigua's Directorate of Internet Gambling to discuss these issues.  We will have that interview shortly but bottom line is that confidence is growing with the new U.S. administration. 

Christopher Costigan, Gambling911.com Publisher