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There have been talks about the launch of online poker in Pennsylvania for a long time now. In fact, ever since online gambling regulation came into being in the state, Pennsylvania poker lovers had been keenly looking forward to play their favourite card game on the Internet from within the state. But no official commitment has been made in this regard as yet. Now everyone is left wondering if at all online poker will be available in the state or not. The Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board (PGCB) has preferred to stay mum on this matter and its spokesperson hasn’t been very clear about the subject in the press interviews.
A section of people believe that the government might be apprehensive about issues related to problem gambling, and hence might be holding things back for now. Well, if that really is a concern, Pennsylvania could take a leaf out of the UK model. For instance, UK has a program known as Gamstop that enables players to voluntarily exclude themselves from online casinos for a specific time period. Although you can always find online casinos not registered with Gamstop, for instance, here’s the Casinomir’s Gamstop-list, the program does work as an effective tool to help players abstain from any kind of gambling.
No commitment from PGCB yet
The poker fans in Pennsylvania have been pretty vocal about their enthusiasm for poker launch in the state and have been tweeting about it on a regular basis. PGCB on the other hand has been busy answering questions about the timelines. However, as mentioned earlier, there spokesperson has only been talking about how good a poker market Pennsylvania is and that there is plenty of excitement building up around the launch right now.
No visible progress either
July 15 was the date when online casinos had to go live in the Pennsylvania State, but eventually 3 got launched. And to everyone’s dismay, none of those platforms offered online poker. They only provide a limited number of casino games. It’s also worth noting that 3 of the world’s biggest poker entities have joined hands with 3 reputed casinos from Pennsylvania recently.
The state’s decision to go slow with the launch of online poker might also be because of the latest online gambling revenue figures of the New Jersey State, for the month of August. Of the $ 60.3 million revenue generated by online gambling in New Jersey, online poker contributed only $ 1.7 million.
Michael ‘Gags30’ Gagliano, a pro level poker player, had tweeted on August 27 about Pokerstars launching its beta testing platform in the state, however, PGCB didn’t take much time in shooting down that rumour and called it negative information, leaving a great multitude of poker fans disappointed. Thereafter, people started looking forward to September 2019, but nothing happened. Many are now hoping that October might be the month when Pennsylvania will finally get some legal online poker action.
