Poker site (under light of current domain seizures by us govt.)

[Herodes]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1377470/FBI-shut-largest-poker-sites-probe-end-online-gambling.html

Perhaps it is time for someone to make a poker site that accepts bitcoins? I haven't checked the "accepting bitcoin sites"-list for poker sites, but obviously the largest obstacle is not technical, but rather that promotion. To get big liquidity, you need to promote the site agressively.

The reason the FBI has shut down the sites is because the sites in question is circumventing the laws made by the US, and disguising payments that go through banks a something else, and thus (still according to us federal law) comitting a crime.

If the poker players funded their accounts with bitcoins, and withdrew their winnings in bitcoins, then the whole case against payment processors would be impossible.

So let's say that pokerstars, ultimate poker and fulltiltpoker moved offshore, changed their domains into something that the us govt. can't easily reach (is that at all possible), and then let the players fund their accounts with bitcoin, would not that remove the need to bribe bank employees and payment processors to disguise poker transactions as something else?

Or would the case be that a poker site would be in trouble anyway if they accepted cash from us citizens?

What if I lived in Chicago, then I transferred 2000 USD to my friend in the UK. He put this into a poker site for me, and I played through an encrypted remote terminal windows session. How could anyone prove that I was doing something illegall?

That is of course too much hassle for the ordinary player, but it is really disturbing to have sites that is owned by companies in other countries shut down just because the US does not approve of their business.

So, in theory if the US have reasons to believe that your business breaks one or more of US laws, they could essentially shut down your business and leaving all your customers in the dark, and even if you were cleared of all charges later on, your reputation would be irreversible damaged.

And what about all the customers that hold money in their player accounts, customers from other countries that are no liable to US laws. They become victims of the domain seizure. Thus the US govt are creating victims.

I don't hold money in any online poker site that's been shut down, and I am not affiliated with the gambling industry, but I think that people should be able to decided for themselves where and what they want to use their money on. There should be restrictions in place to ensure responsible gambling, and there should be regulations and checks on the gambling industry, but why make it all illegal, just think of all the taxes the government could get if they made online gambling legal.

I really do not get how the US govt. thinks.

And to keep the discussion somehow bitcoin related: Would using bitcoin for funding gambling online be the solution?

More discussion: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2451302

[error]

Online gaming would definitely be a "killer app" for Bitcoin. I would not be terribly surprised, if it takes off, to see an even more rapid rise in the exchange rate.

As for the domain name, it can be none of .com, .org, .net, .info or .us.

As for how the US government thinks, it doesn't think. It's a bunch of power-hungry and sometimes morally uptight jerks who think they have the power to control your life. In the case of Preet Bharara (and many others) that even extends far outside the borders of the US to anywhere on the planet, if they can get away with it.

[EPiSKiNG]

betco.in ftw.

[zer0]

or alternatively create an exchanger that converts bitcoins to load gambling accounts. make sure you are 100% anonymous and don't live in the excited states of america

example, most gambling sites accept Ukash which is why you can't buy Ukash in the states. trade BTC for Ukash and vice versa, so players can cash out.

i'll joint venture with somebody if they want to do this, i know dozens of ukash and psc exchangers

[malditonuke]

"excited states of america"

lol

[FreeMoney]

or alternatively create an exchanger that converts bitcoins to load gambling accounts. make sure you are 100% anonymous and don't live in the excited states of america

example, most gambling sites accept Ukash which is why you can't buy Ukash in the states. trade BTC for Ukash and vice versa, so players can cash out.

i'll joint venture with somebody if they want to do this, i know dozens of ukash and psc exchangers

This would have been good 2 days ago, but really we just need a straight bitcoin site or 5.

But seriously someone show me something with potential and I'll pay and help the bit I can (consult I guess) for an equity share.

[Herodes]

betco.in ftw.

I found that site using google, unfortunately I cannot load it at the moment.

>ping betco.in
Ping request could not find host betco.in. Please check the name and try again.

Also I tried looking up it's ip with some online tools with no luck. I may try again later to check it out.

Yes, a bitcoin to EUR or a bitcoin to USD gateway as a "payment bridge" for various poker rooms could be an idea. Either this service would need to take the risk doing the conversions and have some solid capital to start with, or it could be implemented with mtgox.com API if possible, and thus the risk for the site operator would be less. However, if someone powerful really wanted to take down this centralized service, they could, and then we would be back to square one. What if the pokersites started to accept bitcoins. To reduce their risk, they could make bitcoin only tournaments, or bitcoin sngs and bitcoin (cash) tables and then pay the winners in bitcoins. So bitcoins would flow into the poker site(s), the site would take a small sum of this (fees), and the players who profit would be paid in bitcoins. I am sure a dedicated developer could hack this together for a poker site in a few weeks or less.

[kalfu]

As for how the US government thinks, it doesn't think. It's a bunch of power-hungry and sometimes morally uptight jerks who think they have the power to control your life. In the case of Preet Bharara (and many others) that even extends far outside the borders of the US to anywhere on the planet, if they can get away with it.

Too true.  The US Federal government hasn't been "of the people, by the people, for the people" for quite a long time now.  It treats its citizens like cattle, forces citizenship on anyone born in it (all governments do this of course), and then makes sure it punishes you if you try to leave the country, even if you completely renounce your citizenship.  The way I see it, if you were a child when you became a citizen, then that's not legally binding   But of course all the branches of the US federal government are grossly dysfunctional. 

Anyway, I digress very easily when the subject of government (US or any other) comes up.  I was wondering why you said you need to avoid certain TLDs (like .com, .net, etc).

[foo]

http://poker.bitcoinvegas.com/ exists, but seems kind of dead?

[Cryptoman]

I think the best way to go about this is for the poker site owner/administrator to remain fully anonymous.  We already have Bitcoin merchants who will register domains and host sites taking Bitcoin as payment.  Make sure that the site is in a jurisdiction not easily interfered with by the US government, and also make sure that the site databases are continually backed up to multiple other locations.  The wagering should be done directly in Bitcoin, with deposits and withdrawals directly to/from the user's local wallet.  Then the only real issue is how to buy Bitcoins with national currency.  I think this need is ideally met by having thousands of local exchangers.  In fact, anyone who holds Bitcoins should offer to do exchanges.  Then everything is decentralized and there is nobody to shut down.

[kalfu]

I think the best way to go about this is for the poker site owner/administrator to remain fully anonymous.  We already have Bitcoin merchants who will register domains and host sites taking Bitcoin as payment.  Make sure that the site is in a jurisdiction not easily interfered with by the US government, and also make sure that the site databases are continually backed up to multiple other locations.  The wagering should be done directly in Bitcoin, with deposits and withdrawals directly to/from the user's local wallet.  Then the only real issue is how to buy Bitcoins with national currency.  I think this need is ideally met by having thousands of local exchangers.  In fact, anyone who holds Bitcoins should offer to do exchanges.  Then everything is decentralized and there is nobody to shut down.

Great post.  That actually answers some questions I was going to do research into.  I hadn't seen any bitcoin hosting/domain registration.  It's still irritating to think that governments should have the ability to block or otherwise interfere with a bitcoin poker room/casino, since it's not a recognised legal currency.  If they can do that, then they should probably start trying to tax that World of Warcraft money or whatever they have.  Shame on oppressive governments.

[luv2drnkbr]

Please please talk to people in these threads:

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/45/software/idea-relating-new-regulation-decentralized-poker-software-1021113/

https://www.bitcoin.org/smf/index.php?topic=5966.0

I am trying to generate interest for just such an idea, and need to get people talking about it to help get it off the ground.  Especially in the wake of last Friday, peer to peer Bitcoin based poker would be the savior and holy grail of online poker.

[kalfu]

Could you host a play money poker site in the US, and then have a special "donate" feature which gives you a slightly different type of play money?   I really do believe the us government has no right to take down a site which uses money which is not recognised as legal tender.  Obviously, having the lawful right usually has nothing to with what the us government does...  I guess it's one of those situations where you won't know unless/until it happens...