Ace in the hole, one up his sleeve
Free Framingham-based poker site finds way around fed. gambling law
A Clark University education can put graduates in a position to succeed in any number of fields, like how to get around the federal Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act.
It turns out, that's done by establishing an online poker site that falls under sweepstakes and lottery law instead of gambling regulation.
Since the passage of the act, and the subsequent retreat of internet poker sites like PartyPoker.net and Poker Stars from the U.S., a Framingham company called the National League of Poker has found a way to give gamblers, err, gamers, their poker fix without sending their money to the Caribbean.
In fact, National League doesn't want its poker players' money at all.
Getting a seat at the table
National League's founder Michael Clebnik - the aforementioned Clark grad - wasn't too much of a poker player before he started NLOP. But he was a computer guy.
"We were looking for expansion, and we were starting to play online poker," Clebnik said. "There was just this huge growth going on" in online poker, just as the game itself was gaining wider public attention and being televised.
But there was a problem. "All of them were offshore sites," exempt from U.S. gambling regulations, and players were losing real money playing poker on the internet.
"We felt there was a different way to offer poker to U.S. markets, and there was a lot of legislative buzz going on" about cracking down on offshore internet gambling sites.
So Clebnik and the folks at NLOP spent 16 months developing the National League style.
It's just prize money
Also, National League doesn't require players to put money down to play a game of poker. The site is supported by advertising and sponsors, and since it launched last June, it has gained 142,000 registered users, Clebnik said.
National League probably couldn't get away with requiring players to ante up for its games, anyway. Last October, the U.S. Congress passed the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act as part of a port security bill.
Gambling has three characteristics: Consideration, chance and prize. What National League did was remove the consideration. "Nobody has to pay anything," Clebnik said. "We fall under sweepstakes and lottery law, and that's a very different kind of legislation."
Instead of dollars, National League uses points to get players into games. "That's how we avoid the UIGEA," Clebnik said. And it gives away $25,000 in prize money every month.
The site really got some attention around the time of the World Series of Poker, which is played in June and July in Las Vegas.
National League announced that it had landed a national title sponsor, the Miller Brewing Co.'s Milwaukee's Best beer, and that sponsor had its most successful promotion ever when it, and National League gave away a seat at the World Series of Poker.
Clebnik knows National League won't be the only game in town for long.
"I definitely assume there's an industry being created here. We're definitely the first, but we believe there will be some competition that comes out."
WBJ Web Partners
Most Recent
Most Recent
0 Comments