Poker and the law: a resource guide for staying informed

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Online poker (and online gambling in general) is currently existing at what will probably be remembered as a pretty transformative point. Still a very young industry, online poker is currently facing a variety of legislative challenges that will eventually have an impact, one way or another, on its eventual evolution. While some players are content to focus the majority of their poker attention at the tables, others might be more curious about the broader context online poker operates in. If you’re one of those people, we’ve prepared a quick and dirty guide to a handful of quality sources and tools online that will help you stay current and provide you with insight and analysis regarding the legal, political and social issues surrounding online poker that you might not get otherwise.

Poker forums can be a bit of a mixed bag when it comes to talking law and politics, but there are far worse places to get information and analysis about legislative happenings than the 2+2 Legislation forum and the Poker Player’s Alliance forums. There’s also the newer entry of the Pocket Fives Legislation forums, which has more direct cooperation with the PPA than 2+2 does.

Gaming news sites are similarly split between topical and trash, but there are a few worth adding to your bookmark list. Unsurprisingly, we’ll start our list with a shout out to the home team – PTP news does a pretty good job of cherry-picking the stories that are relevant to poker players. We’re also big fans of the coverage over at online-casinos.com, where they rarely miss a headline that’s legislatively focused. Industry rag IGamingBusiness isn’t solely (or even primarily) focused on legislation, but will include the headlines that matter, plus you’ll gain a lot of insight on the broader world of the online gaming industry from regular reading.

Lobbying groups are quality, albeit slanted, sources for information, especially if you’re looking for a deeper set of resources on a particular case or piece of legislation. Two of the current heavies: the Poker Players Alliance and the Interactive Media Entertainment & Gaming Association (iMEGA). The PPA is a bit more focused on legislative efforts, while iMEGA is currently pursuing a judicial remedy for the UIGEA. Their webpages are useful tools for keeping up with each organization’s efforts and for accessing additional relevant resources.

A handful of lawyers maintain websites that offer some resources for online gaming and the law; two of the more often cited are I Nelson Rose’s and Chuck Humphrey’s, although neither seems to be updated on a regular basis.

Books and journals are handy if you’re interested in diving a bit more into the minutia of online gaming law and you have a few bucks (and hours) to spare. Check out Gaming Law Review or I Nelson Rose’s book Internet Gaming Law. If you have a friend who’s a lawyer or a law student, they can probably be convinced to do a publication search for you in Westlaw which will turn up hundreds of hours of reading material.

Finally, a few well-phrased Google News Alerts can ensure that you’ll never be more than a day behind of almost all relevant developments in the world of online gaming legislation.

Hopefully you’ll find something useful in the above set of resources, and please feel free to contact us with any suggestions for possible additions to the list.

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