Looks like online poker will be illegal July 1 in Germany.

Germany is the biggest country now that the US is offline. And it looks to me they have to go offline once this law is goes into effect for all the sites.

It also does not seem like the schleswigholstein state will ever issues licenses for stars or other poker sites.

http://www.gamblingcompliance.com/re...erstate-treaty

I wonder how many players stars will lose.

What a cluster ****!

http://www.casinoscamreport.com/2012...-cancellation/

can't read the 1st article, but the last thing i read about this topic is, that schleswigholstein can't afford to cancel the already issued licenses. PLUS the EU Parliament vocalized some warning about the other plan (by the 15 other states), to create an isolated market.

edit: btw, i think the 'Russian' market should be bigger than the german ... but just a guess

So, is there a chance that the accounts will be frozen for german players and should we withdraw before July 01?

It has always been illegal for us to play online poker. This just means nothing will change
http://de.pokerstrategy.com/home/ is the biggest german community and it has been discussed there for ages already, online poker will just stay what it is now "a grey area" and nothing will change sadly by the looks of it.
Even if something would change soon hopefully, germany would never seperate their players and not allow them to play on .com

I'm curious how you know this. FWIW, Germany is 2+2's 3rd largest market after removing the US. Not saying it's necessarily the same for Stars, just wondering if you know this as fact or if it's an assumption.

Two reasons:

1. Germany is the biggestest and strongest eco in EU anyhow

2. Germans play the most hands acccording to pokertableratings http://www.pokertableratings.com/top-countries

Maybe change the thread topic someone -_- because its not true

oh damn, hopefully UK doesn't follow.

Actually I don't know a single player in Germany who is worried about this right now.

Whether this affects German players or not, governments need to realize that nationalized player pools are TERRIBLE for everyone. The player pools shrink as potential income goes down and (usually) rake goes up -> poker sites make less money -> government makes less money. I understand they want to keep the cash flowing within their own boundaries and make sure they collect all the taxes possible but if they were to have agreements with other countries in terms of regulation and oversight, they wouldn't have to screw us all at the same time. There's no reason why poker as an industry cannot be regulated on an international level by an organization that can represent all participating countries. This is especially true in the EU.

Sadly, governments rarely ever get anything right as they are excellent at ****ing things up, usually in the costliest and most time consuming way possible.

Oh, in that case.... !

cliffs from the first link, please. otherwise discussion gets challenging

So true. But I have absolutely no doubt that there will be a united EU player pool in the future. I just wonder how long it will take but its a 100% certainty

Me either but I don't know a single player in Germany.

blabla poker stays illegal in germany as it has been for ages

True, since germany's operating in a "grey area", still.
Nevertheless it will not stay this way in middle term, say next two or three years...

IMPORTANT NOTE: Last sentence is MY personal opinion. I have no sources who can backup this (cross referenced from "FTP-Thread").

every second player on stars seems to be from russia, so you're title is surely wrong...

Thanks Cola20 - so nothing new there, fine for me

So does it mean Germans wont be able to play Stars just like Spanish people now. Its obviously ****! I hope it wont happen here in UK! But they have to let people play whenever they like.It sucks for the people who lives from poker. All these news about online gabling in EU for the past time scares me a lot what will happen in the future. Theres loads of players out there whos first income is poker and they just take it away like that..

I feel like there are more russians than germans trust me I would know. I target them as often as I can which is all day er day

This. Russians everywhere.

but ive heard some german players are paying taxes on their online poker winnings, how is that possible if its officially illegal ??

or how do german pokerstars players cashout huge sums of $ ??

Poor Pius Heinz.

Its a grey area, its not illegal but its also not legal. Most dont play taxes, cashouts do work as everywhere.
Its also 100% certain that even if it gets legally regulated that the german players dont get seperated into their own market they can still play on .com. Whole threadtitle is totally misleading.