wow that is scary to read, can u elaborate on where i can find info of this?

jaja aussies are notorious whales, could prob count the aussie SS FR regs on my left hand

not as silly of a comment than people being pissed at the liberals for wanting to ban online poker and then in the same post saying they will vote for them.

vote for them and don't be pissed about the ban or be pissed about the ban and don't vote for them.

(not that any of the 2 deserves any votes IMO)

That legislation is full of loop holes. it's not illegal for you to play online but it's illegal for anyone within Australia to provide you with the means to play online. Which is why, as it is now, there is nothing illegal happening.

So what you are saying is that the current legislation will have to be amended to include overseas operaters such as Pokerstars? If this is the case this might take some time, maybe 1 year+. I hope you are right.

Where do you stand on all this? As one of the highest profile online players in Australia with presumably a lot to lose, I'm very interested in your thoughts on the issue.

Also I'm not sure what to take from that article. The author starts by stating that an Abbott victory won't really affect anything in the short-term, but concludes by saying online grinders probably need to move abroad if they wish to continue operating in the current online climate. It seems somewhat inconsistent.

i will miss 41/3 aussie players :/

https://www.facebook.com/groups/512924338783880/

A facebook group has been set up as a rallying point for the likely coming fight to keep online poker legal in Australia. Please join and invite your friends who play poker and/or support our cause. Once the group has grown to a large enough number to be taken seriously, i'll discuss putting together a pre-filled letter, tweets, facebook messages etc. with some of my friends who are poker players as well as a friend of mine who is relatively high up in the LNP and we can target key politicians (Andrew Wilkie, George Brandis, etc) with an organised effort.

For now I think it's best not to make a major issue out of something where the status quo is a desirable outcome but if we have a group with 10k+ members ready to lobby on our behalf if such a bill is proposed by those who oppose online poker in Australia, it's a good starting point so that we're ready to act when/if the time comes.

Yes, the louder you shout about this and if you don't get the LNP to change their position on this may push it further up on their agenda to action.

I have the opposite experience. Makes sense given Aus is one of the worlds richest in income/person.

Which is why i'm saying we don't want to start lobbying politicians right now especially before the election, but we do want to be in a position to lobby them immediately upon a bill we don't like being drafted, without wasting weeks of time organising ourselves.

My suggestion would be to have a contact of mine who plays online poker who ran the campaigns for three LNP members of parliament and works for one of them quietly lobby the future attorney general who he assures me has libertarian/government stay out of your personal business leanings, as it would be more likely to work from someone who is 'on his side' - having the attorney general fully understand the issues before such a bill was proposed could help shut it down quickly if he's educated on the matter by someone who is considered loyal to his party who has the ear of several MPs

Good tactic

From my own experience with the shadow A-G, even if a reasonable and sensible position (even by law) crosses his desk, it certainly doesn't mean that he will accept it. This doesn't mean you shouldn't put the poker side's case to him, just know that he isn't entirely predicable when it comes to what should be right and fair.

Sure, there's no knowing what he thinks, that's why he should hear it from people within his own party, then we can demonstrate grassroots support for the issue if the time comes.

That's what I am alluding to. IMO not much would cross his desk if it wasn't generated from within the party or an affiliate to it with the conservative cause in mind. And despite this, he can sometimes reach the opposite view to what he is being lobbied for.

If you guys had to give time periods/risk approximations for;


-How likely are we to actually see foreign poker site providers barred.
-If/When should we withdraw our money online to avoid getting it frozen.

What would they be?

It's a popular campaign promise because it has the potential to win votes without risk of losing any. How many people of Australia's population do you think will vote as a consequence of Abbots policy - I'd say about 0%. On the other hand saying he will enforce the IGA makes him look like he is doing something about gambling for the anti gambling lobby, but at the same time he isn't alienated himself from the huge on shore gambling industry. It's basically a freeroll for him.

The public perception concerning the legality of gambling in Australia is actually the opposite. Whilst it's been legislated against, advertising on tv shows or for events like the Aussie millions and a complete lack of enforcement has resulted in a situation where most would think its legal. Australia has a very big gambling culture, poker isn't that big over here because sports betting dominates imo

threw $50 on rudd to win get $50 freebet on sportsbet so it's effectively 25:1, COME ON RUDDY SAVE THE COUNTRY AND MAKE ME 1K

edit: and NBN, pls fiber.

We are not talking about starting to force sites to disallow Australians from playeing. Poker sites are already disallowed providing online play to Australians. The prohibition just hasn't been enforced. You can't assume that the commencement of enforcement in Autralia will be preceded by a warning. Black Friday in the US was an enforcement action. After it, AP, FTP and UB didn't let their players cash out. PS customers had no access to their cash for several days.

The Libs say they will investigate how to best enforce the existing ban on online poker. This might mean they give providers a chance to wind up voluntarily, or it might mean they just cut off access to the poker sites' URLs. In either case, players would get theit money back, as long as the sites actually have the money to give them. Alternatively, it might mean the authorities just start seizing funds without notice, as happend in the US, which reducies the chance that the sites will sitll have the money to give back.

Either way, the increased possibility of enforcement increases the risk that either your money will go away, or you will not have access to it for a while. When funds on deposit are put at increased risk, it is usually prudent to reduce the amount of those funds. The amount you should reduce your funds by depends on your tolerance for the type of risk to which you are exposed and the increase in amount of risk. We can be confident that PokerStars will pay players back as soon as they are allowed to do so. So, if your money is all on Stars, your amount of risk is the income you won't be making somewhere else during the time the money is tied up. If that is small relative to your usual winnings, maybe you don't need to withdraw anything. On any other site there is a chance you won't get your money back at all. If you have properly assessed the risk to date, you have limited the funds you leave on deposit in accordance with your best estimate of the ongoing risk. The Liberals' campaign rhetoric indicates an increase in the risk, so the prudent approach for most should be to reduce the amount of money on deposit.

Yeah, good luck with that argument. Stars, FTP, AP and UB were all physically located outside of the US too, but a US court still found it had jurisdiction over them because, by providing online poker to US residents, the companies were effectively in the US. An Australian court could make the same sort of determination.

Not saying it's not a utilitarian measure. However, its potential to be seen that way is quite a distance off which goes back to my 'popular' argument; in that, the position is not all that popular atm as the average citizen has no clue that the liberals think this way towards poker.

Why do you assume this?

Firstly, if the sites are told to shut up shop and there is no realistic possibility that online poker will be allowed to resume in this country (which would be reasonable given the legislation has been in place for 12 years and authorities would then have to be consistent in their enforcement once and if it really begins), then what is the incentive for the poker sites to refund the money? Sure, most sites might given the relocation factor for some players but I can also see that others might be a bit under-handed and hold on to it as there is no jurisdiction for them to be sued here in Australia for it.

Secondly, as for the authorities freezing the sites' funds and then a refunding to players will ensue in time, well given that the players were partaking in illegal activities by playing online poker, is it right for the authorities to assist players in getting their money back?

You're right. Silly me, I assumed that if the sites were honest enough to keep player deposits on hand, they'd also be honest enough to cash them out if unable to continue play. But you are correct to point out that there is a chance that a fully solvent online poker company might still be dishonest. So the situation is even riskier than I suggested.

The incentive to pay out is that Australia comprises a small portion of most sites' market, and the sites wouldn't want to risk their international reputation by leaving a small portion of its players in the lurch. If you are going to cheat players, you do it on a large scale, like FTP or Cereus, who stiffed all their players.

I disagree that it is a given that the players were partaking in illegal activities. AFAICT, there is nothing that makes playing on these sites illegal for Australians.

It ought not take assistance from the authorities for the sites to issue refunds, just an absence of active obstruction.

It's not illegal to play poker in australia, it's illegal to offer online poker to australians.

Same as it's not illegal for a young australian to smoke it's just illegal to sell them smokes.

Its all about the Senate people. politics is deal making the libs couldn't give a toss about online poker but Xenophon does.

Then the question becomes surely, if the funds were to be seized by the authorities, should they be refunded to the players who knew or ought to have known that the provision of online poker services by these sites are unlawful?