It's much worse than I thought. I stand firmly against it.

Some more things I don't like:
Yep, unlicensed sites serving the US will go away. Consider right now how the sites like Merge, Cake, Bovada and Revolution prohibit some states. What are they going to do when it becomes expressly criminal under US federal law? Forget about playing from any opt out state.

Like I said before, players will be liable to have their money and possessions seized, and will have to go to court to sue even if they are innocent (e.g., an unscrupulous operator pretends to be licensed).

It's nice that it spells out that opting in is by state legislative vote, but now just never passing a state bill is an automatic opt out. Much worse than requiring a yay/nay vote to take place one way or the other.

There will be no such thing as international player pools with licensed US sites.

So, it won't be IP geolocation. It will be "biometric or GPS" technologies. That means you will have some sort of hardware hooked up to your computer to verify your identity and location. Big Brother is watching!

I expected this. In practical terms, it means that offshore sites will lose their safe harbor claim that their acceptance of US players cannot be forbidden per under US law due to the WTO agreements. We knew that this was already the stance of the US govt, but under this bill it will become concrete. Foreign sites accepting US players will no longer have a loophole to stand on.

These are all Kyl consessions....

I'm leaning toward the opinion that we should concentrate more on state-by-state legislation and downgrade the push for federal legislation.

I think the federal gov't is just too agenda-driven to get something done where most of us will enjoy the end product.

Welcome to California crapy bill but get to play, looks like thumbs down. Nothing is passing until after the election and really nothing is passing this year off to 2013 and state by state

Do people advocating a state by state approach understand how long it will take? Do we even know if interstate pooling is going to be allowed?

I am also not sure why anyone would expect them to make laws making unlicensed sites illegal and not having strict consequences for breaking these laws. If you play on an illegal site your money won't be safe. Do you really think your money is safe on Merge or Lock now? Was your money safe on FTP or AP? This is our last chance at a federal bill, it seems short sighted to me to oppose it.

Consequences should be for the sites, not the players.

It's going to take at least 18 months for the feds to be ready and we would still have to wait for the states to sign up which may not happen concurrently.

If you play in an underground poker game that gets raided do they let you keep your money?

Guess it depends in the state. I know of one in Houston that was raided. Legitimate game but they still had to file with the court to get their money back. Took months.

In my case, in Alaska, the answer was no. Not only did the police take money from off the table ( and in the player bank), but once we were handcuffed, the police dipped into our pockets and seized all money. While handcuffed, I asked the police sergeant for a receipt of my money seized and he provided me with one but I never got a cent back. In order to have charges dropped and not proceed to court, we had to sign a paper allowing for forfeiture of our money. I'm not sure how it was handled for the one player, out of about 15 present who hired a lawyer and went to court.

I just have to say that the state by state scenario is awful for poker b/c it will involve other forms of gambling. Poker will be a fart in the wind compared to online casino gambling and lotteries. The future for poker is certainly brighter at a federal level with this bill than state to state. That said, criminalizing players is an extreme line I cannot support.

POWERBALL, POWERBALL, POWERBALL

There was no new federal bill needed. There now IS a federal bill authorizing multistate compacts like Powerball for lotteries.

FWIW, B&M Casinos can and do pool slot prizes among compacting States operators now. (Del, WV, RI)

There is NO federal law that prohibits pooling of poker players between State who license operators. unless this law passes of course.

This clusterf**k of a federal bill is what you should expect from the Hill.

Hey, almost EVERY State has a lottery, yet there seems to be unanimous revulsion at the possibility that THAT route may be available to a national poker market with player pooling.

(FWIW, I prefer a casino route of some mesh of lottery/casino pooling, on a State by State basis. NOT because it is better than a theoretical federal bill*, just better than any likely federal bill.

*Too bad a federal bill will not just say ..... "States go ahead and license, then compact for player pools among yourselves.")

So, How long could it take before a State-by-State approach brought online poker to most of the players in the US ?

It is achievable in 3 years if the Feds back off; with international pooling within 1 year and at least 2 big States involved within 2 years.

Also, understand that WITH this bill you are only getting a State-by-State process anyway, just delayed by 18 months and dictated by a federal agency.

Mark my words, see who gets appointed to head/advise this new federal agency if it comes to pass. In certain respects, this is a federal jobs bill.

can someone start a daily action plan to OPPOSE this ****ty bill so we can just move on with the state by state patchwork

Lets see what the PPA has to say first. If this looks like the final version, or we cant guarantee its the final version wont have this, its easy enough to piggyback the existing action plan and oppose the bill. Its not gospel criminalization is in there.

It's been years now and you guys will still never learn. Same people that wanted to oppose the 2010 bill cause of a black out period? To think the status quo perpetuating is the alternative is really naive.

Dont criminalize/punish players and I agree.

Otherwise, go state-by-state.

Just my opinion, feel free to disagree, but I'm definitely calling my reps/Senators and telling them I oppose the bill if this is what the final bill looks like. If it means no legislation for ten years, so be it. Criminalizing players is a line I wont cross.

The PPA has gotten this right in the past. Im confident they will do so again and will oppose a bill with player penalties.

5. To deter U.S. players from patronizing illegal sites, the bill makes explicit that any property involved in or traceable to a gambling transaction in violation of the new act (including winnings) is subject to forfeiture. That same provision also clarifies existing forfeiture laws by providing that all operator proceeds from such unlawful Internet gambling activity similarly are subject to forfeiture.

I'd quote some posts in the Reid 2010 lame duck push thread that hold your same sentiment, and then quote post-BF posts raging against those people, but the thread got locked due to too many people pissed we didn't band together behind an imperfect federal bill when we had the chance.

^^^^ to the above ... We need to fight crimalization site not players, blackout is really bad unless we know regs complete, it can take years to approve regs. Plus years for states to pass opt in.

As a ca player kind of doubt we opt in, which really hurts us liquity. Lots of really bad things in this draft. 16 percent of revenue is no picnic on the rake front.

Where does it criminalize players? As in they can be charged with crimes and thrown in jail?! It's just an asset forfeiture provision almost certainly directed at balances if a site is seized. They learned their lessons from neteller ftp and stars.

Calling this "criminalization of players" is grossly inaccurate fear mongering.

Fair enough. If you have mod privileges mod my title in the PPA thread to player penalties, words matter, I'll refer to them as player penalties until we have more detail.

PX seems to think it will criminalize players.

EDIT: Player penalties remain the line I wont cross, whether its "criminalizing" players or not. Obviously, each player should make their own choice on the acceptable tradeoffs when deciding whether to support/oppose legislation.

It's not all the same people. I, for one, have been a staunch supporter of the federal route, but I now oppose this new bill. Besides all the bad stuff in this bill for players, the whole landscape has changed due to the DOJ opinion letter and the skill vs. chance court decision. It is silly to not re-evaluate now from a fresh perspective.

1. Legally there is no such thing as asset forfeiture without a commensurate criminal act.

2. While the only penalty for the criminal act may be asset forfeiture, not jail time, the forfeiture itself can go far beyond just player account balances. From the actual bill summary text:

And the DOJ could round up the pcs of all demonoid users too but they won't. I think it's very obvious why that provision is in there. It's not so the DOJ can waste time breaking down doors to seize your Dell. It even specifically notes a hint.

When they seize an illegal site under the new law they don't want to have to constantly act as DOJ, payment processor.

I have been a big supporter of the DAP, but now I'm not sure where I stand. I will have to take some time to think about this.

- Well, I don’t plan on playing on an unlicensed site.

I'm torn. I still think a federal solution is needed, but this looks like a step back from where we are now.