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Copyright 2005 Knight Ridder/Tribune
Business News
Copyright 2005 The Washington Times
The Washington Times
January 21, 2005, Friday
HEADLINE: Homebound locals ante
up for inaugural
BYLINE: By Jeffrey Sparshott
BODY:
Online poker was dealer's
choice for many Washington-area residents who stayed home this
week to wait out cold weather and inauguration-related traffic
tie-ups and security snarls.
Empire Poker, which bills itself
as the world's largest online poker room, said its Washington-area
activity rose 28 percent yesterday. The company is betting that
local residents upped their ante while they worked from home instead
of heading downtown.
"We saw a peculiar uptick
in our D.C.-area players and realized that it corresponded to
the weather and the inauguration," said Ron Burke, Empire
Poker president.
The company said its District-area
traffic has climbed steadily all week -- slightly Monday, by 11
percent Tuesday and 18 percent Wednesday. This week's profits
from the District will be about equal to the state of Massachusetts,
Empire said without providing specific dollar or user figures.
Online gambling is a multibillion-dollar
industry. Worldwide Internet wagers reached $ 5.7 billion in 2003
and are projected to hit $ 16.9 billion by 2009, according to
Christiansen Capital Advisors, a gambling and entertainment industry
consulting group.
Christiansen estimates that of
almost 12 million Internet gamblers worldwide, about 4.5 million
were from the United States.
Poker
is especially popular, with shows such as ESPN's "The World
Series of Poker" and Bravo's "Celebrity Poker Showdown"
drawing attention to the game.
Coupled with easy Internet access,
sites such as Empire Poker, Party Poker and Poker Stars can cash
in.
Despite rising popularity, some
online gambling might run afoul of the law.
"It's a legal gray area right
now with regard to that," conceded Kevin A. Mercuri, a vice
president with 5W Public Relations, a company seeking publicity
for Empire.
Many popular sites have incorporated
overseas -- Empire in Cyprus, for example -- to stay out of reach
of sometimes unclear U.S. laws on online wagering.
But the Justice Department has
gone after U.S. companies that carry ads for the international
sites and banks that allow their credit cards to be used for international
gambling transactions.
The agency is concerned that online
gambling could allow minors to wager and that there is potential
for fraud, money laundering and infiltration by organized crime.
The U.S. restrictions on online
gambling have riled other governments, which rake in taxes from
online casinos. The tiny Caribbean nation Antigua and Barbuda,
a hotbed of Internet gambling, filed a case at the World Trade
Organization, and in November, the WTO said U.S. limits on foreign
online casinos violate global trade rules.
The Bush administration has appealed,
saying it has the right "to protect public morals and public
order."
Empire's statistics show that
in the nation's capital, public morals might have been dealt a
weak hand during the country's quadrennial celebration of power
and democracy.
"More federal employees are
telecommuting and playing some poker on the side. Many accounts
that are only active in the evening [this week] are being used
during business hours," Mr. Burke said.
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