Tsunami Relief -- Various I-gaming companies from around the globe are chipping in to offer aid to those affected by last week's Indian Ocean tsunami disaster.
Sportsbook.com, the flagship brand of Sportingbet, has partnered with Northwest Medical Teams International and is encouraging its customers to help those in need by matching 100 percent of all customer donations. . . . Britain's National Lottery has pledged £12 million toward a three-year program to help rebuild communities and restore local infrastructure. . . . AbsolutePoker.com will donate all tournament fees from this Saturday's activity to the International Red Cross. The company expects this amount to reach $25,000. Last night AbsolutePoker hosted a special Tsunami Tourney, the proceeds of which will also benefit an aid fund... Next Generation Entertainment and Winward Casino Group, two separately owned gaming companies, joined together to pledge 100 percent of revenue from all of their Web sites on January 5 to the International Red Cross. The Web sites, which include WinwardCasino.com, WorldwideVegas.com, Bingohall.com, BingoPalace.com, OnlineBingo.com and Vicsbingo.com... Bryan Bailey of Casinomeister.com and Ted Loh of Got2bet.com are holding auctions for one-year ownership of prominent advertising space on top of both Web sites' main index pages, and the entire sum of the winning bid will be donated to UNICEF to help flood victims. Bidding opens at $20,000 and closes in one week.
IGH and IEN -- Interactive Gaming Holdings, which through its subsidiary, Interactive Entertainment Network (IEN), operates over 1,000 Web-based properties in over 30 countries, says it has just signed two major online gaming operators as paid advertisers through IEN. The company derives its revenue from the sale of advertising to third-party operators based upon a cost-per-click model. It says current click-through rates for the recently introduced contextual advertising are between 20 to 30 percent with conversion rates between 5 to 8 percent. The company's statement does not include the names of the two operators.
betinternet.com -- Isle of Man-based betinternet.com stated that high attributable overhead costs will cause it to post an interim operating loss when it publishes it results for the half-year ended Nov. 28 in three weeks, despite considerable improvement by its sports book division and turnover from its pari-mutuel activities. The company also claims it will benefit from the Isle of Man's new policy change that permits the acceptance of bets from U.S. customers, and it announced that it will again begin offering wagers on horse racing at major U.S. tracks. The company's Play Live Casino product brought in more than $1.1 million in turnover in its first two weeks of operation, and another new product, Play Football, is said to be off to an encouraging start.
Slot Reviews -- Online casino portal CasinoMan.Net has launched a new section of its Web site that provides detailed information, reviews and screenshots of 250 online slot games. Information such as jackpot size, reels, pay lines, coin sizes and other features are given to help players find games that are to the their liking and right for their budgets. The site also boasts a search-and-compare engine that lets users compare up to five slot games next to each other.