Rigorous Tesing -- Britain's National Lottery operator, Camelot, says it receives 10,000 new online registrations each week. Hoping that 5 percent of sales will come through interactive channels, the company is spending £45 million over seven year to develop and run Internet and digital TV channels. Camelot attributes its success through interactive channels so far to rigorous testing.
In-Room Gaming -- BettingCorp UK Ltd., an I-gaming software supplier and subsidiary of OpenTV, has signed a multi-year contract to provide its "UlitmateOne Technology" system on Quadriga's "Genesis" platform, which is a fully digital on-demand in-room entertainment system for the hotel industry. BettingCorp's games will at first be available to all hotels in the United Kingdom that operate the Genesis system, and eventually Quadriga will incorporate them into all of its hotels in Europe, in accordance with each jurisdiction's laws and regulations. Players can wager real money or play for fun games such as keno, virtual horseracing, slots, video poker, blackjack and roulette in addition to skill games like trivia, word and arcade-style games.
Quoteworthy -- "There is massive betting interest worldwide on the outcome of Euro 2004, and we now have clients betting with us from 193 different countries. As well as being the biggest betting football tournament ever, Euro 2004 will set new records for Internet turnover, with a nine-figure sum gambled on the Web for the first time. However, the majority of money bet will still be staked in betting shops."
A statement from betting company William Hill, which predicts that over £100 million will be wagered online on the tournament.
Terror Concerns -- The Sydney Morning Herald reported today that Australia' federal cabinet is examining the possibilities of instituting tougher legislation to ban foreign Internet gambling, mostly because of fears that Internet gambling can be used to finance terrorist activity and that it causes a high degree of problem gambling among young people. Among the options the cabinet is considering are total prohibition, tough industry regulations and leaving policing to the states.