The Ongoing Commotion -- Australian media are in a feeding frenzy over the Betfair controversy. ABC Online reports that Tasmanian Premier Paul Lennon said the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission's chairman, Graeme Samuel, will not allow Tasmania to be unfairly sanctioned by opponents of Betfair. "The only avenue left for our opponents was to threaten us, was to bully us, was to intimidate us and thankfully there are laws in this country to protect Tasmania, protect Tasmanian business from such action," Lennon said. . . . The Advertiser reports that Racing Minister Michael Wright has circulated a draft bill of his legislative amendments to block Betfair from taking wagers from South Australians to several organizations, including the Australian Racing Board; the SA Bookmakers' League; SATAB; the Independent Gambling Authority and the Opposition party. The bill would also prohibit betting exchanges outside the state from publishing race field information without approval from relevant authorities. . . .There is good news for Betfair, however. Lennon said the Tasmanian Racing Club confirmed its support of the Betfair legislation.
Mobile in China -- Financial Times reports that while China is still behind in the overall lottery market (ninth place at the end of 2004), revenues from the lottery have grown by more than 50 percent per year for the last five years. Technology businesses in China have begun work on making lotteries available on mobile phones. China lottery company China Gloria Lotteries is working with the Sports Lottery Administration to begin offering regional sports lottery tickets which can only be bought through mobile devices. China Unicom and China Mobile customers can already check lottery numbers through the SMS system. "Mobile lottery betting suddenly becomes a viable option for the man on the street without a credit card but who probably does have a mobile phone,” said Simon Miller a British gaming consultant with long experience in the Chinese sports betting market.
Quoteworthy -- "Should the agreement with WPC Productions (the relevant PartyGaming subsidiary) . . . be breached by them, the company would have to sue such parties in the courts of the British Virgin Islands and to enforce any resulting judgment in Gibraltar . . . without any guarantee that any such action would be successful."
- Found on page 31 of Empire Online Limited's flotation prospectus reprinted in a Guardian article Nov. 22 about the collapse of its deal with PartyGaming.
iTV Poker -- Interactive software and technology developer Zone 4 Play, Inc. has announced the live launch of what it is calling the first ever interactive TV multiplayer Texas Hold'em poker on U.K. television channel Five. The program will begin as a play-for-fun application and eventually be replaced by a real-money version. Zone 4 Play plans to launch the program on three additional channels before the end of the year.
Stairway to Poker Heaven -- EGET, a Finnish supplier of Internet and mobile money games, is beginning to see the fruition of the deal it signed last month with U.K. mobile content and applications provider Stream Plc. The duo has announced the signing of an exclusive agreement with the Poker Channel to provide and promote mobile poker and other mobile gaming products. The first product is a mobile poker game developed by EGET to be promoted by The Poker Channel under the online brand "Poker Heaven."