With this year’s WSOP Champion just a few hours from being crowned, most of the eyes in the poker world are affixed squarely on Las Vegas. But there is quite a bit of other action going on around the world, including a slightly less publicized delayed final table that dealt with a cheating scandal, as well as a couple of WPT events.

World Series of Poker Main Event (Las Vegas, Nevada): Well, unless you’ve been living underneath a rock for the last four months, you know that the final table of the 2010 WSOP Main Event finally got back underway Saturday night, and did not disappoint as far as excitement goes. If you weren’t checking out Pokerati for some strange reason for your Main Event coverage you should definitely check out the work Michael Reed and Mark Gahagan were doing, as well as Dan and Pauly rattling off quite a few episodes of Tao of Pokerati.

Heads-up play between Jonathan Duhamel and John Racener will take place tonight (Monday) at 8 pm PT. Duhamel holds a substantial 6-1 chip lead over Racener, thanks to a hand with Joseph Cheong that will be discussed for a very long time amongst poker fans. The winner will receive $8.9 million, the third largest prize for a WSOP champion, trailing just Jamie Gold and Peter Eastgate. [WSOP]

Partouche Poker Tour Main Event (Cannes, France): The other table that came back from a months-long hiatus was the Main Event of the Partouche Poker Tour in Cannes. It should have been a “November Nine” for them as well, but when play resumed they were one player short.

German player Ali Tekintamgac was disqualified when tournament staff reviewed tapes from earlier in the tournament and discovered he was being tipped off to other players’ hands. He was working with people who obtained media credentials for the sole purpose of signaling Tekintamgac. This is not the first report of him allegedly cheating, as a post from several months ago on Two Plus Two apparently refers to a similar incident.

When they actually got underway, it was Vanessa Selbst beating out a fairly impressive final table that included Fabrice Soulier. Selbst took $1.8 million for her win, bringing her lifetime cashes to almost $4 million, and capping an impressive year that also saw her win the NAPT Mohegan Sun main event. [PokerStars Blog]

WPT Foxwoods (Mashantucket, Connecticut): It was almost a week ago now, but Jeffrey Forrest came out on top of a final table of impressive young players that included Tom Marchese, Nikolai Yakovenko, and Kevin Stammen. Forrest won $550,00 for his efforts, besting David Inselberg heads-up. [Foxwoods Live, WPT]

WPT Amneville (Amneville, France): Forrest wasn’t the only one to capture a WPT title this week. Sam El Sayed won the first ever WPT Amneville for just under $600,000. He also won a $25,000 seat to the WPT Championship at Bellagio, while second place finisher Franck Pepe settled for $320,000 and a $10,000 WPT Paris seat. [PartyPoker Blog]

MPCC Main Event (Lisboa, Macau): The PokerStars-affiliated Macau Poker Cup Championship held their main event this week as well, drawing 254 players. The final table featured players from seven different countries on four different continents, with Jilian Hasse of Germany winning the title and HK$1,064,000. [PokerStars Blog]

Caeser’s Classic (Las Vegas, Nevada): The Main Event of the month-long tournament series brought out quite a few of the local pros, as 290 players came out to play in this one. Among those making it into the money were Bryan Devonshire and Sorel Mizzi. Phillippe Boucher was the winner, beating a final table that included Blake Kelso and Justin Young for a first place payday just short of $60,000. [Cardplayer]

Elsewhere… Kurt Fraser of Schaumburg, IL won the HPT Tama in Tama Iowa for $75,000… Karina Jett already has one big buy-in out of the way as she won her seat in a charity event hosted at the Rio during the day off between nine-handed and heads-up play at the WSOP Main Event.

Online: “NickDandalos” channeled the Greek, beating Jason “strassa2″ Strasser on his way to winning the PokerStars Sunday Million and $195,000, while “salue” took down the $750K on FullTilt. Annette_15 finished second in FullTilt’s Sunday Mulligan.

November 9:

• The dinner break gave the spectators a chance to booze it up and our very own Dr. Pauly is writing about it. It is a Friday night in Vegas and all. (Tao Of Poker)

• The next two episodes of the special November 9 Tao of Pokerati are now available: The Dinner Break: Sustenance and Smoke and Mezzanine Menagerie.

• Two players have been eliminated since coming back from the dinner break. The first one to sent to the rail was Jason Senti followed by Jonathan Duhamel. You can catch their bust hands at poker listings along with their elimination interviews for Jason Senti, the Duhamel interview will be up shortly. (PokerListings)

• Bluff Magazine is on top of the numbers, this time you can find out how many players have moved all in since the dinner break. (Bluff)

Non-November 9:

• As earlier reported the WPT Amneville was down to the final 3 players. They have since then crowned their winner, with Sam El Sayed taking the money and the title. You can read up on the final hand along with getting a picture of the winner at the Party Poker Blog.

November 9:

• The guys over at PokerLisitings caught up with Matthew Jarvis after getting eliminated from the Main Event. He seemed to be taking things well. (PokerListings)

• Stalking Sasquatch around the Rio for 10 mins with Dr. Pauly, and I am sure you might find a new podcast towards the end of the dinner break. (Tao Of Poker)

• Players are coming back from their 90-minute dinner break at 400/800/100k. Follow live updates at WSOP.com

Non-November 9:

• The WPT also has a final table today in Amneville, France. They are currently down to three players that are trying to win 426,425 €  ($598,871.27) and an entry to the $25,000 WPT World Championship at Bellagio in May, 2011. (Party Poker Blog)

November 9:

• A few new episodes of Tao of Pokerati have been posted. In N9 – Episode 3 Timtern sneaking in for the absent Dan and talk about Sasquatch. The N9 – Episode 4 has Dr. Pauly catching Dan up on what he missed by arriving late. Once again check out Dr. Pauly’s blog for the up to date happenings around the Penn and Teller theater. (Tao of Poker)

• Filippio Candio likes to celebrate when he wins a hand and the guys over at Wicked Chops (with the assistance of Jess Welman) have made a connection to Candio and Roberto Benigni. (Wicked Chops)

• For those that saw the hand unfold between Matthew Jarvis and Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi might have noticed that it was very similar to the hand that saw Chris Moneymaker eliminating Phil Ivey on the way to winning the Main Event in 2003. (YouTube)

• The staff over at Bluff Magazine is keeping the content coming in, this time providing some off the wall stats about the Final Table play. If you want to know when the first four-bet happened then check them out. (Bluff)

• The guys over at Pokerlistings caught up with Soi Nguyen after he was eliminated in 9th place. (PokerListings)

Non-November 9 Notes:

• The WSOP is not the only November 9 that started up today. The Partouche Poker Tour (PPT) also started back up today. Given their November 9 became the November 8 after Ali Tekintamgac was disqualified from the tournament when tournament official determined he had been getting signals from a fake media member tipping him of his opponents hands (Poker Nyhederne). The remaining 8 players played down to the final two today with Vanessa Selbst and Raphael Kroll coming back tomorrow to play for the title. You can watch a live feed tomorrow starting at  2pm local time (PPT).

November 9 Updates:

• Andrew Feldman of ESPN Poker has a Final Table Blog/Chat going on where you can chat and ask him questions as he live blogs the Final table. The live chat also has the twitter feed for all the players on the table along with some other pros, so should be a fun feed to follow throughout the day (ESPN Poker Live Blog).

• Bluff gives the low down on the patches. With FTP coming into the day with 7 sponsored players and only 3 allowed to wear the FTP logo everyone was speculating what they would do. They definitely came up with a creative answer (Bluff Magazine).

• Pauly over at Tao of Poker lets you know what happens during the break at the Main Event final table in his Semi-Live Blog (Tao of Poker).

Now in some non-November 9 News but definitely a good read:

• Amy Calistri and Tim Lavalli took a deeper look back in 2006 into where 2 million extra chips came after they noticed a discrepancy at the end of Day Seven of the Main Event. They take a look at possible staff error to even the possibility of cheating between staff and players. (AimlesslyChasingAmy)

I’ve returned from Spain after attempting to live-tweet a very informative conference with some great minds on the forefront of gaming law. Here’s a look at some important legal developments from @GamingCounsel over the past week …

1. American Midterm Shuffles - Today, everyone is thinking about the US elections. Are the pundits right? Are the Democrats headed for heavy losses? Will Harry Reid prevail in Nevada? What does it all mean for Internet gaming, specifically for poker? Whatever happens today, the trend towards legalizing and regulating Internet gaming will continue in the United States. The focus may move to the state level - although some are saying that a new Reid bill could  be passed before the end of the lame duck Congressional session on December 31^st - and, if Senator Reid loses (which is unlikely), things may be slowed down. However, the push for poker by many interested groups is too big for one person or one election to derail entirely. Some see today as crucial to the industry (see: Offshore Gaming Association); taking the long view, however, I’m a bit more sanguine.

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2. Kentucky vs. Microgaming - Things always seem to be developing in the Kentucky domain name seizure matter. Several weeks ago, the Supreme Court of Kentucky denied the writs of IMEGA and the IGC, sending the questions of standing and jurisdiction back to the Franklin Circuit Court (that was only a waste of 6 months); recently the Commonwealth added Microgaming to its list of defendants in the separate but related suit against Pocket Kings (FullTilt Poker) and PartyGaming for damages. Kentucky is seeking to recover triple the amount of losses of those located within Kentucky against these three “and unknown defendants. [EGR Magazine]

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3. New Bank Seizures - Circumstances continue to challenge those servicing the US-facing Internet poker market. In Seattle, federal prosecutors have sought to cause the funds of Secure Money Inc. (a payment processor based in Canada) to be turned over to the US government. [Seattle Post-Intelligencer]

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4. Boyd Gaming Fundraisers - On October 26^th, Boyd Gaming Corporation announced that it’s seeking to raise $500M through 8 year senior notes in a private placement. The bonds will be guaranteed by certain Boyd subsidiaries. Boyd will use the funds to pay off existing debt. This continues the recent trend of gaming companies reaching out to the broader markets (some through IPOs - see Betfair) to raise funds. [Boyd Gaming]

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5. IMGL Conference Summary - The International Masters of Gaming Law had their fall conference in Madrid last week. It was a great series of sessions and contained lots of stories and gossip (lawyers are as bad as judges and schoolgirls for thriving on gossip). Snippets on the US: rumours about Harry Reid working on his own poker regulation/tax bill; predictions about New Jersey and Florida being the most likely to pass intra-state gaming bills among the states; and, forecasting that current US-facing operators will still have a significant role to play post-US regulation. [Gaming Law Masters]

Barrister Stuart Hoegner is an expert but not quite a “master” in international gaming law whom you can follow regularly @GamingCounsel.

Some may recognize me from Twitter, a few may have cracked my aces a time or two, and it’s possible that some of you were smart enough to jot down that number I left on the bathroom wall. If you don’t recognize me AT ALL, then you’re part of an exclusive group called “Almost Everyone”.

My name is Kim Shannon, and I’m all up in everyone’s bidness… which is why Pokerati invited me to share with you the poker gossip and celebrity “news”. My initial response was “I’d rather drink a thumbtack-and-jalapeno smoothie”, but then Dan reminded me that I still owe him a beej from a prop bet I lost… so here I am.

Let’s skip the gristle and get right to the bone, shall we, with what’s buzzing in poker … or wait, is that coming from my purse?

Clock Blocked

Word from the felt is that Daniel Negreanu and Andrew Robl have kissed and made up in the wake of a spat over last week’s episode of “The Big Game”, in which Negreanu & Tony G were poster children for fucked up poker etiquette. Poker bitching about implied collusion aside, I hadn’t seen so much high-fiving and snickering since I last got “Eiffel Towered” in a drunken MFM.

After the broadcast, Tony G redeemed himself by posting a quasi-apology, but Daniel kept the drama going with a post of his own expounding on Robl’s nittiness. I was in the middle of reading Robl’s rebuttal when I realized that I had been punching myself in the face the whole time over the pettiness of it all. However, I do feel the need to give Daniel a special award for managing to refrain from calling Robl a “cunt”.  Then, just as I was about to start placing bets on who would blow a gasket and sprain their vagina first, Negreanu ruined my fun by saying he has since called Robl and smoothed things over.

A-Rod’s Poker

Alex Rodriguez was in the Ivey Room at Aria with Jean-Robert Bellande last week — supposedly playing 50-100 NL with a couple non-pro Aria regulars. Tweeting from Haze Nightclub, @BrokeLivingJRB reported that A-Rod “won 3k” in the game, which sounds to me more like 5-10 without steroids — hardly enough for new pair of Yankee-caliber starter tits. Dealers say A-Rod tipped adequately, btw, tossing “like $36 in gravel” before leaving the game. Not one to hit-and-run, he was back at the tables a couple days later, playing 10-20 NL at Bellagio. John Kim snapped a pic. Orel Hersheiser (great first name, terrible last) also joined the action somewhere along the way.

More…

There was poker being played all over the world as the EPT, WPT, WSOPC and ANZPT were in action across four continents this week.

EPT Vienna (Vienna, Austria) Daniel Negreanu was chasing history Sunday, attempting to complete the third stage of the poker “triple crown” by adding an European Poker Tour title to his WSOP bracelets and WPT title. He was also in line to regain the top spot on the All-Time money list. He fell short of both of these goals, settling for 4th place and €175,000. Michael Eiler of Germany was your winner, banking €700,000 for his efforts. [PokerStars Blog]

WPT World Poker Finals (Foxwoods, Mashantucket, Connecticut) Just 12 players remain from the 242 who started. Play reached the money after more than three hours of hand-for-hand play Sunday. The slow start eliminated any possibility for a day off Monday for sleeping in … err, players recuperating before the final six get down to business Tuesday. Tom Marchese is the chip leader with over 1.8 million, almost twice that of second place. Jason Mercier, Sorel Mizzi and Hoyt Corkins are among those still in contention. You can find full chip counts and a recap here. [Foxwoods Live]

WSOP Circuit Midwest Regional Championship (Hammond, Indiana) The revamped World Series of Poker Circuit had its first big test as the first of four televised $10K Regional Championships was held this week. 226 players showed up to the Chicago-area Horseshoe Hammond, and the final table featured quite a few familiar names, including Shannon Shorr, Brandon Adams, David “Doc” Sands and Bernard Lee. Jim Anderson parlayed a seat he had won, which was added to the prize pool of a $200 event that he had won earlier in the series and turned it into $525,449. All nine players who made the final table have qualified for the million dollar freeroll that will award a bracelet to the winner at the end of the season. [WSOP]

WSOP-Circuit South Africa (Emerald Casino, South Africa) One of the quirks of the new WSOP Circuit schedule was a brand new stop in South Africa. Well an unofficial official stop that doesn’t count towards the $1 million dollar freeroll or award a ring, but a stop with quite a bit of money on the line nonetheless. Maria Ho finished sixth in this event, while the title was captured by Warren Zackey, who won $223,155 for his efforts. [Bluff South Africa]

ANZPT Darwin (Darwin, New Zealand) The biggest story of this Main Event had to be rapper cum poker player known simply as “Brotha D”. Danny Leaoasavaii, who captured the APPT Main Event in September, is the first to own a title on both the APPT and the ANZPT, as well as the first New Zealander to win on the ANZPT. The true test will come in the summer of 2011 as he looks to challenge Jeff Madsen and Prahlad Friedman as the best poker rapper in the game, which should be pretty anticlimactic. [PokerStars Blog]

Caeser’s Classic & Venetian Deep Stacks (Las Vegas, Nevada) Two tournament series’ with smaller buy-ins are now going strong in Las Vegas as the final Venetian Deep Stacks of the year has gotten underway. Action at Caeser’s is still going strong and attracting some interesting names. Among those who have made final tables in the last week are Barry Shulman (Event 13, 9th) and Kenna James (Event 16, 3rd).

In the Online World… There was some lack of name recognition in the Sunday Majors action, but don’t take that to mean that there wasn’t a whole boatload of money to be won. Amongst those who pocketed six figures were “Zareta” (PokerStars Sunday Million, $230,513), “chickface” (FullTilt $750K Guaranteed, $140,967), “Levan1971″ (PokerStars Sunday Warmup, $188,860) and my personal favorite, “monkeybudgie” (FullTilt Sunday Brawl, $106,737)

Here’s @GamingCounsel‘s look at the important legal developments in gaming over the past ten days or so:

1. Crespo v. Online Poker - Interesting complaint filed in the US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division filed on October 12^th. In a nutshell: A resident of Florida named Scott Crespo, who may or may not play poker online (there’s no indication from the complaint that he does or not), is suing residents of Illinois under an Illinois statute for money they purportedly won from other online poker players who may or may not be residents of Illinois. Oh, and Crespo apparently didn’t lose any money. He wants triple the amount of the unclaimed “losses” of others accruing to the defendants. Illinois was chosen because it’s one of a handful of states that have third party recovery statutes. As a gaming attorney I know in the US put it: We have way too many lawyers with nothing productive to do. [US District Court]

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2. Betfair IPO Numbers – The Betfair IPO seemed to hit the top end of what analysts were predicting as the company’s market capitalization. Betfair was valued at £1.4 billion on flotation. Fully £200 million was raised on the IPO. [Herald Scotland]

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3. Harrah’s IPO Imminent - More news from the public markets: Harrah’s is heading back to the public marketplace with an estimated $575 million offering. The money is likely to be used for new casino projects in Las Vegas and Ohio, not to pay down debt. We’ll have to wait and see how this offering fares, but there are definitely challenges ahead. [Wall Street Journal]

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4. Canadian I-Gaming Split - While certain provinces are keen to enter the interactive gaming market, others are throwing cold water on the idea. Ontario and Quebec have announced that they’re coming out with online offerings; British Columbia already offers an online experience at www.playnow.com. However, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, and Prince Edward Island recently announced that they’re not comfortable with participating in Internet gambling at this point. These latter three provinces are small - PEI is the smallest province in Canada, both geographically and in terms of population - but, interestingly, they’re part of the Atlantic Lotteries Corporation, which is working with BC and Quebec on sharing liquidity on a common Internet poker platform. [Globe and Mail; CBC]

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5. IMGL Conference in Madrid - The International Masters of Gaming Law is the pre-eminent organization for gaming attorneys and other gaming experts. Their Fall conference is on from October 24^th-26^th in Madrid and, as usual, it’s an interesting lineup and series of sessions. I’ll be tweeting on different panels and speakers throughout the conference; check out my tweet stream if you’re interested. [Gaming Law Masters]

Good morning, ladies and gentleman, and welcome to the beginning of… something. You may know me better as Timtern, of Bluff and PokerRoad (non) fame, and I am the newest contributor to Pokerati. I’m definitely stepping into some giant shoes, so I hope you’ll bare with me as I get settled in. Anyway, here’s what happened this week in tournaments:

• The biggest money of the week was on the line at the Festa al Lago, the latest stop of Season 9 of the World Poker Tour. There were some heavy-hitting young guns that reached this final table, including Andy Frankenberger, who was coming off of a victory at the Legends of Poker. Randall Flowers managed to add “youngest two-time WPT winner” to an already impressive resume at the tender age of 22. Flowers, who banked $831,500 for his win, was also the youngest to win a WPT title, which he did in Barcelona before he even turned 21. [World Poker Tour]

• The $1,500 World Series of Poker Circuit at Horseshoe Hammond Main Event wrapped up early Monday morning, with the appropriately named Kurt Jewell snagging the circuit ring and $242,909. Amongst the notables at this final table were William Reynolds, who took third, and Bryan Devonshire taking seventh. The $10,000 Regional Championship, which will air on Versus, will get underway Monday. [WSOP]

• There are many different options for the members of the November Nine as they prepare for the WSOP final table. They could follow the major poker tours and play other big buy-in events, take a trip to clear their minds, or hire a coach to fine-tune their skills. Or, as in the case of Filippo Candio, they could get in amongst the grinders and play a $230 prelim event, in this case Event #1 at the Caesars Classic. Candio brought his A-Game in this one, reaching the final table in the 232 player field before falling just short in 3rd place, banking a cool$4,726. (The attached story is in Italian, so if you don’t have a knowledge of the language it might be time to crack out the Google translator, or maybe go old school and try Babelfish). [Tuttosport]

• Maybe Candio started a trend, as he wasn’t the only November Niner doing well in prelims. With the World Poker Finals Main Event (the next stop on the WPT) fast approaching, John Dolan made a deep run in a $1,500 event, eventually making a three-way deal and taking second place for $45,000. In a twist that might be more appropriate for Soccerati, ESPN Soccer commentator Adrian Healey took third place for $40,000. [Foxwoods Live]

• In the online world, Sorel Mizzi started things off early with a win in the PokerStars Sunday Warm-Up for $149,737.10. The biggest money of the day online was to be had in the $1.5 million guarantee, with “Bodog Ari” Engel making the final table and finishing seventh for $32,856; “ramondemon” won $246,424 for taking that one down. On the FullTilt side of things, “EatMyBluff8″ was the big winner in their $750,000 guarantee, winning $135,939.

• And just in time for Halloween, we have a tale from beyond the grave. The late, great Dean Martin made the final table in a recent Borgata $1,000 event. Although I always thought Atlantic City was more a Sinatra town. Oh well. [Cardplayer]

Time for some of the major legal developments in gaming over the past week, as selected by @GamingCounsel:

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1. Netherlands I-Gaming Attitudes - Probably the most interesting international story of the past week is the ruminations from the Netherlands that the new government may be interested in liberalizing the country’s Internet gambling laws. It’s not clear how far this process would go and what games or betting would be included, but a lot could happen in what has been a very restricted online market in the EU thus far. [eGaming Review]

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2. Nova Scotia Says No (That’s in Canada, Folks) - Another international piece is the recent pronouncement of the premier of Nova Scotia that that province will not pursue a government-sanctioned Internet gaming offering. Nova Scotia’s finance minister added that any estimate of the revenues associated with Internet gaming would be “a wild guess.”(That’s an interesting comment given that the province of Ontario has publicly estimated that it could turn a profit of at least C$100 million/year; many have questioned the basis for such a projection.) The CEO of the Nova Scotia Gaming Corp. (rightly) pointed out recently that Internet gambling will continue to grow whether the government is involved or not. [Globe and Mail]

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3. Betfair Move - Hot on the heels of the Betfair IPO announcement, there is speculation that Betfair may move out of the UK to a jurisdiction with a lower tax rate. William Hill and Ladbrokes recently moved to Gibraltar because they perceived that UK taxes were too high. Some are saying Betfair may make a similar play. With competition increasing among Internet gaming jurisdictions, more and more operators are paying attention to applicable taxes. [CasinoGamblingWeb]
   

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4. Station Casinos Trademark Infringement/Cybersquatting Suit - Station Casinos Inc. has sued two website operators in Federal Court in Nevada: SL Enterprises (www.vegasstationcasino.com) and Ryan Murphy (www.stationcasinos.org). If the Station marks have sufficient rights attached to them through use and/or registration, they should have a good case. This kind of thing happens in i-gaming all the time and it’s a big problem for operators; it’s tremendously time-consuming and potentially expensive to vigilantly prosecute misappropriation of property rights. [Las Vegas Sun]
   

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5. PartyGaming in Venezuela - PartyGaming plc has set up an online poker offering in Venezuela. This continues two trends: Party’s continuing march around the world into new markets and the increased interest in South America as a lucrative and growing market for interactive gaming. [Gambling Zion]

Hello good people of Pokerati. Here’s what I hope to make a weekly digest of what I think are the most interesting and/or relevant stories (not necessarily the same thing) happening online and around the world:

1. PokerStars turns off Washington players - This is the first US state to be turned off by PokerStars. Major Stars competitors have not responded in-kind. This was not prompted by any change in state law in Washington (the ostensible reason was the result in the Rousso v. Washington judgment handed down on September 23^rd). This may signal that Stars is not going to be as aggressive as others in maintaining a presence in all jurisdictions in the US. [Casino City Times]

 

2. HR 2267 - People continue to try to read the tea leaves to determine what’s going to happen with the Internet Gambling Regulation, Consumer Protection and Enforcement Act. Every utterance from Reps. Frank or McDermott or from Senator Reid sends the online forums and poker press into overdrive. The House is now adjourned until after the November elections. If HR 2267 is to pass, it must be done during the lame-duck session starting after the mid-terms and ending before the start of the 112^th Congress in early January. I continue to believe that it’s more likely than not that the current version (as amended) will not pass before the start of the next session, but remember that a lot can happen in a few days. [GovTrack.us]

 

3. Betfair IPO - This is one of the biggest public offerings in gaming in some time, so it’s no surprise that it’s getting quite a lot of attention. Betfair is apparently not raising new money on the float; shareholders are selling off approximately 10% of their holdings before over-allotment. Initial media reports had suggested a valuation of as high as £1.5B, but this appears to have been discounted. [Wall Street Journal]

 

4. Penn National coming to Vegas - Penn National Gaming purchased the outstanding debt of the M Resort in Las Vegas for $230.5M. This is seen as Penn’s way of eventually owning the asset, giving it its first Las Vegas property. The M was built at a cost of $1B, so most appear to be congratulating Penn for effectively purchasing a nice asset at a fraction of cost. [LVRJ]

 

5. PokerStars Licensure - Stars continues to build up gaming licences in various jurisdictions; it now has operating licences in France, Italy, and Estonia, as well as its ‘main’ international licence from the Isle of Man. This may be a sign of the kind of regulatory fragmentation that owners will face in future (especially in Europe) as different countries open up their markets to licensure and operations. [Gaming Zion]

Gaming attorney and expert Stu Hoegner follows the poker and casino industries from a tax- and law-minded perspective @GamingCounsel.

Stuart Hoegner is quickly becoming something akin to the Joe Navarro of online-centric, international casino and gambling law. Though I’m sure @GamingCounsel on Twitter would never claim to be anything close to an @Kevmath for poker-related legal and legislative matters, this independent barrister and solicitor (they say things funny in Canadian) has in due process become a go-to voice of info about the latest legal and political shifts affecting 10s of millions of people in our multibillion-dollar industry.

While in town a few weeks ago, he sat for an episode of Jon Friedberg’s UTG, where they tackled some challenging questions for the Poker Industry as a whole in these undeniably tumultuous legal times — for anything connected to online gambling:

(Here’s a link if you’re having probs with the player as I am: http://tinyurl.com/2dkv9jj)

Ahh, remember how cute it was when Poker’s primary response to any insinuation of illegality was simply: “Whatever, game-a-skill.”

GamingCounsel has also become a regular guest on a podcast called CEM Audio Edge (Casino Enterprises Management), where he has broken down in great detail for CEMers matters of Canadian gaming code as well as effective use of Twitter:

Speaking of laws and Twitter, while we’re at it here are some quick story-worthy links — all ganked highlighted from @GamingCounsel’s feed:

Legal Briefs

State of Maine seems ready to expand gambling beyond parimutuel horse betting with a new “racino”.

Alderney (Full Tiltville) pushing propaganda to maintain its relevance as international online gaming regulator.

Isle of Man (PokerStarzistan) hosting frigid online gaming summit in November.

New Jersey Senate passes billto revitalize state gaming industry with boutique casinos.

Also …

The New York Times acknowledges that Big Casinos are finally on board with online gambling.

And a NYT piece about the continuing recession in Vegas.

Lastly, for now, (GC’s got plenty more) … The Economist on sports betting, athlete salaries, and match fixing.

OK, some really quick poker links, random, some from not-so-typical places, that have caught me by the finger recently:

John K’s blog, interesting, well-analyzed poker-tinted life stuff from an accomplished Vegas grinder still trying to get there: [JK's Blog]

Pauly, on a site not about poker, on a documentary about Mad Men culture, and why it’s better to be a creative person than a suit. [Tao of Pauly]

Wonk out with your Donk out … our friends at CardRunners have set up a site monitoring legal developments in poker. [Poker Law Bulletin]

Corny T-shirts, designed by women poker players for women poker players at family picnics and in ladies events. [PMS Pokerwear]

A rap album all about poker — Portland, Maine, represent! (PokerRapper]

Yo, turns out Jeff Madsen was right about 9/11 all along, obv. [The Onion]

Sorry, meant to get this out to y’all earlier … occurred to me tunes might work better than video for the holiday weekend, and poker podcasts better than that … so here’s some stuff that caught my ear for an extended period of time in recent days/weeks … I’m gonna presume you already listen to, and probably subscribe to The Poker Beat, the definitively #1 podcast in poker, you know, according to the readers of Bluff Magazine and WPT-Poker, which is the official magazine of the World Poker Tour in Europe. But if you can handle more than that, you might wanna perma-connect with these shows, too — via iTunes, RSS, or muscle memory:

Donkdown vs. Coolio

Donkdown Radio :: The always-NSFW working-class Vegas grinders at Donkdown went to war with Coolio last month before moving on to better things (like hunting down @asianspa). This feud started a few weeks back with an on-air story about how the aging rap star, a recent relo to Vegas, showed up at Binion’s during BARGE … allegedly to buy drugs from a player attending Barry Tanenbaum’s keynote address … only to end up with pictures of himself passed out butt-naked (literally) on the Donkdown forum. Coolio even came on their show and sang a few bars of Gangsta’s Paradise before getting hip to Brandon and Micon’s game a few days later, at which point they allege he began threatening to retaliate … right after the next season of Ultimate Big Brother. [Link]

Laak Extra-Whack

The Strip Podcast :: A worthy leftover from the summertime WSOP … Vegas culture blogger and New York Times stringer Steve Freiss’ talking to Phil Laak 114 hours into his record 115-hour poker-endurance run. If you thought Laak ever said weird shit before, listen to the twisted gems Freiss pulls out of him (or stumbles into) tableside during his final hands. [Link]

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