Actually, I\’m hearing unconfirmed buzz about a World Series of Poker – Latin America, and I\’m sure at least a few folks have thought about a WSOP in Asia. But something actively worked on: the \”Latin Series of Poker\” and \”LSOP\”. Legally, what these entities intend to be, according to their recent filings with the US Feds:
Entertainment services, namely, organizing, conducting, producing and exhibiting poker events and tournaments rendered live and through the media of television and the Internet, and providing poker news and information via a global computer network
Now to be sure, just because someone applies for a trademark doesn\’t mean the business is going to fly. I suspect \”Poker Bowl\” was registered back in the day before its collapse. The folks behind the forthcoming LSOP are Siete Dos Publications out of Carson City, NV. Hmm, I didn\’t realize actual people even lived in Carson City. But I do like the idea of a media company with a namesake mission of gloriously spreading word of The Hammer to the non-English-speaking world.
I do, however, wonder what the folks at Harrah\’s think of that. Not only is it interesting to see the ongoing and evolving convergence between digital poker media and actual tournament operations, but also … We ran into some similar trouble in Dallas back in the day … when two independent but eventually overlapping groups of rounders were both running an annual tournament called The DSOP. (In the end the Batfaces surrendered the name to the guys in McKinney, I was allowed to keep my 2003 co-champion title, and Desktop Solutions of Pennsylvania was allowed to keep the highly coveted DSOP.com web domain.)
UPDATE: The LSOP is apparently not that new of a venture, even though they just applied this month for trademark registration. Their website — www.lsop.com — is up and active, and has a $500k guaranteed main event scheduled for 110 days from now in Panama.