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State of Kentucky Seizes Control of 141 Domain Names
ashmodai9 writes "In a rather interesting (read: insane) decision, a district judge in the State of Kentucky has awarded control of 141 online gambling domain names to the governor of the state. Most of these are hosted offshore, and very few are registered under US domain name registrars, let alone registrars in the State of Kentucky (are there any?). You can check out the press release here, and confirm that the Commonwealth of Kentucky does in fact now 'own' these domain names by performing a WHOIS search on any of the domains listed here."
[sarcasm] for posting a link to gambling911 in the article. Not like anyone reads Slashdot at work or anything. [/sarcasm]
One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
I WHOIS'ed about a dozen of these domain names, and not a single one showed up as having anything to do with Kentucky.
How would the State of Kentucky "seize" a domain name registered in the Isle of Man anyway?
Given that the biggest gambling Mecca in the western world is in the US (Las Vegas)
I don't know about that. Native American casinos have far and away outstripped Nevada for gaming supremacy. California appearing to be the biggest State.
Some other places in the world probably have bigger operations either in construction or complete. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gambling_in_Macau
The judicial event in question is odd to say the least. The chances are excellent this one will go a few rounds through appeal. The gaming industry doesn't like attracting attention to itself, so they'll probably let it die at some point to stay out of the limelight. The former owner of the domains will be encouraged to let it go.
Online gambling isn't seen as a direct threat to location-based operations, but sooner or later organized crime will run that too.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
1 tablespoon rosemary
1 tablespoon oregano leaves
1 tablespoon powdered sage
1 teaspoon powdered ginger
1 teaspoon marjoram
1 1/2 teaspoons thyme
3 tablespoons packed brown sugar
3 tablespoons dry minced parsley
1 teaspoon pepper
1 tablespoon paprika
2 tablespoons garlic salt
2 tablespoons onion salt
2 tablespoons chicken bouillon powder (or 4 cubes, mashed)
1 package Lipton tomato Cup-a-Soup mix
Place all ingredients in blender and pulse for 3-4 minutes to pulverize, or rub through a fine strainer. Store in an airtight container so the spices will not lose their potency. Makes about 3/4 cup.
Add 1 ounce mix to every one cup of flour for coating chicken. http://www.razzledazzlerecipes.com/eatingout/eating_k/kentucky-fried-chicken-spice.htm
Enjoy.
The judge included this line in his order:
"The domain names' configurations shall otherwise remain unchanged."
So - the state is not permitted to use the siezure to shut down the sites.
What's also interesting is that the title of the case is Commonwealth of Kentucky v. 141 Domain Names.
In other words, they didn't sue the companies and owners, they are doing a "civil forfieture" type of case. Nobody affected by this case was notified or served process.
This case is going to be really fun to watch. You can bet that it's going to be removed to Federal Court very quickly.
Here you go, sir, the court order.
I checked a few random domains and noted some very recent updates... noone would really think this would stick?
$ whois casinoextreme.com
Updated Date: 23-sep-2008
Creation Date: 15-feb-1999
Expiration Date: 15-feb-2010
$ whois casinoextreme.com
Updated Date: 23-sep-2008
Creation Date: 15-feb-1999
Expiration Date: 15-feb-2010
$ whois inetbet.com
Updated Date: 23-sep-2008
Creation Date: 15-jan-1999
Expiration Date: 15-jan-2012
#1 Link for us who are at work Try Here #2 The article that I linked notes that it was requested that access to these sites be blocked to persons inside the Commonwealth, or lose access to the domains. It seems the site owners were unwilling to comply.
The horse racing lobby controls KY. That's why there's no casinos in the state. This is just a continuation of that control.
Forbes.com article about Steve Beshears attempt to ban internet gambling sites
As a native Kentuckian, this is truly embarrassing.
In other news; Kentucky has computers now! Disclaimer: I am an Appalachian-American so it is ok. Seriously. :)
Forgive my spelling from time to time. I'm often posting during short breaks.
The District Courts are the lowest courts in the Commonwealth. They have limited jurisdiction, and typically deal with piddling misdemeanors or civil cases with low damages. How this even originated in District Court and not Circuit Court (the court of general jurisdiction over "real" cases) boggles my mind, but IANAL.
This would still have to get through the Kentucky Court of Appeals, as well as the Kentucky Supreme Court, and then there's always an appeal to The Supremes. Right now this is like a divorce court judge (which is what Kentucky District Court judges were until the recent-- read: last year-- establishment of the Kentucky Family Courts) ruling on international law, and I can't imagine it'll stand.
Also, I notice that a couple of domains have been changed to Secretary of Justice. This would be the head of the Justice and Public Safety Cabinet, which is responsible for the State Police. This should not be confused with the Attorney General, Jack Conway. He actually struck me as a level-headed, intelligent, reform-minded guy.
All that said, this is one more reason for me to be glad I moved out of that crazy place!
--Obyron
Seriously what is the issue here?
The deal is they can't stand the competition. From the news article..
"Unlicensed Internet gambling significantly undermines and threatens horseracing, Kentucky's signature industry and a key tourism industry, by creating unregulated and untaxed competition; "
Follow the money. It has nothing to do with protecting the citizens of the state, but everything to do with protecting the gambling revenue of the state from competition. The unregulated and untaxed competition is the issue.
What the hell is so fundamentally wrong with gambling?
This is not the issue. The state has horse racing. The issue is someone else is gambling outside of the state control and is in competition with it.
Personally my biggest issue with gambling is I am not the house. After taking a stastics class I learned to never gamble against the house. Over time it is always a loss. I've done a lot better in the stock market. Many people forget buy low sell high. I sold 30K of stock last fall at $26 a share. It's now $18.75. I hope the market goes up and down a few more times before I retire. Remember, buy low.
The truth shall set you free!
The US government is notorious for giving itself exceptions, both directly and indirectly. Credit cards come with hidden fees that the merchant must pay. For example, of that $1 for the ticket, anywhere from 1 to 5% goes to a transaction processor who validates that the card is good and has an open balance. That's 95 to 99 cents that goes to the vendor of the ticket. It's illegal in the states to charge someone a different price for any item using a credit card instead of cash, so the merchant eats that. It's meant to encourage the use of credit cards as something just as good as cash, and makes the fee a cost of doing business. Since what I described is a federal rule, this is a good way to get around since this is only a state law.
There are probably many reasons for this law being enacted. Laws don't usually have only one true reason for existence, and you know that if it wasn't a law, some people would try to blow their $5000 platinum card on lottery tickets at some point.
side note: you may see many local mom and pop gas stations charging gas at two prices, one for credit and one for cash. Yes, that's illegal, and one of the reasons you don't see the big corporate chains doing it. However, the mom and pops are getting away with it because gas margins are slim and in the current economic climate the government isn't entirely unwilling to crack down on them since they have more important things to worry about at the moment.
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
FYI: I've found that Astroglide makes a much easier-to-swallow sandwich.
"Al Gore claims to have invented the Internet", debunked (among other places) here: http://www.perkel.com/politics/gore/internet.htm (dated) and http://www.snopes.com/quotes/internet.asp
(Burning my karma once again, folks don't seem to like to see "popular" falsehoods debunked).
Jack Rickard and his army of sysops gave us the free internet.
What the hell did Albright and Clinton have to do with it?
I'm a Programmer. That's one level above Software Engineer and one level below Engineer.
Russia is not run by a mafia mob, it's run by the KGB old school. The Russian mafia is just one of many parties that would like to control the country however much like large portions of the military and the church. Russia has a lot of factions vying for control but the KGB is the current trophy holder.
I'm sure you were just referring to the current KGB elite in control as being like a mafia, but it seemed worth pointing out that there is also an actual Russian mafia who aren't in control but would like to be.