US Now Says All Online Gambling Illegal, Not Just Sports Bets (bloomberg.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: The U.S. Justice Department's decision that all internet gambling is illegal will cast a pall on the industry as businesses and state lotteries evaluate the implications of the change and the government's plans to enforce it. The U.S. now says federal law bars all internet gambling, reversing its position from 2011 that only sports betting is prohibited under a law passed 50 years earlier. Although the federal law specifically prohibits transmission of wagers and related information across state lines, the Justice Department's new interpretation will impact all online gambling because as a practical matter it's difficult to guarantee that no payments are routed through other states, said Aaron Swerdlow, an attorney with Glaser Weil Fink Howard Avchen & Shapiro LLP in Los Angeles.

The reversal was prompted by the department's criminal division, which prosecutes illegal gambling. The opinion issued about seven years ago that the 1961 Wire Act only banned sports gambling was a misinterpretation of the statute, according to a 23-page opinion by the department's Office of Legal Counsel dated Nov. 2 and made public Monday. The new reading of the law probably will be tested in the courts as judges may entertain challenges to the government's view of the law's scope, the Justice Department said. It may also affect states that began selling lottery tickets online after the 2011 opinion, as well as casinos that offer online gambling. In contrast, the Supreme Court last May "cleared the way [...] for states to legalize sports betting, striking down a 1992 federal law that had prohibited most states from authorizing sports betting."

Comments

Uh, okay

[Anonymous Coward]

So states can legalize other online gambling too? Seems reasonable

Practical Difficulty

[Thunderstruck]

The article does not explain why it would be difficult as a practical matter to ensure that payments do not get routed through other states. Can anyone clarify what they mean by this? What exactly would need to be done, and how difficult would it be?

Re:Practical Difficulty

[Anonymous Coward]

The intent of "it being difficult as a practical matter" is because the prohibitive nature of wagers and related information being able to cross state lines. If you are gambling online, and you live in NJ, and a server is located in CT. Well..now the fact of your wager, and related information has crossed state lines. Even if you had independent servers located in each state to handle that state's gambling traffic you could not reasonably say that it had not crosses some network, or was bounced in a VPN through another state. The task to 'limit' traffic to a state's boundaries is not possible.

Re:Practical Difficulty

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd guess the companies and banks involved don't want to change their operations to support their clients under regulations, once again. Maybe the next generation of lawyers wake up to the new, digitally transformed and agile reality. SDC, or software defined corporation is the way of the future. *enthusiastic and impactful corporate video voice*

Re:Practical Difficulty

[AHuxley]

Total control over the US CC system.
Every use of the credit card has to be legal.
Should a US website be created and then attract users in the USA, then the US gov can "find" that same site too.
Block the easy way to move money on the internet, track all the US sites.

Re:Practical Difficulty

[Richard_at_work]

I'm wondering at how wide the US is going to start casting its net on this - VISA, MasterCard not allowed to facilitate online betting anywhere in the world because they are US companies and online betting is illegal under US law?

If you think that's reaching, I suggest reading up on the case of the Danish man buying Cuban cigars from a German seller - the US confiscated the payment as it used the SWIFT network, and Cuba is under a US embargo...

Re:Practical Difficulty

[AHuxley]

AC when a CC company is told by the US gov something is illegal, the payment wont work.

Re: Practical Difficulty

[Anonymous Coward]

Use dialup modems with local numbers. Problem solved!

Re:Practical Difficulty

[rtb61]

They can also be extremely mean, as in get the all the losers money back, less a recovery fee and block the business from claiming any future debts. Make the bets not count over statute of limits durations ie seven years, if you lost money to an internet gaming site, they can go back, get that money back and give some of it back to you, less recovery costs. Blame the dicks at Electronic Arts, getting children to gamble to scam them of their pocket money, seriously, oh yeah, they will be coming for you next, the proverbial straw and make no mistake.

There are so many ways to target online gaming sites, their executives and investors, they are sitting ducks because to get gamblers they have to publicly expose themselves and public display their intent to break the law, publicly flout the law, no choice, else they can not target enough users to keep the scams going. Expect a lot of crypto currency gambling, in fact likely the main use for crypto in the future, pretend gambling. Tax Havens will want to keep it going but they are already in the cross hairs and their days are well and truly numbered (which will bankrupt their biggest money washing laundry, the UK, the monarchists of tax evasion, the homicidal maniacs of the for profit terror war, the lack of Integrity Initiative, lying monarchist pommy cunts on parade, corrupting democracies all over the world).

Re:Practical Difficulty

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe- but there are laws in other countries which prohibit companies from discriminating. If they want to operate elsewhere they may not have a choice.

Re:Practical Difficulty

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm wondering at how wide the US is going to start casting its net on this - VISA, MasterCard not allowed to facilitate online betting anywhere in the world because they are US companies and online betting is illegal under US law?

If you think that's reaching, I suggest reading up on the case of the Danish man buying Cuban cigars from a German seller - the US confiscated the payment as it used the SWIFT network, and Cuba is under a US embargo...

Why wouldn’t US law apply to a US company operating overseas?? If not, that would leave loopholes big enough to drive a freighter of cash through.

Re:Practical Difficulty

[gl4ss]

whats probably more important is that you're not betting against other people in other states.

Re:Practical Difficulty

[Alci12]

Because those companies have to comply with local laws as well.

Re:Practical Difficulty

[Anonymous Coward]

This is a good example of what happens when Congress fails to keep up with the times and pass appropriate legislation. Online gambling has been with us for years and yet the only federal law we have to go off of predates the internet and home computers by decades. They have had ample time to pass a law that clarifies this but haven't done so. Its not just gambling either but with computing in general and other industries Congress's inability to stay with the times has lead to similar issues where regulatory bodies wing it. Needless to say this is not good.

Re:Practical Difficulty

[Anonymous Coward]

Visa and MC already block gambling payments online. They've been doing that for years.

Re:Practical Difficulty

[jeff4747]

SWIFT (the network that actually does inter-bank transfers) crosses state lines. So unless your bank's processing center and the destination bank's processing center happen to be in the same state, the transaction will cross state lines.

Also, credit card purchases are not actually processed in your state (unless you're in SD or DE). Even then the money from the credit card company will probably cross state lines when it is sent to the seller's bank.

Finally, your bank may contract out payment processing of various types. And that contractor may or may not be located within the same state as your bank.

The reason this is impossible for the consumer to deal with is there's no way for the consumer to know the location(s) where their transaction will be processed. Even if the bank processes most transactions within your state, the consumer can't guarantee that a particular transaction was not sent to a backup site in another state.

Now, we need an opinion on loot boxes

[Anonymous Coward]

If this law applies to loot box gambling, there will be a very large market with many customers that no longer welcomes unscrupulous games.

Re:Now, we need an opinion on loot boxes

[Opportunist]

I guess that closes the lid on those boxes, too. Let's hope it does.

Re:Now, we need an opinion on loot boxes

[Anonymous Coward]

Please shut down all lootbox gachapon bullshit. It's getting kids addicted to gambling. Never mind grown adults who can't see their credit cards being drained by the very same skinner box mechanics.

Re: Now, we need an opinion on loot boxes

[Anonymous Coward]

That is going to be interesting for sure...

Stocks

[backslashdot]

So investing in the stock market, or anything for that matter, is illegal?

Investing in anything has a risk/probabilistic component. Therefore it is a form of gambling. Well isnâ(TM)t it?

And donâ(TM)t retort with BS that playing blackjack online is 100% luck based .. it isnâ(TM)t. I mean, let me know randomly how clicking âoehit meâ for everything works out. All gambling takes some amount of skill to improve your odds.

Re: Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

"gambling and investing are two different things" - Hmmmmmm. I guess it depends on your methodology but even so, profiting from a taken risk is a gamble by definition. Write large, gambling. A venn diagram overlaps a bit.

Re:Stocks

[Mark of the North]

You might see similarity between the stock market and gambling, but does the same similarity exist between your savings account and gambling?

Re:Stocks

[Opportunist]

The stock market is like the old joke about poker.

Q: Is poker a game of luck and chances?
A: Not the way we play it.

Re: Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

Stocks, trading, and investing are essentially a form of legalized gambling. Not sure why OP is rated as a troll, it's a fully legitimate point.

Sure, it has its own set of nomenclature but it's throwing money at something with probability that money will either grow or shrink, like all gambling.

One may argue that it contributes back to society, the again, so do winners in traditional gambling scenarios who push their money back into the economy.

The real difference I see is that stocks allow for creating risk pools to gamble with where multiple people (shareholders) divide the risk (similar to typical insurance policies). By sharing risk in pools, the money gambled is allowed to grow and be used for more complex longer lasting games (businesses) than typical gambling (boxing match, football game, horse race...). Those really reaping the rewards leverage insider trading secrets, akin to the 'house' having the advantage in established known probability games.

Stock investments are still gambling, no matter how you dress it up.

Re: Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes. An investment has a measurable, predictable, and controllable outcome.
Don't let anyone fool you into thinking that investing in the stock market is
investing. It's not; it's gambling. It's the biggest lie the government tells people
to make people believe that their 401K is actually an investment in their future.

Now, an example of an investment is money spent on one's education. You have
a particular goal, and there are milestones along the way to measure the distance
to said goal.

People who do well in the "market" have the same skill set as a good poker player.
And poker is mostly an games of luck and memory. There is no formula to always
win. That's why it's gambling. Plain and simple. Now chess / go, etc. are games of
skill. There's no luck involved. A certain sequence of moves always produces the
same outcome. Gambling in the stock market has no such characteristic. Truth!

So, the stock market is legal sanctioned betting / gambling. Those are the facts.
Believe what you want, but don't expect sympathy when you lose from me...

CAP === 'posture'

Re:Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

No, the legal definition of gambling specifically excludes any activity governed by the securities laws (as that term is defined in section 3(a)(47) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934[1] for the purchase or sale of securities (as that term is defined in section 3(a)(10) of that Act); or any over-the-counter derivative instrument; as well as insurance contracts

Re: Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

". An investment has a measurable, predictable, and controllable outcome. " - Not quite, that's a SECURED investment. There's a lot of boilerplate legal text you're skipping to make that possible.

Re: Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

That's correct. If it isn't a SECURED investment, then it's
a gamble (i.e. unsecured by your own definition).

CAP === 'studios'

Re:Stocks

[alvinrod]

Don't forget insurance. That's just another form of gambling as well when it comes down to it. Of course the government has no problem with they or their friends who can make sizable campaign contributions engaging in the kinds of behavior that that the common man cannot.

Trying to make it illegal is stupid, since it won't stop people. It just drives everything underground and gives criminals another profitable enterprise in which they can engage.

Re: Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

IAAL.

a risk based entirely on CHANCE is the legal test for gambling. if there is STRATEGY involved, it is not.

that's why POKER is allowed in US states that have banned gambling. poker involves both chance and strategy.

now, argue among yourselves whether the stock market really involves strategy or not! ;)

if a company makes a good product, and makes money from it, it pays dividends on the stock. so generally a strategy might be to invest in a good company if it makes a good product.

Re:Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

Absolutely correct!!! Ding! Ding!
Stocks are an excluded (from anti-gambling laws) form of gambling.
If stocks we never considered gambling, there would be no need for a law
to legalize their use as an investment (that is, make their use an exclusion).

Really, people are you that gullible?

CAP === 'dispels'

Re: Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

" if there is STRATEGY involved, it is not." You can have a "strategy" with a game of chance, though. You aren't getting rid of the random by having a plan. That's self-reinforced thinking.

Re: Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

Not as long as my balance is under $100,000.

Re: Stocks

[sound vision]

It's not a matter of gullibility so much as people confusing "what the law declares" with "what is". Although my personal experience is that both types of folly tend to occur in the same people. Probably stems from a lack of critical thinking.

Re: Stocks

[tinkerghost]

Under your standard, blackjack is also not a gambling game.

Re: Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

Yep. And pretty much anything ca have a strategy (or multiple strategies) developed for it to tip chance to favor winning or a positive return on money/time/experience invested.

It is an absolutely ridiculous standard, if true, of seperating gambling from non gambling.

Re:Stocks

[Rockoon]

Lets provide proper citation here.

It is from the 1935 film "Mississippi"

The character is Commodore Jackson, played by none-other-than W.C. Fields, who over his acting career played many characters that were "gamblers", which I put in quotes because in the films, the games were always crooked, and he was in on it.

Re:Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

So investing in the stock market, or anything for that matter, is illegal?

Investing in anything has a risk/probabilistic component. Therefore it is a form of gambling. Well isnâ(TM)t it?

And donâ(TM)t retort with BS that playing blackjack online is 100% luck based .. it isnâ(TM)t. I mean, let me know randomly how clicking âoehit meâ for everything works out. All gambling takes some amount of skill to improve your odds.

I'm as lefty as anyone. I wanted to see Trump in Gitmo a long time ago, since his behavior is criminally negligent. I also have no interest in gambling. That being said, I've not heard an argument that convinces that the infringement on liberty is worth whatever gains this is supposed to have. Maybe there needs to be rules and such to try to limit stupid, but an outright ban? Seems fishy to me.

Also, what does online have to do with anything? If your going to ban gambling, then ban it. No lottery, no obviously insanely risky investments, etc. No riverboat exceptions. Seriously if we want to make the argument that gambling is bad, which it most certainly is, then you ban it entirely, not carve out exceptions for the gambling that kicks you back money.

It isn't, however the job of a government to enforce a universal morality beyond what is commonly agreed upon. If people want to personally destroy their lives with risky behavior, then they have a right to do so. Similarly I tend to think people should be perfectly able to opt out of Obamacare, if they are over the age of 18. It's just once you do, you should also opt out of your right to be treated if you walk into a hospital with no money. (I suppose you could pay the money back with interest, but you'd have to do so before you got sick, or pay all the bills after getting well, then pay the money back, then you get the right back.)

Re: Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

It's excluded specifically because as society we deem it by intent and function to be different. You can say it's gambling all you want, but the OP is asking what's different about it, and the short easy answer is so much is different about it that we specifically codify in law that it isn't gambling.

Re: Stocks

[ravenshrike]

Single deck blackjack isn't. However multi-deck blackjack effectively is. There are few, if any, casinos which play single deck anymore.

Re:Stocks

[Type44Q]

Blackjack is closer to the market, being based more on chance.

Poker, being based more on skill... is also closer to the market.

So there.

Re:Stocks

[Solandri]

There is actually a statistical difference between all of these.

• Stocks are (over time) positive sum. The total value of all stocks goes up over time, meaning on average stock investors are winners. So trading and investing in stocks is good for the economy.
• Same goes for savings accounts. They're positive sum. You make money (interest), the bank makes money (dividends from investing your savings). So it's good for the economy.
• Insurance is zero sum (negative sum if you subtract the cut taken by the insurance company). But the "winners" in insurance are people who suffer an pre-agreed loss. So insurance has the effect of minimizing individual deviations from the average. Minimizing deviations results in more economic stability (fewer bankruptcies), so it actually ends up a net gain for the economy.
• Gambling is zero sum (negative sum if you include the cut taken by the casino). On average, gamblers are losers. On top of that the winners are randomly distributed, so there's no benefit to the economy as with insurance. So gambling is on balance bad for the economy. (The only way it helps the economy is if you count its entertainment value as stress relief for the gamblers. But the few addicted gamblers who gamble too much end up counteracting this benefit on average.)

Re:Stocks

[Waffle Iron]

Don't forget insurance. That's just another form of gambling as well when it comes down to it.

There is one important pragmatic difference: You don't see very many insurance addicts blowing their family fortunes on premiums.

Re: Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah you're right.
Poker IS a more rational investment. I was on the fence until that last line of your post.

Re:Stocks

[Rockoon]

There is one important pragmatic difference: You don't see very many insurance addicts blowing their family fortunes on premiums.

But you do see folks blowing the heads off insured people for fortunes.

Re:Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

in this case i'd argue that assuming it's a matter of gullibility is a bit... idealistic.

I note that this might have an interesting effect on sports card collectors, et al.

Re:Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

Trying to make it illegal is stupid, since it won't stop people. It just drives everything underground and gives criminals another profitable enterprise in which they can engage.

While also creating a new set of criminals to exploit with our for profit prisons.

Re:Stocks

[Joe_Dragon]

Health insurance is not really insurance and out side of the usa it's more of an Health plan or add on Health plan

Re:Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

No- maybe- because my savings account is held in USD and USD is inflationary. If the USD was not inflationary and fluctuated in the same way that other hard fiat currencies did than it would be similar to gambling. If you know something is going to decline in value then it's not gambling. If you can't predict the outcome then it's certainly gambling.

Re:Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually what you're talking about is really only applicable to gambling and stocks as entire ecosystems, yes over time all stocks generally head upwards, but for unfortunate individual investors, no amount of time will change the fact that they are bankrupt

The true distinction between stocks/investing and gambling is that gambling by definition is a game of chance where the odds are entirely arbitrary. Stocks on the other hand have loads of information to inform what choices you make in them and while the ultimate outcome may be affected by chance occurrences (as it true of anything in life), the fact is that picking winners is much more a game of skill than of chance.

That's why Hold'em Poker is legal in many places where other gambling games are not because the element of skill involved in winning is large enough that you can no longer truly call it "gambling" in that sense of the word.

Re:Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

Seems like youre taking the illogical path that since all gambling is risky, all risk must be gambling. Its not.

The stockmarket requires a stat check on intelligence, but its not some arcane mystery better left to ancient sages and neither is it a game of chance.

Online gambling is 100% sucker based. Its not a game of chance in the slightest and anyone who thinks the closed source code contains an actual chance is delusional.

Re: Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

Your reasoning holds that any system too complicated to understand is gambling.

By such definitions, a hundred years ago it would have been gambling to bet on the weather. Today, not so much.

Once studied, its not hard to create a system that outperforms inflation on the stock market. Nor is it hard to create a system beating the house in blackjack.

In a western society, ones place on the rich/poor spectrum is entirely controllable.

Re: Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

"the short easy answer is so much is different about it that we specifically codify in law that it isn't gambling."

If that were true, it wouldn't need codifying in law. The fact law needs to draw distinctions means that it is so similar as to be indistinguishable unless it is explicitly stated it is not covered.

Re: Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

You clearly dont understand what the stockmarket is, when your counterexample is an education.

The stock market is dumping money into a hole and hoping somthing comes back up. You are buying shares, different ones have different prices, and the value of them can change over time.

The exact same applies to education. You buy an education, different ones have different prices (although cost differs greatly between countries, as in tax vs tuition, while time is always spent), and the value of that education can change over time. If you think the value of a specific education is static over time you are delusional.

The stock market does have a measurable, predictable, and controllable outcome as long as you have a sufficient understanding how it works. Dont blame the world that you failed the intelligence stat check, or didnt put in enough time to get an understanding of it.

Re: Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

"Super Fun" Blackjack at some California Indian reservation casinos. Payout reduced from the usual 3 to 2 for a Blackjack, it's 6 to 5. No joining in mid-deck. Assorted other rules regarding Surrender. No amount of card-counting strategy can predict the next card 100%, and spectator players have to wait for the next shuffle and deal anyway (assuming there are any extra spaces left at the usually ONE TABLE that has that game).

Re:Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

So, what you saying is the DOJ and all the other three letter departments need an increased budget to fight underground online gambling.

Re: Stocks

[jeff4747]

Only if the game is set up such that you can count cards.

Tip: No online gambling site sets up the game such that you can count cards. They're all multi-deck and reshuffled every hand.

Re:Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

Any transfer of risk for money is insurance, and if you want to compare that to "health plans" you are comparing apples to oranges.

Re: Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah, proof by:
(1) Naked assertion AND
(2) Ad hominem

Both barrels! Blam! Blam!

Re:Stocks

[Anonymous Coward]

It's still a risk. There is a very very tiny risk that my bank goes under and the FDIC doesn't have the funds to cover the loss. There is no such thing as a sure thing.

Re:Stocks

[ChrisMaple]

Savings accounts are positive sum only if you ignore government's watering the currency ("inflation"). I don't think there's been any time in the last 60 years when the return on a savings account exceeded inflation.

Trading

[Anonymous Coward]

Does that mean they're going to shut down ETrade too?

Trump's Taj Mahal

[PopeRatzo]

The fact that Trump has had an interest in several casinos in the past and says he seeks to be in the casino business again in the future has absolutely nothing to do with his Justice Department outlawing all online gambling.

Nothing whatsoever.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[Rick Schumann]

+1 Plausible (if true).
Certainly fits the profile.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[Anonymous Coward]

Well... somehow I doubt this is going to be the straw that breaks the traitor fraud's back.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[Anonymous Coward]

We can add this to the list of theories there is no evidence for.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[Rick Schumann]

No just add it to the ever-growing heap.
I'm pretty sure if they can force him to submit his tax returns and other financials we'll find all sorts of dirty dealings, that's why he won't release them.
Personally I think there should be legislation passed or a Constitutional amendment made (or modified) that requires candidates to submit all that sort of information, among other things. If we had a more rigorous vetting process we might not have had a Trump problem in the first place.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[PopeRatzo]

We can add this to the list of theories there is no evidence for.

Do you need evidence that Donald Trump had financial interests in casinos? It's public record, and he put his name on it in big letters.

Do you need evidence that Donald Trump's Justice Department just made online gambling illegal? It's right up there in the summary. So what do you need evidence for again? Those were to only assertions I made.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[Anonymous Coward]

There's no evidence for your claim that Donald Trump's Justice department made online gambling illegal due to Trump's past or potential future financial interests in casinos.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[ravenshrike]

Ah, so you're of the lack of pirates is causing global warming school. Good to know.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[PopeRatzo]

There's no evidence for your claim that Donald Trump's Justice department made online gambling illegal due to Trump's past or potential future financial interests in casinos.

I didn't make that claim. Read my comment again.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[PopeRatzo]

Ah, so you're of the lack of pirates is causing global warming school. Good to know.

I am of the "if it walks like a duck..." school.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[Anonymous Coward]

I have two things to say to that, pick whichever one applies to you:

You didn't make the claim: It is etiquette to present facts and ideas that are relevant to the topic under discussion. There are lots of things I can say that are true like "The sky is blue" and "It's now winter where I live", but they aren't relevant to the topic of online gambling prohibition, and neither is the fact that Trump once owned a casino -- there's no reason to write it unless you intend to establish a connection to the topic, and that connection is what is missing from your post.

You did make the claim: I'm going to scold you for a bit. I understand sarcasm as well as anyone else and when you use it to make a claim and then retreat when challenged to the position that you didn't literally say the thing you meant you're a liar taking a page out of Donald Trump's playbook. You are the reason discussion on Slashdot is not as intelligent as it could be. In the future, speak plainly and say clearly what you mean.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[Actually, I do RTFA]

Trump has a current interest in casinos in Nevada. He lost his interest in NJ casinos. The SC judgement that came down (and lead to this ruling) allowed non-Nevada casinos (like NJ casinos) to compete online.

It's more sour grapes than anything, since it's just killing the online market because his share is decreasing.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[PopeRatzo]

I understand sarcasm as well as anyone

I just listed two unrelated and totally true facts. You're the one who made the connection.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[PopeRatzo]

It's more sour grapes than anything, since it's just killing the online market because his share is decreasing.

I would never suggest Trump was doing things for rational reasons. He does it out of grievance and spite, which is how he does everything. It's why a certain subset of the population loves him, because theirs is the politics of grievance and spite.

Fortunately, enlightened self interest is starting to take hold, which is why his poll numbers are falling. Some people - some smalls subset of the small subset of Trump supporters - have learned that grievance and spite doesn't put food on the table. It just enables a guy who will ultimately let them all down.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[Anonymous Coward]

It's just that 'the swamp' was all on-line - now that's all drained out, the government can get on with making america great again.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[Anonymous Coward]

I saw a quote from a wavering Trump supporter:

He's not hurting the people he needs to be hurting.

So, it does seem that grievance and spite were much on her mind when voting him in.

https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/08/politics/donald-trump-2020-hurting-the-wrong-people/index.html

Re: Trump's Taj Mahal

[Anonymous Coward]

This needs to be modded to +5 facts.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[ChrisMaple]

Things like Obama's college transcripts.

Re:Trump's Taj Mahal

[Anonymous Coward]

Listen, faggot Chump supporter, Obama IS NO LONGER IN OFFICE OR EVEN IN POLITICS, and by the way he was NEVER suspected of being a Russian asset, nor was he a RAGING ASSHOLE like Chump is. FUCK OFF. Your boy is bound for utter infamy in the history books and there is NOTHING you can do about it. Oh and by the way Chump may as well be considered a TRAITOR right now for killing the government for FOUR WEEKS now. Eat shit and die.

For now

[Anonymous Coward]

I bet you 5 dollars the courts strike this down.

Does that include AAA gaming Loot Boxes?

[UnknownSoldier]

Belgium has already made loot boxes illegal due to them being another form of gambling.

When is the US going to follow?

Re:Does that include AAA gaming Loot Boxes?

[AHuxley]

The US and EU will place more demands on what a "game" is.

When creating a game a trend to ensure the game has something networked well outside the EU and USA will be a way around this control.
To ensure an easy payment system with some global gift cards is ready and well away from controlling political demands of the EU, USA and the CC on a computer game.
Make the game able to run on an OS as software outside any control by a US digital distribution platform and its US CC rules.

Re:Does that include AAA gaming Loot Boxes?

[Anonymous Coward]

God shut up please ranting paranoiac idiot, you're treading old water badly.

Re:Does that include AAA gaming Loot Boxes?

[Kazymyr]

Not just lootboxes, but more generally speaking almost all online gaming. Many online games rely on dice rolls to calculate the outcome of an action. Strike your opponent with a sword? A dice roll determines the amount of damage that you do. This can fall under the broader definition of "online gambling".

Re:Does that include AAA gaming Loot Boxes?

[AHuxley]

The EU and US governments will study the method of payment and then start to ban games, block their ability to to use CC services.
Pay for a EU nation game once and its ok.
Pay for a EU nation game once and then pay for an update and its all legal.
Pay money into a game for an in game currency?
Have to pay for a new version every year?
Pay by the month to rent photography and video software? The user never owns the software? The pro software is a professional "loot box"?
When is converting and using in game currency a way to hide paying game rent every week, month for years?
A free US "OS' that loots a users privacy to pay for the cost of "free" updates?

Re:Does that include AAA gaming Loot Boxes?

[UnknownSoldier]

That's _quite_ a bit of a stretch there Skippy.

If a sword does 1-4 damage you know you are going to roll a 1,2, 3, or 4. There is no bait-and-switch like there is with real gambling where the outcome can be *nothing.*

Second, no one is complaining about random dice rolls; only about **paying real money** for random loot.

Spending virtual currency that you earn IN-GAME isn't the problem. Spending _actual_ money is, aka Pay-to-Win, IS.

Re:Does that include AAA gaming Loot Boxes?

[Anonymous Coward]

How is spending actual money on a stupid hat that has no impact on gameplay defined as Pay-to-Win?

loot boxes

[Virtual_Raider]

I wonder if it affects loot boxes. Some EU countries think they are basically gambling

Re:loot boxes

[SmaryJerry]

Yea definitely. You pay $5 for a loot boxes and potentially win an item worth $1000 in some games. Typically you win some skin worth 5 cents but that doesn't stop people from playing for the $1000 item. When I say $1000 also that is the market value of the item due to rarity of the item. In reality it is worth next to nothing (it's a digital copy) that the company could easily mass produce if they wish. So is that gambling? The results seem like gambling but in reality you only win a few 1s and 0s that someone else doesn't have.

Re:loot boxes

[Harlequin80]

Essentially all items can be broken down into a base material that doesn't really reflect its value.

You buy a real life loot chest and get a Jackson Pollock painting. You can't really argue that it is only worth the price of the canvass and the paint.

Re: loot boxes

[Ambvai]

As an avid gambler and video gamer who follows legal trends in both fields, I'd say a quick and dirty test is how easily the value can be officially extracted from the system.

In a casino, I take my chips, walk 30 feet to a counter and get cash. In most online games... There's no official mechanism, just black market exchanges against the ToS. In parts of Asia, you put money in, get points, redeem for a tsochke, sell the tsochke to a store across the street. In an arcade, you put money in, get tickets, redeem for worthless junk. In different parts of Asia, you put money in, get points, redeem for actual products that people want or gift cards.

I'd say that 1, 3, 5 are definitely gambling, 4 is arguably, 2 is not because you're not supposed to be able to remove value. But the line gets more complex with games that DO allow it, like the D3AH.

Re:loot boxes

[SmaryJerry]

True but these can be copied exactly an infinite amount of times. Really a game company could start making copies themselves to basically print money. However, if they print too much the price would go down.

Re:loot boxes

[Anonymous Coward]

The funny thing is, real money isn't much different if any at all. You might give one million dollars each to one million people overnight by twiddling a few 0s and 1s in a computer, or printing cheap pictures.

Re:loot boxes

[Harlequin80]

Consider though that there is more money in existence than there is currency. By quite a long way in fact.

So for a lot of us money is no different than those 1s & 0s that make up an in game item.

Re:loot boxes

[SmaryJerry]

I think I get what your saying. In the stock market a company may be worth 1 million dollars but only have $1000 in cash and $100,000 in materials. The value is what people see them doing with those materials for resale value etc. It's all about confidence really. Same with these digital items. When a game's popularity goes down so does the price of it's digital goods. I just find it funny that 20 years ago no one was paying for skins and every company that did micro-transactions or charged for updates was hated. Now the whole free-to-play thing has taken off people can accept that digital cosmetics cost money. It's essentially people with money subsidizing those that want to play for free. Anyways I went on a tangent.

What is the reasoning behind anti-gambling

[Anonymous Coward]

I've never understood the US attitude about gambling. It's like nudity - everyone shuns it but the US has a giant porn market. Same with gambling. Just come out of the closet friends!

Re:What is the reasoning behind anti-gambling

[ledow]

I live in the UK.

In my last house (in quite a respectable area of London, famous for very posh schools etc.), the local high street was dead. There were a handful of shops.

What happened is that betting shops moved in. Dozens of them. At one point, six in the same street (which was only short).

The people going in are pissing away their money to fund an addiction. They've now had to introduce laws to reduce the maximum bet on a "fixed odds betting terminal" (fruit machine to you and me) to £2, because it was getting up to £100 for one spin in some instances.

To generalise, the clientele are generally unwanted - dozens and dozens of people who crowd the ATMs on the day when benefits (social security) are paid, draw it out instantly, and spend all day in the betting shops and drinking.

It's not everyone. I have what the British call "a flutter" occasionally, and I'm a mathematician too, so I can do the maths to tell you that you'll never win on average. But you don't really want your population gambling away money unless you own and tax the casinos so heavily that it's beneficial - even then, the social cost is enormous because the people who gamble the most are those that can't afford to.

Las Vegas is tainted because of this for me - I get that it's a part of the US culture in that area, and casinos are different to grubby betting shops, but the clientele are the same.

You'd think you could just tax it to oblivion to counteract any effect, but it does more than just encourage people to get into debt. It's an addiction. There are "gamble aware" programs, where anything advertising gambling has to offer certain functions (i.e. to let people "lock" themselves out of their account for a period of time, to encourage them to "gamble responsibility", and so on). In Italy and other places in Europe, cruise ships (which used to be seen as luxury liners for the rich) are now just regarded with condemnation because they are just used as offshore gambling and drinking dens, usually for British tourists!

The TV is full of adverts for bingo and casinos (online and offline). It's become "the norm" to be swamped in gambling advertising.

There's a big difference between someone playing a lottery once a month (what I'd say was analogous to, say, a village fete tombola) and high-level gambling establishments. Online can be dangerous - it's just a number on a screen.

Gambling will always exist. But it can lead to a degeneration if it's unchecked. I don't get the online/offline distinction but certainly controls need to be in place. The UK ditched most of the legislation about what can apply to be a casino or gambling establishment, and all it means is that the whole high street is just full of gambling places, and websites full of gambling ads.

I've gambled in Las Vegas. I've gambled on cruise ships (but the QE2 was the last of the luxury liners and wasn't gambling-focused at all, it was just a fancy evening dressed up). I know the odds and play games for a living. Hell I have a felt card table, card shoe and poker chips in my lounge as I speak... but even to me, unrestricted or lax gambling legislation has lead to an easily observable phenomenon and every-day news story headline... "My boyfriend stole our benefits to gamble away all our money, and now we're homeless".

I can understand them wanting to limit it. The ruling is a bit arbitrary, but gambling isn't as victimless as you might think. It's not the people losing the money they need to live that are hurt... they are suffering for their own stupidity. It's the knock-on effect on society.

Re:What is the reasoning behind anti-gambling

[edi_guy]

Gambling I thought was harmless until I witnessed first hand a buddy of mine go down the tube with online gambling on the early days of online poker. We're talking the age of dial up modem. The guy lost a ton of money, basically wiped out, started running up credit cards, getting cash from cards, just everything to gamble. After first making fun of him, as this progressed we really started to get scared for him. Ended up sabotaging his modem, then his computer, then basically what nowadays they would call an intervention. Though less touchy feelly and more "Dude, you are a *&#$$ dumb*@!#, you better get your @#$@ together, or we're kicking you out of the place."

He got over it, but a couple times years later we'd meet up for a wedding or something where you can gamble, Nassau, Bahamas etc, he would hit the tables and go nuts, lose all his cash. Though he did win $9k one night, and we ended up hiding $8k of that from him until after the trip. By that time he was smart enough to let us take his credit cards away too. But that impulse looks scary and call it what you want, addiction, moral deficit, habit, whatever...its the real deal and if I were running the world I would seek to minimize it as much as possible.

Re:What is the reasoning behind anti-gambling

[grumling]

But using the state's punishment system as a deterrent seems rather drastic to me, especially when you see what the War On Drugs® has done to the United States. And by driving it underground it will promote a certain counterculture aesthetic that might make the activity even more seductive to someone who's already vulnerable.

Re:What is the reasoning behind anti-gambling

[Anonymous Coward]

Wire gambling is banned due to the high fraud rate.

In particular, it offered nothing like the protections that were offered by the legal casinos against crooked games.

The same about internet video poker. There's no power strong enough to ensure they aren't rigged.

Re:What is the reasoning behind anti-gambling

[Anonymous Coward]

Fuck off. There are lots of things that are addictive. It's not any of your business how other people spend there money. It's also none of your business if they live or die. Leave each to his own or the next thing you get is a bullet in your head for utilizing violence (ie government) against those who disagree with you.

Re:What is the reasoning behind anti-gambling

[bradley13]

That's a very moving description of the kinds of problems that gambling can lead to. And you're right: gambling tends to be done - not by the millionaires - but by the people who can least afford it. Hoping for that one big win to heave themselves out of their misery, and thereby putting themselves on the street.

That said, banning activities is (usually) counterproductive, because it just drives them underground. In the case of gambling, would it not be better to treat it the way we do smoking? Prohibit advertising, make it as unattractive as possible. So you can have your betting shop, but you cannot advertise, and you cannot have anything but a plain shopfront. For internet sites, of course, it is a lot more difficult, but one can still try, and regulation of the payment processors may be the best lever.

OTOH there is no cure for human stupidity. People have been pissing away their wages for as long as there have been wages. If you could eliminate gambling, people would drink their wages, or smoke them, or give everything to some charismatic cult leader. The only "cure" is long-term, trying to ensure that kids get solid educations and employment opportunities, so that fewer of them turn into the hopeless types that do this kind of stuff...

Re:What is the reasoning behind anti-gambling

[djinn6]

I feel like I've heard this story many times. Drugs, alcohol, sex, internet. Then there's ones people don't consider addictions, such as work and love.

For most people, they get caught in one of those traps. It ruins them for a while, then they learn not to do it again.

It's definitely worse for them than not having been addicted at all, but I don't think there's a way to learn that lesson without going through the process. If it's not gambling, it'll be one of those other things. It's just unfortunate that for some of them, it ends up being fatal.

Re:What is the reasoning behind anti-gambling

[serviscope_minor]

moral deficit

I think it's a quite common attitude that it's a moral deficit so they deserve it really. I mean they should just be stronger.

I am not likely to ever get addicted to gambling because I simply don't get any kind of rush from it. It's very easy to not be addicted to something which to me is a bit boring and expensive.

But there's no moral fortitude in me not gambling.

Re:What is the reasoning behind anti-gambling

[misnohmer]

So your argument is that if a business is undesirable on your street it should be illegal? I bet you wouldn't want a sewage treatment plant next door to you, does that mean you will argue they should be outlawed in UK? This is why there are zoning laws and regulations, to keep businesses from disrupting neighborhood - obviously something failed on your street by allowing six gambling shops to open next to each other.

You argument about addiction has some merit, but you could argue that about alcohol too. Are you a proponent banning all alcohol for human consumption because, no argument there, alcohol addition has ruined many lives? How about sex? That can be a powerful addiction too. Are the Brits wanting to outlaw sex too (introduce hospitalized procreation sex and only allow recreational sex on cruises)? Banning gambling, alcohol, or sex, doesn't work - people who want to do it will find a way. The way to deal with it in society is to control it, if for no other reason other than because you can't stop it and futile trying is very expensive.

About Vegas and the US, I think people who don't live here think Vegas is the only place with gambling. Most states have casinos today. You can usually find one within driving distance unless you live in places like Utah. I've lived in a number of states (not Nevada), and I could usually drive to a casino and/or a card room in under an hour, most often under 20 minutes.US is fighting online gambling, but brick and mortar locations are still growing all over - governments are encouraging those (for obvious reasons).

I think it all boils down to how paternalistic you want your government to be. Should they treat their citizens as irresponsible children who need to be tightly controlled because "the government knows better what's good for you" or should you give people freedom to determine their own future? You mention how cruise ships fell into disrepute because of gambling. Well, that's how it's supposed to be. If there was a market for gambling free cruises, they would be offered, evidently there isn't if they are not offered (or maybe you just discovered a great investment opportunity?). Also, people wouldn't be going on cruises to gamble if they could gamble at home.

You know, there was one government in history which "knew better" and controlled their citizens as much as possible - Communist Russia. They always knew better what is best for their citizens. More libraries or more night clubs? Of course, libraries are better than night clubs for society right? Well, how come people risked life and limb to escape such controlled society then? Personally I prefer to live in a free society, even if it enables people to be stupid and self-destructive.

Re:What is the reasoning behind anti-gambling

[misnohmer]

Are you voting for prohibition too? Or not yet, because you don't know anyone who had their life ruined by alcohol?

Re:What is the reasoning behind anti-gambling

[Anonymous Coward]

Fuck them. And double fuck the baby sitters of the world.

America should not err on the side of caution, but on the side of more freedom. Sorry you've got a personality disorder that causes you to do things to such an extreme that it ruins your well-being. But I am not sorry enough to take the ability to do those things away from everyone who doesn't have such a disorder.

Re: What is the reasoning behind anti-gambling

[Anonymous Coward]

Will this get rid of all gambling? It won't? Only shady online gambling sites? Good, good riddance. No one is saying outlaw all gambling. What we are saying is outlaw these shitty websites that stack the odds and trick consumers.

Re: What is the reasoning behind anti-gambling

[Anonymous Coward]

You sound like a fine upstanding citizen.

Tip: when someone's addiction starts effecting you, it becomes your problem. His friend couldn't pay rent, that then became a we problem, and no longer a his problem.

Also, it's called being a friend, you know, like the golden girls. Would blanch let rose get addicted? No she would not, thanks for being a friend.

Re: What is the reasoning behind anti-gambling

[Anonymous Coward]

Your strawman isnt working. Apparently we all agree on this issue and only a few clueless fucks like you seem to disagree.

Ethereum

[Anonymous Coward]

We finally found _some_ use for it.

Horse Racing

[Anonymous Coward]

This ban doesn't include horse racing/off-track betting. Those are specifically exempt.

I must have been sleeping

[Anonymous Coward]

During my American government classes. I didn't realize the DOJ was a legislative branch. So why the hell do we even have Congress any way?

Re:I must have been sleeping

[Anonymous Coward]

The DOJ is part of the Executive branch. Congress writes and passes the laws, and within those laws they delegate some of their Legislative power to the Executive branch to further clarify and interpret the law. These interpretations and further clarifications are called Regulations. There are limits to what Congress can delegate, and to what the Executive branch agencies may regulate.

Congress is the forest, and the Executive branch regulations are the trees. Congress may say, it would be good to protect endangered species, but we are not experts on what is and isn't endangered and the best way to protect them; therefore, let us establish an agency or delegate our legislative authority to an existing agency which should be comprised of experts to legislate the best way to achieve our goals, and then handle the day to day administration of this policy.

Constitution?

[Anonymous Coward]

Show me in there where the have authority to do this.

Re:Constitution?

[Anonymous Coward]

Although Article 1 Section 1 explicitly states that only Congress may legislate and cannot delegate that power, since 1928 in J. W. Hampton, Jr. & Co. v. United States, and countless cases since then, the SCOTUS has held that Congress does indeed have the implied power to delegate this power, so long as it provides clear rules and guidelines for what it is asking for. So Congress can't say "we don't want to set any tax rates, Mr. President, you know best, you make all the tax rules". However, it can say, "Mr. President, we are concerned about cheap outside goods coming into the country and hurting our local manufacturers, we think the best way to solve this is to use tariffs, we think these tariffs should be updated frequently and should be balanced against the interests of consumers and domestic manufacturers, and we'd like you to do some research, hire experts, and decide what the tariff rate should be and on which products."

In this case, the summary is sensationalized. This is just the DOJ saying that we are interpreting this law in this was, and will allow the criminal division to prosecute based on this interpretation. If it is correct, the judiciary will actually make the final say on whether or not this is the way the law is supposed to be read. The DOJ didn't make anything illegal, it just said it is now going to interpret the law to include different acts as illegal.

Pot's illegal too

[Anonymous Coward]

As sure as my late upstanding Dad got a ticket for going 70 in a 55 in North Carolina back in the day--one of the few times he got caught. And allegedly you aren't supposed to drink until you're 21. Now what was all that fuss too about the last POTUS and his "brackets" in the White House? Word is too that the king ain't none too pleased about his tea in the harbor.

I'll *bet* not much comes of this for a lot of people.

So...

[argStyopa]

...what about lockboxes, then?

Re: So...

[Anonymous Coward]

Rogues can still pick them for you. Depends on the rogues pick pocketing level though. Make sure to ask in /global or /trade chat.

Yeah, it kind of is

[rsilvergun]

the government heavily regulates who can buy and sell stocks. You can't for instance, as a small investor, just pick a random company to give money to. There are rules about how, where and when you can invest specifically to prevent predatory investment instruments. To say nothing of the rules about soliciting investments.

A friend's company went on the lookout for investors for a new product and it's crazy how many rules there are on both sides of the equation. The only thing that makes gambling any different is the rules get suspended if you go to Las Vegas or an Indian Casino. For the most part those two self regulate to keep the absolute worst excesses in check (though they still take advantage of people to what I would say is an appalling degree).

Re:Yeah, it kind of is

[apoc.famine]

You can't for instance, as a small investor, just pick a random company to give money to.

What? Of course you can. You pick one, walk in, drop a bunch of cash, and walk out. Granted that makes you a really shitty investor and the ROI isn't there, but that's totally doable.

A fool and his/her money will soon be parted

[PKI Champion]

Let'em bet it. Let'em win or lose. The mechanism or location used for placing the bet and conducting the transaction should not matter. My father always told me never to bet money that I was not willing to lose. If it's a bad bet, and you don't know it, then you're the fool. And, a fool and his/her money will soon be parted. If you're at a poker table and you don't know who the weakest player at the table is, then it's you! Same holds when you're doing things on the internet.

This whole thing about reinterpretation of 50 year old laws strikes me oddly. We in the U.S. have a Congress right now that is more interested in getting re-elected and filling their own pockets than making sound and just laws. Sadly, there may actually be money to be made and fun to be had without this reinterpretation. Too bad. Call your Congress whatchamacallit and tell them you want to place bets and be responsible for your own losses and hunger!

Re:A fool and his/her money will soon be parted

[Anonymous Coward]

Be thankful you and your father where not genetically predisposed to addition or had the ability to over come it, many are not so lucky.

But why?

[WolfgangVL]

I've never understood why gambling is so much of a controlled substance here in the US. I can buy scratch tickets at the gas station, pull tabs at the bar, and nobody ever gets raided for playing poker.... but for some reason every few years there seems to be some big gambling scare. I've always kind of assumed it was just marketing to get people to go to Vegas?

Somebody enlighten me.

Re:But why?

[Anonymous Coward]

easy: taxes

Re:But why?

[Actually, I do RTFA]

A lot of it is morality laws, but there is also a very important reason - regulation and cheating. If the stat wasn't behind the scratch tickets (or auditing them), it would be very easy for them to lie about the odds. And that matters, because although gambling is a bad investment, your expected loss determines how expensive it is as a hobby/fun activity. I mean, if you piss away $50 at a blackjack table, that may be a fun evening for you. If only 1/2 the aces were being dealt, you were cheated. That's why Nevada has a strict gambling oversight body

Re:But why?

[djinn6]

Those regulations are for the casinos, not the gamblers. If a few of them started cheating, they'd make more money than the rest. But it'll give a lot of customers bad experiences in the process, which drives them away from the activity. All other casinos then make less money. It's a case of the tragedy of the commons, with gamblers being the field and casinos being the herders.

Re:But why?

[serviscope_minor]

I've never understood why gambling is so much of a controlled substance here in the US.

Because it's as addicitve and damaging as some controlled substances are.

Humans are manipulatable monkeys for the most part. And gambling organisations have shown they have no qualms about using that to the maximum extent regardless of lives they destroyed. The law in this case doesn't recognise some idealised form of human that doesn't really exist, it actually recognises humans as they are.

Only applies to online gambling crossing state bou

[Anonymous Coward]

This /. article leaves out key pieces of information quoted in the source: this is an opinion (and NOT a law or regulaton!) and impacts forms of online gambling *crossing state lines* ONLY.

As long as online gambling does not cross state boundaries AND the state itself has regulated online gambling, such as New Jersey, online gambling is perfectly legal but ONLY on those sites regulated and approved by appropriate regulators. Other states where itâ(TM)s perfectly legal to gamble online include Nevada, Delaware. But everything - e.g. players, servers, also taxes ;), have to remain within the state boundaries.

E.g. for New Jersey hereâ(TM)s the list of authorized and legal online gaming sites regulated by the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement: https://www.nj.gov/lps/ge/gamingsites.html.

The other part worth mentioning is this is ONLY an *opinion* that does not carry any legal weight whatsoever.

Hmm... Who benefits?

[gregstumph]

Gee, a cynic would say think that the Trump administration did this to benefit brick-and-mortar casino owners, such as, oh, I don't know, Sheldon Adelson.

Re: Only applies to online gambling crossing state

[illiac_1962]

Do loot boxes count?

Who does this benefit?

[GezusK]

I would think this benefits physical gambling establishments. Who do we know that owns physical gambling establishments?

Evils of gambling.

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh dear - the Stock Market is in trouble.

Insurance now illegal?

[misnohmer]

All insurance is based on statistical risk. Is selling insurance online now illegal?

Re: Insurance now illegal?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm glad no one is upvoting you. Every couple posts you throw out these strawmen and no one bites. Good. You are a fool and keep getting proven to be a fool over and over the more you post your strawmen.

Do you want to bet on that?

[Roger W Moore]

Trying to make it illegal is stupid, since it won't stop people.

Really? Do you want to bet on that?

down with Christian law

[Anonymous Coward]

"land of the free" my ass. most hypocritical country ever. sick of living in a fucking theocracy.

Re: down with Christian law

[Anonymous Coward]

Then move to China. Fuck off.

It's a trap!

[Anonymous Coward]

I think an offline version of your hilarious bet is essentially happening right now -- between the owners of Internet casinos.

Lottery?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wouldn't this force Mega-millions and PowerBall out of business?
These lotteries are both multi-State.

Love /. Headlines

[dcw3]

How does a Justice Dept opinion become "US Now Says...Blah, Blah, Blah"? Especially considering that opinion isn't binding, and not representative of the US. The courts will tell us what is and isn't legal when they get a case to respond to. And clearly, it is legal within state lines no matter what Justice says because SCOTUS...wait for it...trumps them.

state lines

[bugs2squash]

Among other definitions ! I found online that a state line is: "a border between one state and another in a country with states"

This would seem to mean that it does not apply to crossing the border between, say, Minnesota and Canada and perhaps again crossing the border between Canada and Alaska.

Maybe Alaska will become the online vegas

Re:state lines

[jeff4747]

A province is legally considered a state.

Tip: If you think you've come across a totally awesome legal loophole based on using certain words, you haven't come across a loophole and the judge will be very annoyed at your pedantry.

Lootboxes

[SirSmiley]

Are these not basically gambling for kids? Fuck off Activision and EA

Good. Read your bible, kids.

[Anonymous Coward]

Gambling is a gateway habit. It leads to things like prostitution, pedophilia and the worship of false gods. The bible teaches us that gambling is an immoral act and no matter what the liberal SJW's and video game haters tell you this country is a CHRISTIAN one.

Wall Street

[sixsixtysix]

The biggest gambling racket in the world is Wall Street. Investing is nothing more than gambling and should be taxed and regulated as such.

Re:Wall Street

[Anonymous Coward]

> Investing is nothing more than gambling

Not at all. Given a long enough time frame, an investor will win EVERY TIME. Gambling cannot provide that.

Re: Only applies to online gambling crossing state

[Anonymous Coward]

Loot boxes count as gambling as much as collectible cards.

Re: Only applies to online gambling crossing state

[Anonymous Coward]

Does playing the stock market count? Does Legal Off Track Betting count?

Re: Only applies to online gambling crossing state

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly! This ruling might save gaming.

#shitholecountry #freedumbs

[Anonymous Coward]

SO FREE GAIS!! lololol

If Intenet gambling becomes illegal in the U.S.A.

[Anonymous Coward]

does that mean Americans will have to go to Nevada to gamble on-line?

Draftkings?

[foradoxium]

what about sites like draft kings, that are being pushed and encouraged by the sport leagues themselves?