“Is the US online gambling policy in contradiction to international free trade?”

Over the last half year and in part due to the new magical awakening to the poker game, online gambling has been continuously showing a significant expansion.

In contrast to 25.43 million visitors accessing comScore Network’s gambling sites listing the previous November, the site pulled in some 29.13 million special visitors in April. This means that within the space of a mere several months, there was a staggering fourteen and a half percent rise.

The biggest attraction in April, and which drew ten point three million visitors to access their mesh of sites was that of iGlobalMedia Entertainment - comprising StarLuckCasino.com, PartyPoker.com and PartyBingo.com.

This all means that statistically the number of people accessing the sites in April the preceding year was capped by an additional 3.89 million visitors, namely, a one hundred and sixty six percent rise. The only requirement for those wishing to access iGlobalMedia’s site is to open an account after having downloaded the suitable software.

A weird tone of silence has resounded from the major companies operating these poker sites although they have maintained a speed expansion. Actually, only email addresses are posted by iGlobalMedia corporate’s site and they do not provide any phone contact numbers. Any queries asking to obtain the company’s contact numbers will be nicely rejected by PartyPoker.com’s live agents, residing in India, and who deal with customer service.

It’s likely that what holds them back and prevents them from issuing this information is connected with the entire problem of the online gambling industry’s legality. Since the World Trade Organization’s ruling that the gambling via the Internet policy of the United States is in contradiction to the United States obligations over international free trade, the entire online gambling issue has become an international one. Apart from the American online gambling sites iWin.com and FreeSlots.com, all the other fifteen most popular online gambling sites belonging to comScore are not United States-based.

Nevertheless, despite the permanent legality problem, poker sites are not opposed to making their service known to the public. Television commercials showing approval given by famous American players are operated by a number of sites. For example, PokerStars.com, a poker site located in London, featured Chris Moneymaker and Greg Rayment the champions of the World Series of Poker. If you access Pokerstars.com you can immediately see that it’s an online gambling site although the commercials tend to deny this. A weekly No Limit Texas Hold’em contest offering a definite three hundred and fifty thousand dollars prize pot is advertised in the site’s main page.