"Internet Poker Creates Billionaires"

It can be said that the online gambling industry worldwide, and particularly with reference to online poker, is flourishing. This is regardless of the issue of legality in the United States as to online gambling. The United States is still struggling with the issues at hand while in Britain, the government has gone ahead and passed legislation that allows online gambling through the use of severe controls and regulations. In the face of this, one of the largest online poker companies, Partly Gaming, is planning a flotation at the end of the month on the London Stock Exchange. The financial value of PartlyGaming is placed by analysts at 5.5 billion pounds and, at the time of its flotation it will become one of the largest companies in England, exceeding in value such household names as Cable and Wireless, Boots, and British Airways.

If the flotation is successful, former pornographer lawyer Ruth Barasol, PartlyGaming’s owner, along with her husband, and two Indian technology university graduates, will become billionaires.

The popularity of poker has grown at an ever more accelerated pace since its being first fueled by television stations televising the Poker World Series back in 2001. This growth in popularity since the advent of Internet poker and its rise in attractiveness has made this surge in poker activity nothing if not short of spectacular. Spectators of the televised Poker World Series have become hooked and have started wanting to play as well. The presence of celebrities such as Tobey Maguire , Nicole Kidman, Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, and Sarah Jessica Parker, at these tournaments has had the affect of luring even more players to the game, creating one of the best ever growing industries around. Last year, in a 12 month period, the online poker market grew by 466 percent. It in fact reached 1.4 billion dollars. Industry experts are predicting that this number will actually double during this year bringing the amount to 2.9 billion dollars. Pokeredpulse.com, which is a monitoring service of online poker, has reported as much as 200 million dollars in wagers in just the last 24 hours alone. PartlyGaming CEO Richard Begal, has said that what has been accomplished by the gaming industry through the use of Internet technology is to give people the chance to play whenever they want. They can play at their leisure in their homes without having to deal with the intimidating prospect of having to look their opponents in the eye as they would if they were in a real-life game.

There are many who are not supportive of the online gambling industry. They are concerned largely due to their fear that easy access to gambling as provided through the Internet may result in large growing numbers of people who will acquire gambling addictions. The counselors at Gambler’s Anonymous, which is an organization that makes counseling available to people with gambling problems, report seeing the immediate effects of the Internet gambling boom directly. They refer to the dramatic rise in the number of calls the service receives from those reporting a gambling addiction. A Gambler’s Anonymous spokesman is reported as stating that gambling on the Internet is very similar to Internet pornography. Just as moving one’s mouse over a computer is a lot easier for many people than is actually going into a sex shop and buying the goods face to face, so access to casinos online makes gambling much easier. Most of the callers, he claims, are blaming the Internet for their addiction. But just as is the case with online pornography, the vast amounts of money to are being made is making it extremely unlikely that much will be done to curtail this rapidly expanding industry.