Online poker in Australia dd

[vegemaybe]

888 has pulled out of Australian market with Pokerstars not far behind. This is due to pending legislation banning all forms of offshore on-line gambling. On-line poker is not the main target, but rather offshore sports-betting companies as they don't pay taxes. Legal - tax paying - online betting is huge in Australia (similar to UK) and IMO its all about protecting their interests.

Received e-mail today:

Hey xxx,
Following a business reevaluation, we’d like to inform you that 888poker’s services are not being offered to players residing in Australia and therefore your account will be closed as of 16/01/2017.

You’ll continue to be able to withdraw all funds from your bankroll using our web cashier.

If you’ve already registered to any of our tournaments starting from 16/01/2017 onwards, please unregister as you won’t be able to participate.


Regards,
888poker team

[zealanddonk]

Fuck, that isn't good at all.
I doubt NZ will bother doing the same thing, and it astounds me that western liberal democracies just don't legalise it, sell licenses, collect sweet sweet tax revenues and peel off some filthy tourism dollars by hosting tournaments for the companies like the ANZPT Stars used to have.

[ftpjesus]

Problem is it seems usually based on some self-righteous morality of saving the public from themselves.. Oh we're the government and we know whats best for you BS like here in the USA or its the more seedy and asinine crap like Quebec has been trying to pull which is.. We don't mind online poker or anything but we want to run it exclusively ourselves so we're getting the rake from it to bring in more money nevermind how shitty our software development is because we have no creative talent working for us because they can all make more money in the private sector....