The charity league sponsorship program has been recently announced by Flop2River.com. The idea of the program sprang from a customer in Chicago area who was creating a business focused on creating poker tournaments for charities on their local area.

“The premise behind the program is to help new charity leagues procure the correct equipment up front for the charity event”. To give back to charities, larger leagues can qualify for the “Final Table” sponsorship – the final and most interesting part of the program.

With the help of the program, new organizations can make sure that their equipment is properly marked and reliable; everything is properly assembled and shipped.

“We’ve spent a lot of time searching for quality manufacturers who can produce quality poker tables at a price that works for large event planners. It also feels great to be able to give something back to charities as well in the form of final table sponsorship. It’s my favorite part of our business”, said Geoffrey F. Moore, managing partner of Flop2River.com.

By the way, pictures of the poker tables used for the final table sponsorship can be found at Flop2River.com.

With online gambling getting more popular, many countries have come to the decision to remove their anti casino gambling laws and replace them with gambling regulation. Ireland is not an exception.

Dermot Ahern, the newly appointed Minister for Justice, Equity and Law Reform thinks the casino gambling laws have “past they sell-by date”. In Ahern’s opinion, it is becoming impossible to outlaw casino gambling sites entirely. So, proper regulation is required. But the minister is not going to act hurriedly. First, he feels there is need “to consult with the public and develop cross-party agreement”.

A Casino Regulatory Committee has already produced a report on online casino gambling, though it has not been released yet and there have been no plans made for the regulation of online casino gambling.

France is reported to start issuing authorization for online betting operators from the second half of 2009. The decision followed the meeting between Budget Minister Eric Woerth and International Market Commissioner Charlie McCreevy where they discussed proposals that would avert court action against France by the EU over restrictions on online gambling.

Whether legal proceeding will be suspended, it’s not clear yet. The French government should send detailed provisions to EU authorities. To notice, the share of revenues from the gambling sector has been put at 5.3 billion euros ($8.27 billion).

“Regarding horse racing, only parimutuel betting will be allowed,” Woerth said. The term “pari-mutuel” refers to the system in which the total sum bet on a race is placed in a pool and the final prize is not set until all bets are placed.

“For other forms of sports betting, we will hold discussions with leagues and federations. There, we will not have parimutuel betting but fixed odds betting,” he said. (Fixed odds betting is a system in which the prize is agreed before bets are placed.). Woerth added: “We also want to open up casino games like poker but also roulette or black jack.

Woerth said: “Licenses would require minors to be prevented from betting and would contain strong protection for gamblers given the risk of addiction, as well as restrictions on advertising and controls against money laundering”.

The potential buyers of the Svenska Spel gaming monopoly are welcome. The government is selling off the parts of the monopoly. The games that are less likely to lead to gambling addiction are on sale.

The government’s gaming commission is working on modernizing and strengthening Sweden’s gaming regulations. The gaming commission is also responsible for the examination of various gaming companies and making decisions whether to allow these companies to participate in the market or not.

As for the sale itself, the gaming commission has to judge whether the sale is appropriate from the point of social protection aspects and Sweden’s obligations under EU law.

It is reported that Charles Barkley has not settled his gambling debt with Wynn Resorts. Having lost money playing high-stakes card games and sports betting, Barkley owes the casino $400,000.

After the public promise last week to pay the debt immediately, Charles Barkley has not made any payment yet.

Some people suppose Barkley is on the edge of bankruptcy, but there is no proof. Still, there must be some financial crisis in his private life, especially if to take into consideration the fact that he has spent approximately $50 million in gambling losses.

Las Vegas District Attorney David Roger has promised to file a criminal complaint if Barkley doesn’t pay up by June 9.

The project of Asian Coast Development (Canada) Ltd. to build a 4.2-billion-dollar tourism complex in southern beach area near Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, has been approved by the government of Vietnam. The complex will consist of casinos, five stunning resorts, conference and exhibition centre, a shopping hall, restaurants and a 200-acre golf course located on the white-sand beaches of Vung Tau Province.

Gambling is banned in Vietnam, but foreign tourists are allowed to visit a casino in the port of Haiphong.

The internet gambling law has been recently passed by the parliament of South Africa. To come into effect the bill should be signed by the president of South Africa Thabo Mbeki.

The aim of the law is to fight the negative effects of online gambling such as money laundering, gambling addiction and player protection.

In accordance with the law every player in South Africa will have to register with a licensed online gambling company proving he or she is over 18 years old. Besides, the law allows electronic monitoring system that helps root out potentially addictive behavior and restricts credit extensions to players.

Despite the UIGEA, there is a growing interest in online casino gambling by U.S. citizens.

The statistics presented by ZD Net shows that growth of online gambling (an interest of 12,592 compared to the previous month of 11,082) follows the growth of interest in the Radio Entertainment field and Gay and Lesbian interests.

According to ZD Net, Google was the top search engine with more than 68% of all search engine traffic. It was followed by Yahoo (18%), MSN (12%), AOL (4%) and Ask.com (2.4%).

Approximately 68% of users click on the first page of search results, what explains the fact that it is competitive to get websites listed in the top search results.

To the mind of ZD Net Web 2.0 will attain $4.6 billion by the year of 2013, so it is clear that the online gambling industry should stay here.

It has become known that Charles Barkley, retired NBA star, owes a $400,000 gambling debt to a Las Vegas casino. As a result of the failure to repay four $100,000 casino loans received on October 18 and 19, 2007, Barkley has faced criminal charges. He admitted his fault saying that he had let the time lapse.

In case Barkley agrees to the standard district attorney’s office restitution program, he could be granted up to six months to pay the $400,000 plus a 10 percent program fee totaling $40,000. If the case remains unresolved, “as many as four felony theft or four felony bad check charges could be filed. The possible penalty for each theft conviction is 1 to 10 years in state prison. A conviction on a felony bad check charge could carry a one- to four-year term”.

Barkley has been gambling for 20 years, and he makes no secret of it. He is known to have gambled about $10 million over the years. Barkley admits that gambling is a bad habit, but he is not going to give up.

The owners of Hoosier Park Racing area, state of Indiana, are going to introduce casino operation in addition to their horseracing business. Slot machines are the only way to gamble there. But there are rumors that poker tables and some more traditional games will appear there in the future.

The opening of the new venture is to take place on June 2, but local residents are invited to experience it before the official open.

The new business initiative will create up to 500 new jobs.