Last month, Gov. Kenny G. Guinn signed a law authorizing gambling in the casino's public areas. In other words, casino games will be available to the gambling guests while they queue for a buffet meal or as they laze about tanning themselves by the pool. Some casino guests may never even have to go to the gambling tables or slot machines as video poker, blackjack, craps, etc. will be available for them on hand-held wireless devices. The spaces authorized for gambling include restaurants, bars, convention rooms, even swimming pools, but excludes the hotel rooms in a veiled effort to keep minors off gambling.

The legislative measure is definitely welcome news for the gaming industry, as the US government closes rank, and adopts the most candid ostrich position since prohibition, by extending the Wire Act to outlaw online gambling in the country. Internet gambling is illegal in the United States, under the 1961 anti-racketeering law, but prosecutors also have been reluctant to bring charges against individuals using their home computers to place wagers through the Internet, which has encouraged some people to participate in illicit online gambling. Indeed, according to the latest news reporting on the PartyGaming IPO, American citizens make up over 80 per cent of the billion-dollar company, which shot up to the FTSE 100 select list of British companies.

In 2001, the Nevada Legislature authorized the State Gaming Commission to examine whether casinos here could enter the Internet gambling business and, after a year's study, Attorney General Frankie Sue Del Papa concluded that without a clear new federal policy it would be legally dangerous for Nevada casinos to venture into online gambling. However, the remote devices are deemed to be legal because they will not be linked to the Web, and are said to be more like a wireless network with game programmes loaded into them. No prizes for guessing where the technology or the software comes from, as Nevada casinos get a big foot in the online gambling door.

As Independence Day celebrations get under way in the state, Las Vegas casinos begin to wake up to the huge prospects that remote gambling opens up for them, and the time will come when resorts will have gambling rooms specially designed for hand held device players only. Happy Fourth of July!
(E-07.04.05)

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