Five Years In Prison For SL Casino Opertors ?

A question asked by Many of you, the response "Linden Dollars aren't real money" comes to mind, But i will remind you, Vegas Chips aren't Money either, BUT they ARE convertable into Money.

The new act CLEARLY states:
`(C) a communication, which entitles the recipient to receive money or credit as a result of bets or wagers, or for information assisting in the placing of bets or wagers;

This means anything that is used in Lieu of actual Cash on the table. Poker chips, or LINDEN DOLLARS for the purposes of this act fall Clearly, and Concisely into that Catagory

Elementary Law.

The only REAL safety for SL players is that their bets fall into amounts so low that most Prosecutors wouldn't bother going after either Wagerer, or Casino Owner. The Costs of prosecution has always made chasing down Penny Ante games a Low Priority.

Apart from that one consideration the Owners of SL Casinos Are Very much in Violation of the Law. LL TOS i believe makes using the SL environment in furtherance of a Criminal Enterprise a Violation of TOS and such Violations are Punishable by term or permanant bans.

Angel

There is no thin line here... it's completely illegal. There's no way the govt would dismiss this on a minor opinion of 'are lindens$ money or not'

It's so friggin obvious its gambling for money on the internet.

Don't you think all of the internet gambling companies would have created a 'buy credits' system for their online casinos if this thought process actually held up?

The problem is:

A) The govt hasn't found out the SL casinos yet
B) LL has not stepped in to warn their residents that SL casinos and gambling is now illegal. LL has an obligation to warn us, so Joe Schmoe casino owner doesn't end up going to jail. ... but I doubt LL will mention anything until the govt actually threatens them. LL did nothing about trademark violations until the govt pressured them to do something about it or risk the consequences.. so LL went around giving out warnings and removing things for about a month or so.... and now LL is barely doing anything once again.

LL and us residents need to realize that as SL gets huge and mainstream, the govt will be entering to police. It's just the same with myspace... myspace became huge, and now the govt watches. .... In fact just last week a kid was questioned by the Secret Service IN HER SCHOOL for posting a message that said 'kill president bush' .... So... the govt will be in SL soon enough, if they're not in already.

I believe i just said that.

Is LL Obligated to warn us of something that has been in every television, internet, radio, and print news media for the last few weeks? I would have to counter with the question, How do you Log into Second Life from the cave you must live in to NOT be aware of it?
I don't even Live in the United States and i know of it.

No, I don't think LL has an Obligation to warn people specificly of every possible law they might be breaking while pursuing amusements using their world. They DO state that doing something Illegal using their world is not allowed and they can Ban you for it. IF they intend to begin banning people for an activity that, up until recently, Has been Legal in SL, then they are morally obligated to send out a Blanket "Cease and Desist" order before they do so, Giving Players a Chance to bring themselves Back into Legal compliance with TOS. Beyond this, the responsibility is yours, and you can't sluff it off onto LL by saying they didn't warn you Internet Gambling is Illegal. I don't remember them specificly naming many other things that are Illegal either, But they will Ban you very quickly if you do them.

Now what i would like to know is;
Given the Current Illegal Status of Gambling on the Internet, Does LL have Firm Plans in place to begin Enforcement (Warnings, Bans Etc.)?
Anyone with an Authoritative Answer?

Angel.

I really don't think Tringo is gambling. There are no wagers being made. Perhaps you could argue that there are wagers being made, if everyone was forced to pay to play. You would definitely call it a wager if people were betting on who would win a particular round, but they aren't. People make voluntary contributions to a prize pool. Often people who are not even playing are the ones making contributions to the prize, and have 0% chance to win. How could that be a wager?

If you consider Tringo gambling, than you would have to consider almost any contest with prize money 'gambling.' We would have to ask, will club owners spend 5 years in prison for "Best in Black" contests?

I hate to break it to you, but the US dollar is based on nothing but the US economy. WE got off the gold standard in the 20s. Don't believe me? Look at a dollar. It says Federal reserve Note. Ones printed prior to 1920 say Gold or Silver note. And yes we are exchanging property for $L. We get a address block on a hard drive in a server ina server farm controlled by Linden Labs. So Lindens are as valable as Dollars.

Tringo would be defined as "skill gaming", due to the fact that it primarily is the participants skill at the game rather than chance that determines outcome.

Contrast with a slot machine in which the only skill involves pushing a button...

WOW put down the CRACK PIPE! The paranoia is getting out of hand.......... The POPO is not peeping in your windows>

Hok, I hope you are satisfied with this Trolling. You got everyone all bent out of shape over nothing. Even in some sort of bizarre scenario where it became unlawful to run a casino simulation on the internet, there are so many ways around it that it's laughable. The only thing the gov. could ever do was make it illegal to trade lindens for dollars, and that just isn't going to happen. People need to relax, sheeesh.

This is all alarmist hogwash.

Archangel Mountain

Ummm:

I saving this page on my hard drive for future reference. Do you prefer mustard or ketchup with your kilobytes?

It appears then that you are wasting your time here. Perhaps your tiime would be better spent advising the British based casinos like UIGEA who had to withdraw from the US market and who stands to lose $1 Billion USD next year as a result. They evidently weren't clever enough to come up with one of your laughably easy schemes to get around the law.

http://www.casinocitytimes.com/news/article.cfm?contentID=161977


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When the first SL casino owner is sentenced to jail for 5 years, I have a feeling things will change.

What is happening in SL now is by definition, ILLEGAL. 100% with out a doubt ILLEGAL. All that is necessary for gambling to be illegal is for ANYTHING of VALUE to be exchanged for ANY game where CHANCE is involved. All of you which think the L$ has no value needs to take their head out of their A**. Anything which is demanded and has an EXCHANGE of all things has value and is thus in this case ILLEGAL to gamble with. Banks and especially LL will not risk multi million dollar fines, jail time and/or the cut off of funds transfers just so a few casino owners can try and run their now illegal gambling operations in world. The current news all over the NY Times, Yahoo, CNN, etc shows that LL is trying to attract the big corporations. No way in hell will they risk that so some idiots can run illegal gambling operations. Sorry.

I give it a few months, probably any day now, before LL adds the new TOS violation of no gambling in world to their TOS. If you don't believe it: there is a great river in Egypt called DENIAL...

He would have lots of company there. There are many Crocks in Denial.

Wanna bet?

See Can we buy real products on Second Life in Linden Answers.

See also: Small ad. Big news?

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There is a company that has opened a flower store in SL where you can look at, select, and purchase with Lindens flowers to be delivered in RL.

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Very true. Even without that it would still be illegal. As per this bill, which is posted on this same thread, the only thing which must be gambled with is ANYTHING OF VALUE. It does not need to be any kind of "currency." L$ have value as they are demanded AND even have an exchange to trade them on. I don't see how some people find this so hard to figure out. Gambling in SL is now 100% illegal. Like it or not.

LL is in the clear. The prohibition against transmitting such requests applies to persons operating a "gambling business." In that respect LL is akin to a web hosting service hosting individual gambling businesses operated by individual owners.

Gambling? L$ is money?

What?

When?

Where?

Crime is all about intent. If you can convince the judge that you didn't know what you were doing then you can get away with anything.

Linden Lab will be just fine.

Here is the operative section of the law that forbids the transmission of certain types of communications.. NOTE THAT IT SPECIFICALLY STATES THAT IT'S APPLICATION IS LIMITED TO PERSONS WHO ARE ENAGED IN A GAMBLING BUSINESS. There is another section that forbids credit card companies. banks, and other financial institutions from transferring funds to a gambling business to pay for wagers and bets. The applicability of that section is limited to "financial transaction provider(s)" as defined.




SEC. 102. MODIFICATION OF EXISTING PROHIBITION.

Section 1084 of title 18, United States Code, is amended to read as follows:

`Sec. 1084. Use of a communication facility to transmit bets or wagers; criminal penalties

`(a) Except as otherwise provided in this section, WHOEVER, BEING ENGAGED IN A GAMBLING BUSINESS, KNOWINGLY --





`(1) uses a communication facility for the transmission in interstate or foreign commerce, within the special maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the United States, or to or from any place outside the jurisdiction of any nation with respect to any transmission to or from the United States, of--

`(A) bets or wagers;

`(B) information assisting in the placing of bets or wagers; or

`(C) a communication, which entitles the recipient to receive money or credit as a result of bets or wagers, or for information assisting in the placing of bets or wagers; or

`(2) accepts, in connection with the transmission of a communication in interstate or foreign commerce, within the special maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the United States, or to or from any place outside the jurisdiction of any nation with respect to any transmission to or from the United States of bets or wagers or information assisting in the placing of bets or wagers--

`(A) credit, or the proceeds of credit, extended to or on behalf of another (including credit extended through the use of a credit card);

`(B) an electronic fund transfer or funds transmitted by or through a money transmitting business, or the proceeds of an electronic fund transfer or money transmitting service, from or on behalf of the other person;

`(C) any check, draft, or similar instrument which is drawn by or on behalf of the other person and is drawn on or payable through any financial institution; or

`(D) the proceeds of any other form of financial transaction as the Secretary of the Treasury and the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System may prescribe by regulation which involves a financial institution as a payor or financial intermediary on behalf of or for the benefit of the other person,

shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both.

Finally. Now I can see casinos burn to the ground!

Again ANOTHER DEAD issue, No one is going to go to jail... why does these dumb post go on and on for, it rates up there with the BS of the US postal serv. charging for emails sent...

Having been in the adult industry online since 95-96 I have some experience in dealing with this kinda thing.

Paypal will drop SL long before the government actually charges anyone.

What follows is opinion. No information about these deals was ever published, just those that were around and watching at the time could see the wheels turning from outside.

Paypal got big fast, in a banking market where the big boys don't like competition. The existing stake holders called in the feds and they started putting all kinds of presure on paypal. So paypal agreed to play by their terms, they stay out of adult and any other high risk merchant activities such as gaming, they don't allow users to use any kind of VISA electron card to access their funds from RL locations, while they also report all their transactions to the feds. Making this concession allowed paypal to breath easy and kept the dogs at bay.

Paypal takes this deal very seriously as their whole existance counts on it.

So now you can't use paypal for ANY adult transaction. That means you can't buy porn with it, you can't pay someone for sending you porn traffic, you can't pay for porn hosting, or send someone cash for a porn design. No porn transactions are allowed on paypal at all, zero tollerance your account will be closed and your funds held.

Same for gaming.

Hope SL has a backup billing company. In adult we use at least 5 different billing companies on cascading fall-backs for some of these very reasons.

-Ben