Re:Betable: Bringing real gambling to social casino games
by dsrguru on Monday July 09, 2012 @10:35PM
(#4221754)
Thanks! Would companies using Betable need to get licenses from the same countries that Betable already has licenses from (which so far means the UK) or would Betable's licenses mean that users of Betable would be covered as well.
Edit: Just discovered the 50/50 revenue share. That's going to turn away a lot of potential customers.
Re:Betable: Bringing real gambling to social casino games
by cellis on Monday July 09, 2012 @11:52PM
(#4222024)
Also don't just jump into this shit unless, you know, you have legal counsel that specializes in gaming. It's still a huge risk. E.g. U.S. customers could circumvent and bet on your site. Guess what, you're on the hook for that!
Re:Betable: Bringing real gambling to social casino games
by davidtyleryork on Monday July 23, 2012 @02:07PM
(#4282233)
That's incorrect cellis. Betable is handling all gambling, so any gambling-related legal risk (such as US customers gambling) is strictly our problem. This is why we have advanced geolocation, IP and identity checks.
Re:Betable: Bringing real gambling to social casino games
by cellis on Thursday July 26, 2012 @04:54PM
(#4298664)
Incorrect that U.S. developers of a game implementing Betable could be targets of legal action? Or incorrect that your software is circumventable?
Here's another question. Is Betable willing / able to provide legal counsel to U.S. developers who get squeezed by the FBI?
Re:Betable: Bringing real gambling to social casino games
by davidtyleryork on Monday July 23, 2012 @02:03PM
(#4282217)
Betable handles all of the gambling, so game companies working with us do not need licenses. This is a key piece of our value proposition: licenses cost millions of dollars and take years to acquire.
As for the revenue share, given the cost of licenses (mentioned above), and the significant increase in revenue that could come from real-money gambling, we think this is appropriate. Remember that we employ and manage the legal, fraud and compliance aspects of gambling that make it so expensive and time consuming. Also, this revenue share only applies to gambling revenue. Your IAP and ad revenue remains your own.
It is definitely that they were allowing Americans to gamble.
"would a gambling site that didn't take a rake and just ran on ad revenue be allowed to have American customers?"
This definitely would not be allowed.
You mentioned the money laundering charges a couple of times. Those were ancillary charges. The primary charge was that they were operating an illegal online gambling business i.e. letting Americans gamble on the internet.
"I'm an American citizen. Would I definitely be allowed to use Betable?"
It is not illegal for an American company to offer real money online gambling to citizens of other countries where it is legal and regulated. So Zynga could get a UK gambling license and offer online gambling to UK citizens. It is a long, slow, difficult and expensive process - Betable has already done it and is allowing others to leverage their infrastructure (legal and technical).