Topic: Your all-new, full custom Bitcoin casino is here ;) - page 2. (Read 27368 times)

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I repeat, why do you block IPs? It is absolute ridiculous! By doing this, you can only minimize probability that U.S. player can register, NOT eliminate it. Even your filter has 99.999% accuracy, chance to register still remains. With power that have USA law enforcement agencies they can easily cheat your filter, register, deposit money and charge you THE SAME you have not implemented any blocking. Give me 2 BTC, for them I can buy high-privacy VPN account that  provides unique static IP in most countries and is not in any blacklist.

For every Dwolla that is shut down, two more Bwitcoins will pop up.

Click my referral link!

Well, Lemonginger, you're right on the money with that. It's the "black hole" nature of Bitcoin (and by extension the problem of how to tax it) that's going to draw the most governmental ire. It's their paycheck, after all. Sorry about the low blow at the US, I happen to be from Vegas myself and politically line up somewhere between Ron Paul and Larry Flynt (if that's possible)... but yeah, it would be a little crazy for me to just say "screw it all, let's take American bets, Anarchy in Akron!" I mean, what gets me (and should get people here) is that I actually have to pay American income tax on anything I earn from this project, even though I haven't lived in the States for five years. If I ever want to see my family again, anyway, which to me is worth plenty. So... pardon the flip response, it just makes me mad. But I'm willing to do whatever it takes to make this work, including paying them a vig they don't deserve, because it's one step toward freedom.

@BTCSports; about the bitcoin-isn't-money argument, it's just not something I can put to the people working on this, or live with myself. I'm not saying it's right or wrong; but if I told that to the lawyers who are working for equity in Sapphire the first thing they'd do is choke on their lattes and the second thing would be to ask how they were going to get paid if it's not money. It would be a daring argument to test in court, but we aren't willing to be sacrificed at the altar just to make a point. We're just trying to make a living, and I think we're of more service to everyone as a legitimate company than as an outlaw thing just waiting to get picked off. I do admire your six-ton brass balls, and I wish the best for your project.

@EhV: I'm personally a major privacy advocate, a member of the ACLU, donated to Wikileaks in their hour of need (they never got it, and Paypal never returned it) and I relay for tor from home every chance I get. I'm a big fan of privacy and web anonymity... but I'm also a big fan of my own skin. If it was a little thing like helping Syrians connect outside the country, I'd do it in a heartbeat. Maybe that's because I'm not scared of the Syrian government. You remember Lando? That's us. We don't f*ck with the Empire, we run our own little thing, and we hope they leave us alone. So what if Lando was a big coward. I still think that by working within the system we can change it.

And Lemonginger, you're right that a BTC exchange will probably be blown out of the water long before a tiny BTC casino is...it wouldn't even surprise me if Dwolla got shut down along the way. What is cool about Bitcoin is that as long as people want to use it, they will find some other way of moving it around. It seems ready to become a chain reaction. Anyway, thanks for coming to my aid here... I'll tell ya this, the day we can take bets safely from the US, without giving up either our morals or our freedom, it'll be a great day.

I think it is an interesting argument. I don't think idle speculation on a forum will help you clarify it though. What does your legal counsel say? Could be an interesting precedent to set. Linden Labs obviously did NOT take this argument -- but Linden Labs has a huge vested interest in being able to take US credit cards.

Honestly, the argument that online gambling is legal from the US if you are using BTC is less interesting to me than the fact that for those companies that want to ignore US laws, BTC effectively completely eliminates the chokepoints of dealing with processors. No more large fees to pay or long waits for transactions and no more central chokepoints for frozen funds.

Honestly, I forsee a major bitcoin exchange getting shut down well in advance of any gaming operation being shut down.

It took years before the DOJ finally cracked down on FTP and Stars for example, and that seems more because they had reached the point of buying their own banks to be able to move around rather than offering play to US customers (which the DOJ doesn't seem to care about). One of the interesting things is that the DOJ has openly said they were most concerned by the fact that the actions that FTP/Stars were taking to circumvent UIGEA were creating a "black hole" for money launderers. That is it wasn't the circumvention of the law itself that was of primary concern, but that in doing so they were creating all these pots of money moving around with inaccurate transaction codes, etc etc.

Bitcoin of course is one large black hole. Which is why I expect to see action by some government against an exchange at some point.

Because maybe they want to step foot in those countries again? Because maybe they want to pursue licensing games to US based corps (as mentioned). Because maybe they want to build a company and go public someday? Because maybe they don't want to take the legal risks associated with UIGEA as the US govt is showing an inordinate amount of interest in cracking down on online gaming at the moment?

Not saying I agree with the reasoning, but until you are the one taking the legal risks, try not to be so flippant about the risks others may choose to take/not take.

Our argument is actually that Bitcoin is neither money nor a currency.  I haven't got much feedback on our Bitcoins = Zynga Poker Chip argument but if anyone would like to read our position you can find it at http://btcsportsbetting.com/is-it-legal.

ssaCEO have you considered that allowing people to bet with Bitcoins may not be illegal under US law as it could be argued that Bitcoins are play money?  Converting them to USD when they are sent to you might invalidate that argument (which is why we don't do that) but I would be interested to know how your company is interpreting the law to disallow US players.

Oh, I see now, you do this willingly.

Well, it's your choice anyways. I imagine the next competitor that shows up with less dumb rules will have advantages over you.

If you're in Costa Rica, why do you care about US, France and Italy laws? Do these governments have agreements with the Costa Rica one to hunt you down or something?


And another thing, I accessed your site and it sad my IP was blocked. You are blocking tor exit nodes. Please, read about Tor to understand what it is and why some might abuse through it. And don't do IP bans, this is just dumb, you can easily block an IP shared by lots of people.

You mean their payment processors do the heavy lifting to allow workarounds for US players to /be able/ to get money onto their site

As a US-based player I am of course biased (though the swipe at people that can figure out proxy servers but can't figure out how to lobby their government was a bit of a low swipe. Many US players have been involved in lobbying and other efforts), but I am eagerly looking forward to the growth of more casinos that are either actively using bitcoin that don't care about US gambling laws (like bodog, etc) or ones that are ready to argue that since bitcoin avoids the US banking system that UIGEA doesn't come into play.

BUT I certainly respect your stance, given that you personally and other partners are the ones shouldering legal liability and definitely applaud the stance of going through verification before taking someone's money, rather than before giving it back -- thanks for your transparency and honesty in this thread.

Sportsbooks have always been the primary target of the DOJ, so it is interesting to me that both of the major bitcoin sportsbooks have no problems taking US money. One that just ignores the regulations, the other is making the argument that it doesn't violate US laws because bitcoin is an internet currency.

We shouldn't be blocking normal home or business subscribers, although there are some subnets flagged occasionally for bot infestation. Or you may be sharing your IP with a tor exit node. We do also block satellite ISPs, however if that's the case we'll whitelist your range and just ask for ID if you want to deposit. Paranoid as we are, we're trying hard to make this as easy as possible for legal players...but do have a fair number of false-positives.

If you can send us your IP address at help(at)strikesapphire.com, or PM me here, I'll check into why our system's blocking you.

In America, I can spend $100 on paint and sniff it until I die of toxic overdose, but I am prevented by law from spending $10 on a game of poker.

xyu, that's to stop you from gambling in casinos when you really should start round 5! 

on topic: referral programm works great too, already have 2 referrals who deposited a certain amount of BTC and the system paid me my share, really nice.

That's all I get from this web site, and I'm not using proxies, tor or vpn. Do you block entire ISP subnets?

Thanks.

I invite anyone who is signing up for the site to click my referral link.

Server time! Sorry, I missed this.  
The servers are adjusted to GMT, the logs are in GMT, but the times displayed in the lobbies are always in your local timezone (whatever your computer's clock is set to). So whatever time a tournament says it is, it's at that time locally for you.

@evoorhees and @mayabong... even though you're only depo'ing and withdrawing in BTC, we just don't want to take the risk of having US players. It could still be said that, if BTC is money (and we can't have it both ways...clearly it's money) then we're still using wires in the US to send it back and forth. I totally agree that the first casino to do it will make a fortune, but they'd also be inviting the hammer; the most likely candidates are the other CR-based casinos that are not run by American expatriates

edit to that: And it won't happen for a bit because everybody's on the mattresses right now since the FT/Stars shutdowns.

Yes, we need a server time displayed prominently on the site.

Any word on timezone? Would like to know exactly when "9PM" is, is the timezone adjusted after the user or does it simply use server time?
Also thanks for the max pass change.

@evoorhees
"If a player signs up, lies about his/her country and fakes an IP address, they're violating our TOS and committing fraud against the us" -ssaCEO
Due to the anonymous nature of bitcoins it would be possible though, but if you respect the company/don't want to possibly hurt them you shouldn't try to.

Yes I was also hoping to play as an American.  Not sure why even the green toilet paper has to come into play. .

Anyways the first real casino to deal purely in bitcoins and allow american players will be rewarded handsomely. 

Little confused... as an American, am I able to play purely for BTC if all deposits and withdrawals are in BTC? I'd rather not "cash out" in silly green toilet paper anyway.

Sucks that being an American is a liability. Land of the free my ass.