Grebbestad in Court
A lot is happening in Norway and Sweden concerning the legality of poker. As I've noted previously, the big tournament in Grebbestad, Sweden, was raided by the police about six months ago. The court date is drawing closer, with six people being prosecuted, including the two owners of the organising company, the CEO and CFO of the hotel where the event was held, and one of the sponsors. This is, to my understanding, the first time people other than organisers have been prosecuted. The law does state that you cannot use premises for poker games, but I don't think it's ever been tried in court before. This means that the Lottery Inspection department has found another way to get at the poker clubs of Sweden. I'm guessing that the arrangers are likely to be sentenced to prison, the hotel people fined, and the sponsors acquitted.
Legal Action
The Swedish Poker Federation is suing Svenska Spel for trademark infringements. Svenska Spel is the only Swedish gaming company, owned by the state, and it has arranged the
Swedish Championships (Poker-SM) live at the Casino Cosmopol as well as online at its own client for the last two years. Svepof (the federation) claims to be able to track the trademark as far back as 30 years, as it's been used for five-card draw and Texas hold'em tournaments for a long time. I don't think that they'll have much success, but I'm really rooting for them. I think that the right to choose national champions should be given to the people, not to a monopolistic, state-owned company.
The Monopoly
Speaking of monopoly, the biggest party in our coalition government (Moderaterna) had its party convention a few weeks back. Being a right-wing party, it put the two heaviest subjects last on the agenda: the question of same-sex marriage and the question of the gambling monopoly. Presumably, the executive board thought people would be tired and want to go home, and thus would vote for what the board wanted. Well, things didn't go quite like that. The convention decided that Moderaterna is to aim for an abolishment of the monopoly. Also, Svenska Spel is to be sold. The most interesting part came when the minister for finance reminded all those present, "You should think of the tax revenue the monopoly generates!" A few months back, the EU commission basically told Sweden, "OK, we might be able to justify your monopoly based on the people's health, but damn you if you're keeping it for tax-related reasons!"
UIGEA in Norway?
Things are developing in a completely different direction in Norway, though. It seems that online poker might very well be outlawed, with the country not allowing banks, credit-card companies, and other financial institutions to handle transfers to gambling sites, as is the case in the U.S. A Swedish minister called Norway "the last Soviet state" a few years back, and in this case, I can only agree. The question of why it's OK to play bridge but not poker has been raised - and the Norwegian Lottery Inspection department started investigating the idea that bridge, which is popular with senior citizens, should be outlawed, too! Luckily, there were some sensible people involved in the investigation, and they came to the conclusion that luck plays a small part in the game, that the stakes are small, and that the game mainly constituted friendly competition. The two latter claims could be said about poker, as well, of course, but a decided politician is a decided politician. It'll be a long time until live poker in Norway gets the same legal status as in Denmark, for instance, where freezeout tournaments with small stakes are now legal to arrange.
Team Poker
The team-poker format I've written about earlier has become a smash hit in Sweden, and I'm hoping it'll spread throughout Europe. There's an online team-poker network in the making by combining existing networks. High5action.com on 24h Poker and Tellpoker.com on Microgaming (Prima) are the first. I suspect that more sites will have joined by the time you read this, enabling you to play in your national league. Check out teamactionpoker.com for more information. There are three live team-poker tournaments right now: The Swedish team-poker league will be playing its last heat soon, and it'll be a fierce competition for first place; Ultimatebet.com is sponsoring the
Swedish University Team Poker Championships, with online qualifying and a live final in Uppsala; and Betfair.com is arranging a competition for two-player teams from Sweden, Denmark, Norway, and Finland, called the
Nordic Top Pair Competition, which has online qualifying before the online final in Tallinn, Estonia.
Ola Brandborn is a writer and blogger for Poker.se.
