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The two organizations battle is going for the use of the trademark “Swedish Poker Championships”, a competition already held online and offline.
Both the SPA and Svenska Spel will arrange online championships in November 2007 with a similar name.
SPA says they have trademark on that name -Â “It is very shocking that a crown corporation with monopoly status does not respect the law of trademark,” said Peder MÃ¥nsson, chairman of the Swedish Poker Association.
Svenska Spel says that is a generic name and can’t be a trademark -
“As far as we are concerned, you are not able to protect a trademark as generic as Swedish Poker Championships, since it is too common a concept. You could claim a trademark on a logotype which featured the words ‘Swedish Poker Championships,’ but not on the phrase alone,” confirmed Jacob Lagercrantz, spokesperson for Svenska Spel
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An Utrech court has decided that prohibited Unibet gambling proposers by means of its Internet site illegal offer gambling games, among which gambling football paid on Dutch amateur games and games from.
As this Dutch website reportsthe Dutch monopoly operator De Lotto says it has secured a court verdict last week against European online operator Unibet, following Unibet’s decision to offer betting on amateur football in Holland. However, the Wimbledon-based operator says it has no knowledge of the ruling.
The lawsuit had been tightened by the Lotto, the only licensee in the Netherlands for offering sport questions. The Lotto gives annual approximately 60 millions euro to the combined Netherlands Olympic Committee and Dutch Sports Federation NOC*CNSF and other good aims in the field of culture, social well-being and public health.
The Lotto organisation doneerde since its establishment in 1961, has clearred 1.5 billion to several good aims. More than 1.1 billion of it helped to the sport. The Lotto is, beside the government, of the important geldschieters of the Dutch sport.
The Lotto, as only licensee, is moreover at this moment in conversation with the KNVB concerning herintroductie of Toto.
Resistance worker gambles on sport games receives a lot of attention the last time prominent. Recent is there in the House of Commons ask keen concerning offer of gamble on games from amateur football by the company Unibet.
In the sentence the Utrechtse right who offering gambling games, predominates, among which gambling on amateur games and games from paid football is prohibited, without Dutch license. By doing this, however, Unibet act unlawfully towards the Lotto. Unibet must strike by directly its gambling offers under penalty of a penalty payment of 100,000 euro per day and with maximum of three millions euro. This is 17th the time that the Dutch judge judges that offering illegal gambling games in the Netherlands is prohibited.
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The European Interactive Gaming Congress and Expo (EIG) held in October 2007 in Barcelona was the place where a new code of conduct for the european gambling industry was suggested, starting from a worshop discussion started by Microgaming and than joined by GamCare, eCogra, and the RGA that presented the new code of conduct to leading online gaming jurisdictions.
The 30-points code of conduct is dealing with issues regarding poker and other forms of online gambling is loking into issues related to responsabile gambling such as : underage gamblers, protection for online players, , advertising, staff training and customer communication.
Andrew Poole, MD of GamCare Trade Services, declared : ‘We are hoping that adoption of this code will better enable the gambling public to make better informed decisions regarding their online gambling destinations, with the knowledge that operators are required to protect the welfare and enjoyment of their players.’
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According with an interesting article in Liberation, France has already started considering how it will change its national gambling laws in order to comply with the obligations required by the European Commission.
According with new info France has until October 29 to act. But France refuses the principle of mutual recognition, which allows a company recognized by a European Convention country to propose its services everywhere within the European Union.
The PMU, French horse betting monopoly, whose sales turnover rose in 2006 to 8,1 billion euros, including 327,6 million euros (4%) for the only bets online, reverse part of its benefit to the horse die, which represents 62.000 direct employment.
For the sociologist specialist in the gambling Jean-Pierre Martignoni-Hutina, it is about a “positive evolution†of the French doctrines. It wishes nevertheless that this “modernization of the economy of the plays†is accompanied by the creation of a new authority of regulation
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This is the new deadline, extended by 2 months, given by the European Commission to France and Greece for a corelation of their laws with the EU principle of free movement of services within the European Union.
Otherwise, a complaint in front the European Court of Justice will be started, as confirmed by Oliver Drewes, a spokesman for the executive’s Internal Market Commissioner, Charlie McCreevy. He added that the situation in France had altered since a favourable court ruling in July which overturned a ruling that banned a Maltese firm, Zeturf, from offering online horse race betting in France.
This has increased pressure on France to end its state gaming monopoly, until now only native providers Française des Jeux (a multi game operator) and PMU (the French tote) are permitted to advertise their services over the Internet.
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Sealand, world’s smallest state located six miles off the Eastern shores of Great Britain, could become a high target for online businesses after it has announced that it is in negociations with a Russian consortium in order to make a multi-million dollar investment for an online casino. A sattelite could have been launched from the island and other servers could have been provided by the investment.
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The study released by the UK Gambling Commission today – 19 September 2007 – shows that the gambling problem has not increased in the last 8 years, despite the contradictory opinions of “many experts” that warned of the “unlimited dangers” of the online gambling issues.
Some essential issues of the report :
- 68% of the population, that is about 32 million adults, had participated in some form of gambling activity within the past year. This compares to 72% (about 33 million adults) in 1999.
- For around 10 million people, their only gambling activity in the past year had been participating in a National Lottery draw. In 1999 this figure was 11 million.
- 6% of people used the internet to gamble (3% did online gaming like playing poker or casino games and 4% placed bets with a bookmaker)
- The rates of problem gambling in the adult population was about 0.6%, this equates to about 284,000 adults. This is the same percentage of the population the same screen identified in 1999.
Full Report – British Gambling 2007
Executive Summary British Gambling Report 2007
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The Swedish Gaming Board, called in their own language the Lotteriinspektionen, has requested UK-based betting exchange RedBet Ltd to send information on its employees.
Apparantly they think Redbet has emplyees based in Sweden : ” This private information has been requested in an attempt to ascertain whether Redbet has too many employees based in Sweden, a country which allows only government-owned gaming operations.”
According to Igaming:
The power to demand usually private information from online gambling companies is based on Swedish laws that permit the Board to require information if it is of the opinion that a commercial entity is carrying on an illegal gambling business in the country. Such information may be required to enable the Board to establish whether significant business for the company is being conducted without authority on Swedish soil.
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South Aforica looks more progressive than the US. Atleast in the field of online gmbling, because the African state has just introduced a bill that makes Internet Gambling legal, though the Department of Trade and Industry.
software vendors providing online gambling platforms will be required to obtain a national license for key staff as well as for the interactive software itself. In addition, licenses will be needed for related equipment along with the suppliers and maintenance providers of that equipment. Probity and technical checks will be a prominent feature of the process, thoroughly investigating each applicant for licensing.
The goal of the Bill is to protect players, ensure gambling revenue reaches the national treasury, retain interactive gambling players in South Africa and prevent underage or problem gambling.
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The Italian Authority for State Monopolies (Amministrazione autonoma dei Monopoli di Stato) has announced that it might change again the regulatory framework for remote gambling and to allow credit cards usage on in the Italian licensed website.
The new laws could be introduced in 2008 and wants to stop money laundring activities.
It remains to be seen if that will be applied, but it seems that Italy has not learnt at all the lessons from the European Court in the cases Gambelii and Placanica.