Online Poker Reduce Risk To Promoting Pros

Published: Wednesday, April 11, 2007 Online-Casinos.com

ONLINE POKER SITES REDUCE RISK TO PROMOTING PROS

Why players may see a decrease in profile activity from US aces on Absolute and Ultimate

In a sign of the (USA) times, Casino City writer Aaron Todd revealed this week that Ultimate Bet and Absolute Poker have made amendments to marketing strategy that will result in several well-known poker pros such as Michael Mizrachi, Mark Seif and Antonio Esfandiari, no longer being used to promote the sites.

Following a merger of Absolute and Ultimate in November last year, both are now owned by Absolute Entertainment although running on separate networks. Both have bravely continued to permit real money US action despite the UIGEA passed in October 2006, and the latest initiatives are aimed at protecting poker pros from possible persecution.

"There has been a decision to reevaluate which poker professionals we work with on each brand in the future," a company official who asked not to be identified told Todd. "But that decision was made purely on the basis of trying to protect our ability to continue to be able to offer U.S. customers the very best in online poker."

The source said that both sites were concerned that as official spokespeople for the sites, professional poker players could become targets for the US Department of Justice and their business relationships with the sites could be viewed as "aiding and abetting" Internet gambling.

Phil Hellmuth and Annie Duke, who have been part of UltimateBet since the site opened, will remain with the site to promote the brand internationally. The site will also focus on promoting the Aruba Poker Classic in the U.S. Absolute Poker will focus on promoting Canadian model Serinda Swan and Internet players through its Absolute Dream package.

"The business has gone through a number of changes as a consequence of current [US] legislation," said the official told Todd. "It's a marketing decision so that we're free to market what we want where we want without putting a degree of risk to our business."