What Europen Court for Justice ruled about online gambling

[Brayn]

Gambelli case.

The European Court of Justice(the "ECJ") delivered judgement in the Gambelli case on 6 November 2003. The case related to the freedom to provide online betting across Member States. Parties interested in the online gaming industry have been polarised into those who believe that there should be freedom to provide online gambling services across the EU (largely made up of commercial operators) and those who argue that online gambling should not be offered from an operator in one state to a punter in another (largely made up of anti-gambling lobbies and the state-sponsored monopolies, like lotteries). ( http://lawzone.thelawyer.com/cgi-bin...=207&f=259 )

European court said that:
"In so far as the authorities of a Member State incite and encourage consumers to participate in lotteries, games of chance and betting to the financial benefit of the public purse, the authorities of that State cannot invoke public order concerns relating to the need to reduce opportunities for betting in order to justify measures such as those at issue in the main proceedings."

<u>Quoted text is the argument of European Court against hypocrisy states, becaused they allowed state owned lotteris, but banned other forms of gambling.</u>


The whole judgement is here: http://curia.europa.eu/jurisp/cgi-bin/ge...mp;seance=ARRET


This might has some relevance because in USA beting on horse races online is allowed, but almost all other forms of gambling are not.
As far as I know WTO already ruled about USA-s restrictions on online gambling, but maybe this can be an argument for the United States Supreme Court. I am not familiar with the American law (I studdy law in Europe), but probably you also have rules about "freedom to provide services" or similar.

I thought it would be interesting to post this, since any idea should be welcomed.

I will really miss American friends, if they won't be able to play anymore. [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img] (In fact, I already miss you now. It was so sad seeing 90 000 players online on Party Poker yesterday, because I know how this number will drop.)

More about Gambelli case: http://www.google.si/search?hl=sl&amp;sa...anje&amp;meta=