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Let's say I went to my local, legal, California card room where I deposited $1000 in my player's club account. Then I receive a user name and password for their on-line card game. And then I went home to play on line using a program owned by the card room running on a card room server only against other players who deposited money in person at that one local card room.
First, assuming the rake is identical to the rake in the live games, is anybody breaking the law?
OK, lets play 1/2 NL, folded to the button who calls. SB folds and BB checks. Pot is now $0.00 as $4 is taken for the drop and $1 is taken for the jackpot. This sounds like fun. Link on how California drop works
And second, assuming there is no rake, but the casino keeps 5% of every deposit as a service charge, is anybody breaking the law?
Doubtful that either Larry Flynt or the California Legislature would write the regs to just charge a flat percentage. Also the house in California can not receive money based on pot size, only charge a rental fee, hence fixed rate drops above.
Third, assuming there is a network of B&M cardrooms across California pooling their live deposits, does this change the legality for either of the rake scenarios?
California is big enough for its own network. Because of California law on drop I dont think an interstate network would be allowed.
Fourth, what if hundreds of B&M cardrooms in all juridictions across the country where B&M play is legal pooled their live deposits and all the players were in jurisdictions where playing at the B&M were legal. Anybody breaking the law now?
And finally, if I were go to a 3rd party "cashier" who charges 5% to hold all deposits, then I went home and played a peer-to-peer game that was not hosted on any one computer, but had a reliable means of recording wins and losses as a "score" on the "cashier's" computer so that the "cashier" could give people money back based on their game "score," is anybody breaking the law now?
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