Australian Poker Advertising Boom to Start?

New blood, new markets new fish and easier poker games. These are the Holy Grail to Online Poker Rooms like Full Tilt Poker. There are many areas left to target and in areas where gaming advertising is technically not allowed Full Tilt and PokerStars are the masters.

They use their '.net' play for free/playmoney sites to advertise to players. Of course many of these end up addicted and playing on the .com real money sites (some probably just assume it's .com and rock right up there first!).

Australia is now hot for the attack as Full Tilt is looking for a longer term deal with Rubgy League as reported in the Morning Herald.

The reason promoting only the "practice" site is crucial, says a lawyer who specialises in the field, is that it allows the sponsor, the NRL and the clubs that endorse it to argue they are doing nothing illegal.
Source: D Lane, Sydney Morning Herald

Hopefully this will be the first step in the breaking down of another barrier to international gaming and advertising and bring more liquidity to the game we love.

Two Legal Situations and One Full Tilt Poker

Full Tilt Poker were the subject of two sets of legal proceeding this week bringing further bad publicity to the room (despite neither situation being in any way their fault as far as I can tell) in the face of a dominating lead for PokerStars in the race for American Poker players.

[Everest's Owners Claim] Harrah’s breached the sponsorship deal when ESPN broadcasts of the tournament by an affiliate in France, television channel RTL9, failed to display Everest’s name and logo and instead featured the name and logo of Everest competitor Full Tilt Poker.
Las Vegas Sun

This alone isn't particularly shocking news regarding Full Tilt. More worrying for the online poker world is the story that broke in the Financial Times in the UK and has been covered extensively across the internet since.

If a recent report in the Financial Times is any indication, online poker room Full Tilt Poker could be in major legal trouble before 2010 is over. According to the article, a federal grand jury in Manhattan is investigating the company and some of the big names affiliated with the site. The Times names both Chris Ferguson and Howard Lederer as potential targets of the investigation.
Bluff Magazine

Since the initial situation with PartyPoker where the owners ended up in some legal hot water over their continued gaming operations in the USA in the immediate aftermath of the UIGEA people have often questioned how Full Tilt can continue to operate without any consequences. Especially since they have a lot of high stakes regulars who both play on the site and live in the USA. Of course these guys are always on TV and one can only suspect this showboating has brought the recent attention.