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October 17, 2008
The order to seize the 141 international domain names was originally issued in September by the Kentucky court, and included online bingo sites, casino, poker, sportsbook and even software provider micrograming.com. Within a week of the order, more than 22% of the cited domains had either been seized or had moved to similar domains to avoid litigation, including bingoknights.com and 123bingo.com.
In yesterday's judgement in Kentucky, it's reported that the judge misapplied not one, but several, existing laws of the state in his ruling yesterday, misquoting current laws and even applying laws to the judgement that were revoked more than 30 years ago in an attempt to define domain names as gambling devices.
Joe Brennan Jr, chairman of iMEGA, one of the organisations involved in the appeal, said: "This decision must not be allowed to stand, because of the threat it poses to the Internet as a whole."
"Judge Wingate has ignored the clear laws of his own state in coming to a decision that essentially green-lights any jurisdiction - in the US and abroad - to ignore our rights and abuse their power to do away with competition or speech or content with which they oppose, regardless of the law. This is a dark day for Internet freedom."
"What Judge Wingate has done is to create the 'ultimate weapon' to be used by the powerful and influential to attack content they oppose. This will enable government to eliminate competition from differing ideas, beliefs and commerce. This decision today is where it starts, but where will it stop?"
This latest ruling places not only the online gambling industry, online bingo, casino, poker websites etc., but the whole internet industry, in jeopardy. Should this remain unchallenged the effects could be felt across the entire internet, with sites such as social networking, video gaming, even political or religious websites controlled or shut down by the ruling.
Written by Charlene Grey for BingoStreet.com – the number one resource for online bingo games and the best bingo promotions.
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