Postmortem Strategizing

As the I-gaming community draws the collective curtain on the first week of the prohibition era, grassroots organizations like the Poker Players Alliance (PPA) and the recently unveiled National Right for Online Gaming (NROG) are regrouping, learning from this latest tussle with U.S. lawmakers in preparation for their next.

"Would we like to be a million strong right now? Yes. Did the poker community take this potential as seriously as they could have? No."

- Michael Bolcerek
Poker Players Alliance

Both organizations are relatively young, with the PPA having been active for roughly seven months; NROG is just finding its feet, entering the I-gaming scene last August.

Each organization has so far taken a different approach. The PPA has split its time between trolling major poker events for members and lobbying on Capitol Hill. NROG, meanwhile, has been approaching the issue from a marketing standpoint, tapping into different communication modalities in an effort to, as they say, "raise an army."

Michael Bolcerek, who heads the San Francisco-based PPA, reflected candidly on the mixed results his organization has met with.

"Would we like to be a million strong right now? Yes," Bolcerek said. "Did the poker community take this potential as seriously as they could have? No."

"But, you know, we've made inroads in D.C.," he added. "We have a voice at the table. Members are listening to the legalize-regulate-and-tax story. It does take time. Horseracing lobbyists have been around for 15 years now; we've been around for seven months--I mean, actively. Obviously the result isn't great, but we have made inroads."

Bolcerek was adamant about autonomous, educated online gamblers taking the reins, spreading the message in an aggressive word of mouth campaign.

"People should register their vote as well as their voice. The next thing they should do is tell other poker players about the PPA. And if we are a million or 2 million strong, we can exert a positive influence on Capitol Hill."

Bolcerek acknowledged, however, that a sense of urgency among the online poker playing population was missing

"I think most players didn't even know what was going on," he said.

From NROG's perspective, the reason online gamers slept while the prohibition passed--not with a bang but a whimper--was simple:

"I don't think there's a disconnect between the players and the organizations," said, co-founder of NROG. "I don't think there's ever been a connection. Players were kept in the dark. Quotes are out now, which indicate that 75 percent of Americans think this legislation is a horrible idea."

- Brian Jakusik
NROG

"I don't think there's a disconnect between the players and the organizations," said Brian Jakusik, co-founder of NROG. "I don't think there's ever been a connection. Players were kept in the dark. Quotes are out now, which indicate that 75 percent of Americans think this legislation is a horrible idea."

NROG has adopted an aggressive strategy, taking its message directly to players on Internet message boards, for example.

"I don't know if other groups know about it or have chosen to ignore it," said NROG co-founder Jay Bailey. "When we launched in August, we got into discussion boards, into message boards. We were putting all of our money into this. The message boards allowed us to not only advertise, but to communicate one-on-one with these players. And that's where we got close to 15,000 members in a few weeks, just through these message boards. That's their community, poker players and gamblers alike--this is their world, this is how they communicate. They were totally ignored for all those years on these boards. They were left there to go over their own opinions, to go over what they think is going to happen. There was nobody sitting there saying, Hey, this is what's going on in Washington, D.C. right now, and this is how you can get active. So, that was one very large piece to our communications puzzle. These are great guys; it's such a great community. They embraced us totally. I think they're grateful that there was somebody saying, Hey, this is what's happening right now, rather than hearing from another player, Hey, this is what I read in the paper two days ago."

Focused on educating online gamblers and voters, Jakusik was particularly appalled by the message the public was receiving regarding Internet gambling.

"The media campaign surrounding the legislation was sensational," Jakusik said. "There were reports of Internet gambling being related to organized crime, how bad the industry is, that children are being taken advantage of, that people are losing their mortgage payments: It was a one-sided story; it was an absolute shame. To think you can stick your head in the sand, to think that it's all going to go away, is absolutely ridiculous."

Bolcerek, meanwhile, hopes that the legislation, and the circumstances surrounding its passage through Congress, rouses the flamingos.

"If it doesn't, I don't know what would," he said.