Online Gaming - General Questions

I have yet to see a federal law that states it is illegal to gamble on the Internet. However, the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 does prohibit U.S. banks from facilitating moving to and from Internet casinos.

As you read on my page, this has happened to me a few times. When it happened to me, the banks and the casinos each blamed each other for deeming the transaction as a cash advance. Since that time I have found that many credit cards now tell you up front that casino chip purchases are considered a cash advance. This seems to be the situation with your card so I'd say that you are stuck with the fee. If you read the fine print of the Yahoo or Ebay credit card agreements they say this directly. To quote from the Ebay Visa terms and conditions, "Transaction Fee for purchase of wire transfers, money orders, betting or casino chips or similar items, purchase of foreign currency and travelers checks from other than a bank; and use of convenience checks 2% of the transaction amount, with a minimum of $5."

Now, I use a debit card for most of my online casino purchases and never have to worry about cash advance fees. The reversals seem to happen faster as well with a debit card. However, I still use the Next Visa and MBNA Mastercard for my big Golden Palace purchases and they have never charged me a cash advance fee.

I used to be a Gambler's Palace and Sportbet affiliate, as well as some other Unified Gaming casinos. Both Gambler's Palace and Sportbet seemed to pay me on a regular basis. These two had the most prominent positions on my site at the time. However, it was hard to tell from which casino I was being paid. They all issued checks though the Bank of Nevis, without any details about from who or why you were getting the check. Checks based on my own gambling winnings also came without explanation from the Bank of Nevis, making things even more confusing to keep track of.

Yes, you can easily count cards when playing blackjack online. However, most casinos shuffle after every hand. For those that don't, software exists to tell you the exact correct play given any deck composition. However, such places generally have strict rules against card counters.

As long as you aren't playing at a multi-player table or live dealer, there is no time limit to play a hand.

The answer depends on how much you are willing to bet in each hand and how high you are willing to allow the probability of losing the entire bankroll. To answer this question properly would require quite a bit of work. There is no easy formula that I know of to get at the answer. Simulations would probably be required.

However, you shouldn't need much to roll through $7,500. If you bring $1,000 and make $25 bets you'll have 40 units to work with, and you'll have met the wagering requirement after 300 bets. The probability of ruin would be pretty low. If forced, I'd guess about 5 to 10%.

The payout is the ratio of money won to money bet. For example if players bet a total of one million dollars and the total amount paid to winning bets was $998,000 then the payout ratio would be 98%. Keep in mind that as players recirculate the same money the house edge grinds them down so the typical player will retain much less than 98% of their original purchase. The way to calculate your own ratio if to keep track of the total amount you bet and the total amount you win and divide.

Thanks for the kind words. I could talk all day about your first question. There are ways to gamble for a living. In my opinion the most viable ways are blackjack card counting, sports betting, and Internet bonus/advantage play. All three of these methods require a large bankroll to make enough to live on, ballpark $100,000, and that is just to get by. Most people have to start small and build their way up. Everyone has to bet relative to his own bankroll. Internet betting limits are high enough for most players. Not many people wish to bet more than $500 per hand. Boss Media’s single player game offers a small player advantage in blackjack, but it is so small it is not worth the time to play it.

When a casino says they pay back 98% for example in blackjack it is generally a historical statistic, looking at the last month or so. They should state somewhere the time period on which it is based. The 98% is the ratio of money returned to money bet is 98%. This generally includes money bet on doubles and splits in the denominator. So if a casino had all basic strategy players their return percentage would likely be less than the house edge, which is based on the initial bet only. Heavy hitters can definitely skew the percentages. That is why sometimes a casino will pay over 100%, because a high roller got lucky and won more than all the other players lost.

That is a fair question. For those who don’t remember I used to review all the Internet casinos I played and had a list of at least 50 reviews. One problem in maintaining this list was I got numerous requests from casinos not on the list to be added. I received no revenue through these reviews and in fact they may have taken customers from the paying advertisers. Another problem is Internet casinos often rise and fall in quality. I was taking a beating on the bulletin boards for saying good things about casinos that had evidently fallen downhill. So I started to remove reviews there were over a year old. However I still found it a hassle dealing with the requests to be added and dealing with complaints coming from players who had a bad experience with a casino I gave a good review to. My site does not make that much money so I decided revenue did not warrant the bother of maintaining that section.

If the players were smart, no! Assume the player made just one bet on an even-money bet in single-zero roulette. The players expected profit would be pr(win)*(1.1) - pr(lose)*0.8 = (18/37)*1.1 - (19/37)*0.8 = 12.43%. In an online environment a high percentage of players grind through their entire deposit until they lose everything, so you might be okay. However I think the pros will smell blood and attack it like and the casino would get killed.

For purposes of recreational playing, it seems that every store that sells computer software games have a few with various casino games, often in the bargain bin. I’ve tried some of them and find them all to be pretty bad. The Internet casinos do a much better job. Sorry, but I can’t recommend anything.