Nevada Regulators Approve Inter-Operator Online Poker Network

Nevada’s population puts it in the lower half of the states in the U.S. The Silver State’s 14-month old regulated online poker industry, while not a bust by any means, has not seen the success that people envisioned. Something needs to be done to wake things up and looks like that may be happening. The Las Vegas Review-Journal reported Wednesday that the Nevada Gaming Control Board has tentatively approved a plan to allow competing poker sites within the site to band together in a single network.

The plan was proposed by 888 Holdings, which would develop the network. The initial idea would be to have WSOP.com and a yet-to-launch Treasure Island poker room operated by 888 as the first members of the network, as well as possibly another 888/Treasure Island room. Players would be able to logon through any room on the network and, just like with networks we have been used to seeing over the years, would end up sitting with players from any of the member rooms.

Said 888 attorney Yehoshua Gurtler, “For Nevada, a network provides more gaming taxes due to greater product attractiveness and player participation.”

And that right there is the key. Poker rooms need players. That may seem obvious, but it is hugely important in online poker. At an online casino, players can be scattered all over the place at different games and different stakes and it makes no difference to the player experience. Gamblers can be perfectly happy playing blackjack at a table by themselves. But in poker, people need other people against whom to play. You can’t have a smattering of players here and a smattering there. You need volume. And low traffic just leads to lower traffic. If a poker rooms is sparsely populated, it just looks that much worse to a prospective player, so new customers don’t sign up. And current customers eventually get sick of not being able to find a game, so they leave.

The proposed inter-operator network would attempt to remedy problems of low traffic by allowing operators who would normally compete with their separate poker rooms to being their player bases together on one, bigger network. The companies would still compete, as 888’s technology would track revenues to individual players and back to the rooms at which they signed up, but they will have to find different ways to draw players to their specific site, as the poker room itself will be identical to those on the network.

It will be interesting to see when and if this happens. WSOP.com is currently the most trafficked site in Nevada, with a seven-day average of 160 cash game players, according to PokerScout.com. That number is likely buoyed by the multitudes of players visiting Las Vegas for the World Series of Poker, though. Ultimate Poker, which is not a party to this proposal yet, is next with just 55 players. 888 does not have a poker room in Nevada, but did create the All American Poker Network (AAPN) over a year ago. It also made a deal with Treasure Island to develop its poker offering. 888 does have a poker room on the AAPN in New Jersey, so it would not be surprising if it was able to get Treasure Island’s poker room launched quickly. There is no word if this Nevada network would actually be called AAPN.