China adds to
censorship of online casino gambling
May 30
A
Chinese news agency announced today that China
is accelerating its censorship of online casino
gambling to eradicate any threats to state
security, stop youth addiction, and to end
pornography.
Online casino gaming has burst into popularity
in China in the past few years. Almost 14
million people play online casino games in
China. Now, Chinese media companies are saying
that there is a concern for teenage online
casino addiction.
Proposed additional online gaming industry
values would entail developers to change games
that might create an addiction. Quality games
are proposed to take the place of other types of
online casino games that are said to cause
addiction. There are no specifics as to what the
new casino games would be. I
In April,
new
censorship of online casino games were put into
place to last until this coming September. A
prime example of new changes being made is the
fact that China removed a popular UK sports game
Soccer Manager 2005 claiming that it
recognized Hong Kong, Macau, Tibet, and Taiwan
as countries - China does not recognize the
above examples as independent countries. This
type of sensitive censorship is considered to be
going too far by many online casino gamblers
there.
Because China states that
there is major
piracy running free in the online gaming
industry, the new campaign would also penalize
any illegal activity that disturbs any
intellectual rights to property and/or market
order.
It
is reported that online casino gamblers in China
spent $240 million play online casino games in
2004. With that, by 2008, is is estimated that
earnings will pass the $1.5 billion marker.
It
is noted that South Korean online game companies
are accountable for about 70% of those earnings.
