As an evangelical Mac convert, I am always excited and thrilled any time Apple does anything. Though that may incite even the least inflammable of tempers in my fellow online gambling buddies, I can’t help it, I’m in love with my Mac. It’s even better when that anything is pick up a new online casino that will operate with their software. PKR has just released a Mac-friendly version of its software for Apple users to gamble to their hearts delight.

“We are delighted to bring our award-winning software to Apple Mac users – who account for more than 10% of the home computer market,” said PKR.com CEO Malcolm Graham

“With our community always at the forefront of our minds, we’ve moved in response to popular demand from some of our fan base who were, until now, unable to play PKR on their systems.”

The Mac version is identical in every way to the Windows version except that the computer upon which gamers can enjoy the online casino is freaking gorgeous. Perhaps the only difference beyond that is the system requirements which are a bit higher than they are for PC, demanding 1GB ram and 1.5 GB of storage. Further, though the online casino software will run on older models, PKR will only provide support for Intel processor Macs.

This time of year is traditionally slow in the online casino business, so casinos are offering a lot of promotions. Land-based casinos right now are having a lot of high-profile shows to bring in the crowds. Online casinos can’t get Crosby, Stills and Nash to play at their casino, so they go with a lot of game-based promotions. Titan Poker has a couple good ones going on right now.

Today, September 25, online poker site Titan Poker is hosting the $20,000 Double Stack Freezeout at 3:45 EST. The entry fee is a little high at $300, but the high prices often bring better competition if you can afford to join the table. The online tournament is No Limit Texas Hold ‘em.

I know what you’re thinking: I don’t have the money to enter that tournament. I was a dumb bully in school who spent all of my time giving people noogies instead of studying and as a result, I’m a 45-year-old man stocking shelves at Save-a-Lot. Don’t worry. For those who don’t want to pay the $300, you can play your way in by winning satellites that have entry fees of only $64.

But what if you’re not a member of Titan Poker? Well, now is a great time to join, because you’ll get free stuff just for that. For new members, once you make your first deposit you will receive five free tokens to use in any of the weekly New Depositor Freeroll Satellites. There is no entry fee for those satellites, which are held every Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday. Players in those satellites compete for a spot in the monthly $20,000 New Depositors Freeroll, which has no buy-in and has a guaranteed prize pool of, you guessed it, $20,000.

So if you want to enter the Double Stack Freezeout or are not a member and want to join for a shot at the New Depositor Freeroll, visit Titan Poker today.

Anyone who has ever gone to school knows how crazy rumors can spread. It starts with someone seeing you talking with Ms. Jameson after class and then before you know it the whole school is reporting that you are getting special lessons “Hot For Teacher” style. It’s the kind of thing that makes the reputation of a young man and leads to the firing and arrest of the lovely teacher. Poor Ms. Jameson.

A recent poll* found that 42% of people believe the story about Richard Gere and the gerbils. The same poll found that 65% of the country believes that Timothy Geithner is part elf and 83% of the country believes that I am amazing in bed. Only one of those three has been confirmed.

It seems that the online gambling community is not immune to the spread of rumors. For some time, people have been talking about the possibility of Betclick buying out Everest Poker. Recently, though, the rumor has gotten stronger, with at least one media outlet reporting that a deal between the two would be announced next month. When asked about that, Betclick refused to comment. Of course, that is only fueling more speculation that the report is accurate.

Betclick, a company that primarily deals with sports betting, would certainly benefit from acquiring Everest Poker. They are not the only suitor, though. PartyGaming, among other online casinos, have been in talks with Everest. Only time will tell if the rumor is true. In the meantime, I might as well start another rumor. Have you heard that Bodog casino is owned by communists?**

*Note: This poll was unscientific poll and only people in my office were surveyed.

** This should go without saying, but I made up that rumor. To my knowledge, there is no truth to it. But then again, I can’t disprove it, either…

There is an old saying: Don’t reinvent the wheel. I think it’s because the wheel is patented and if you reinvented it you would be sued for copyright infringement. Many companies, surprisingly, don’t listen to that advice. Luckily, All Slots Casino is not one of those companies.

Mega Money Mania is back at All Slots Casino. The popular promotion will run from September 22 to September 27. During the Mega Money Mania tournament, a lucky player is selected at random every hour and awarded 50 credits. To be eligible for the rewards, players have to wager at least 50 credits during the last three days before the prizes are drawn. Though regular players are rewarded with 50 credits by the promotion, VIP players receive 75 credits. Once the prize has been awarded, players have to wager the credits 30 times (or 15 if they are a VIP).

That means that right now is a good time to hit the slots at All Slots Casino. The casino is just giving things away. It’s kind of like being a guest on Oprah, except that you probably have a job. All you have to do is show up and start gambling, something you would do anyway, and then every hour you have the chance of winning. So log in to All Slots Casino and stay away from watching Oprah, which, aside from a colostomy, is probably the most unpleasant experience I can imagine.

The World Championship of Online Poker has come to an end and online poker wiz Yevgeniy Timoshenko walked away from the main event a winner. As if winning weren’t a big enough honor, Timoshenko might need a new wallet to hold the $1,715,200 in winnings he took home, which by the way is the second largest pot he’s ever scored.

The event was so big in fact, that online poker players from 140 different countries participated. Timoshenko beat out 2,144 poker fanatics to bring home the crown. The tournament featured a month of high stakes tournaments with the main event yielding the highest prize pool of all in a game of No Limit Texas Hold’em with the stakes set at $5,200. The huge turnout contributed to a gargantuan $51,652,800 prize pool, so big that the runner up walked away with over a million bucks.

Timoshenko wasn’t done cleaning up the chips just yet. While he was winning the World Championship of Online Poker, he won the Monday 1k on Full Tilt, winning another $75,000.

One minute it’s there and the next it’s all gone. Isn’t that just like gambling? Yesterday we talked about Senator Ron Wyden’s proposed bill to legalize and regulate online gambling for the purposes of subsidizing health care costs. That bill has been pulled and the senator has moved on to greener pastures, looking for other ways to pay other people’s bills with other people’s money.

The reason seems to be that healthcare reform is controversial enough as it is and bringing online gambling to the table too is apparently tantamount to proposing abortion or euthanasia to help fund healthcare. And because current healthcare reform seems more about getting something passed than getting something passed that works, the last thing anybody wants to do is raise eyebrows.

“The last thing Senator Wyden wants to do is make it more difficult to expand subsidies for working families by introducing a new contentious issue to the debate,” said Jennifer Hoelzer, Wyden’s communications director. “So when he offers the amendment, he will do it with other funding mechanisms.”

“Changing the laws regarding online gaming is a significant detour from healthcare, a detour that Senator Reid agrees is not appropriate at this time,” said Regan LaChapelle, spokesman for Harry Reid.

Though Senator Wyden’s feet were cold enough to pull the bill, that didn’t stop others from voicing their support.

“Money’s money. If that’s the price we pay, that’s the price,” said Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.). “I would consider adding it.”

Barney Frank, who has been the poster child for legalized online gambling for quite some time now also agrees that the bill was a good idea. “It’s a great idea,” Frank said. “Why should we leave all that money untaxed?”

While I continue to hope that someday online gambling will be legalized in the US, I find it disturbing that the only reason the government will legalize it is for financial gain. Playing a game and doing as they wish with their own money (as long as it doesn’t harm anyone else) is or should be every American’s right. It’s a shame that those rights are now considered on their financial merits and not on the wishes and hopes of the country’s citizens. Just my two cents.

Getting stuff for free is great if you like stuff and don’t like spending money. Now, before you get all bent out of shape, let me say that I’m not talking about fake freebies, like socialized healthcare that everyone pays for with their taxes. I’m talking about actually getting something for nothing out of the kindness of someone else’s heart. Roxy Palace online casino understands that.

Today Roxy Palace is running a special promotion, where they give you a 100% match bonus. To get the bonus, all you have to do is log in and make a deposit, something you have to do to play, anyway. Once a player logs in to Roxy Palace casino and makes a deposit between $20 and $100, the casino matches the amount 100% and transfers that amount to your account to play. You can then use that free money to try and make more money. Of course, you can always loose it as well. If not, it wouldn’t be called gambling.

Players can use that bonus on any of the Microgaming-designed games on the site, including online slots, poker, blackjack and more. To receive your bonus, visit Roxy Palace online casino.

As I’ve talked about many-a-time, I am a huge comic book geek. However, I have not mentioned my love for literature. So imagine my excitement when PartyCasino launched a new online slot that squeezes all of my favorite things: comics, literature, and online gaming into one convenient package.

Their new slot, Tarzan is a 20 line, five reel branded slot game licensed from Edgar Rice Burroughs Inc. and is based upon the adventures of Tarzan: The Lord of the Jungle. While one wouldn’t normally think of Tarzan as a comic book, nor would you think of him as an online slot, but the folks at the worlds largest online casino have most certainly delivered.

My favorite thing about the Tarzan online slot is the pulp-comic look it has to it. The colors harken back to the days where comics were read for fun and not kept in bags. The colors are bright, but muted in tone and give it a real vintage look. As for the play?

Tarzan features fully animated artwork, a story bonus round and a “Tarzan wild scatter” wherein Tarzan swings across the screen, changing symbols wild at random. If you grew up on comics, are a fan of the Tarzan franchise or just looking for a new online slot to try your hand at, I recommend giving this one a go.

When the average person goes on a job interview, they are on their best behavior and the same goes for just about every politician out there (save Ross Perot and Ron Paul). When politicians run their campaign, they will tell the American people anything and everything to secure their vote and despite years and years of broken promises, the good-hearted, trusting people of America buy the political snake oil. Take for example, Herbert Hoover’s pledge to end poverty. FDR’s pledge to maintain a balanced budget and to refrain from significantly increasing taxes. Richard Nixon’s pledge to quickly resolve the Vietnam War. Or remember George Bush’s (the first one) now infamous “Read my lips! No new taxes!” Yeah right.

Enter Barack Obama. The man is dynamite behind the podium. His charismatic approach and message of hope and change excited democrats and converted some republicans (or more than likely George W. Bush sent them running into his arms). With the message of big change comes big promises. Among them, to see that every American has health insurance. Another, not to raise taxes on working class Americans who make less than $250,000. And the American people fell for it. Again. Another charismatic guy with a message of hope, another promise too big for anyone to keep. The latest plan the president is hawking involves required health insurance for all citizens which will be paid via collection from the IRS (now I guess they’re just an automated bill-pay service?). If citizens fail to get the insurance, they are fined $3,000. And he says this is not a tax increase. One of the ways the government is looking to subsidize this “non-tax” is through the legalization and regulation of online gambling.

The U.S. Senate Finance Committee is considering an amendment that would legalize online gambling in hopes of funding a reformed U.S health care system. Senator Ron Wyden proposed the amendment which would dedicate the income from government regulated online gambling to subsidizing health care costs. According to PricewaterhouseCoopers estimation, the regulation of online gambling could generate somewhere in the neighborhood of $6 billion per year.

Michael Waxman, of the Safe and Secure Internet Gambling Initiative praised the idea stating, “We applaud Senator Wyden’s proposal to collect and put to good use tens of billions in Internet gambling revenue that would otherwise be lost in the underground marketplace.”

“The Senate Finance Committee should approve the resolution, finally putting to an end a failed prohibition on Internet gambling that leaves Americans unprotected and unlicensed offshore operators as the only beneficiary in a thriving marketplace.”

Of course, $6 billion dollars in online gambling money is nowhere near the amount needed to fund a health care system aimed at insuring over 300,000,000 Americans. So this would work sort of like the post office, which hemorrhages money year after year, but is kept afloat with our tax dollars. In this case, the government would take the online gambling tax money and any other money they can get their grubby little hands on, and send it health care’s way, until they realize it’s not enough and raise the federal income tax. It’s not the first time the government low-balled an estimate to get it past the American people. Take Medicare: Predicted cost in 1970 was $3 billion per year. Actual cost? $6.8 billion. The predicted cost by 1990? $10 billion. The actual cost of Medicare by 1990? $110 billion.

With that in mind, will $6 billion in online gambling funds even make a dent in our nation’s health care? Or is it just another smoke screen to ease people’s minds so that they won’t think about it. What do you folks think out there? Real solution or smokescreen?

UltimateBet does not exactly have the best name in the online gambling industry. Embroiled in a cheating scandal that may end up involving criminal charges, the online casino is trying to do damage control and restore their image. That’s where Joe Sebok comes in.

Sebok, the popular professional poker player, has signed a contract with UltimateBet, where he will wear their brand when he plays in tournaments and will serve as a media relations representative for the casino. Sebok has a clean image and is a trusted member of the community, which in some ways makes it strange that he would sign with UtlimateBet, but it also makes him the perfect choice for the casino.

Sebok admitted to having reservations about signing the deal, but was then convinced that UltimateBet is committed to making amends for the scandal. Sebok said that his first priority is “to help aid in the release of not only all of the hand histories from the super-user scandal, but also the accounts that were used to perpetuate the scandal itself and the actual physical names of those individuals who we believe to have been directly involved in disparate ways with the actual cheating.” In other words, his primary objective is to achieve transparency and full cooperation with the authorities and the gaming community. Here’s hoping UltimateBet treats transparency differently than Barack Obama.

Whatever happens, Sebok has put his reputation on the line by signing with a company that was involved in a cheating scandal. By doing so, I’m convinced that Sebok at least feels that the company is still reputable and trustworthy. Some people believe that UltimateBet is now the safest place to gamble, since they are under so much scrutiny and can’t afford another PR hit. It’s the same as the theory that the safest airline to fly is one that just crashed and the cleanest university is the one that was just put on probation by the NCAA. Actually, scratch that last one. Universities are never clean.

Other people would rather gamble on a site that has never had a bad reputation. That is the problem UltimateBet has to deal with. They need to restore the public’s confidence in their company. The signing of Joe Sebok helps, but they still have more to do.