Bodog's Domain Names Confiscated

[jetset]

I believe Rollo is right on the question of sealed indictments - this is almost standard operating procedure for the DoJ and even state enforcement agencies, as we have seen in the BetonSports and Sportingbet cases.

Paddy's point about the dearth of coverage in online media on the issue, and in particular that astonishingly unprofessional and malicious blog is worth noting. It may be because there is a lack of official material available, but I would have thought that the outrageous nature of this strategic blunder (imo) merited comment.

Have the sites named here been carrying forum discussions? Surely there is significant player interest in the manner in which this fascinating story is unfolding?

BTW, and for the record - this is a piece on the blog that we have already issued to our clients - it will (probably) be in Casinomeister News come Friday.

QUOTE

MOHAWK MANEATERS TO SEE OFF PATENT TROLLS?

Extraordinary comments on Bodog founder's blog

The patent dispute against the Bodog online gambling group launched by Palo Alto-based 1st Technologies and Dr Scott Lewis (see previous InfoPowa reports) took an extraordinary turn over the weekend with some risky and controversial comments on the personal blog of Calvin Ayre - Bodog's founder and chief exec.

The comments had been preceded Friday by a press release from Bodog that had industry observers scratching their heads - the content advised that all Bodog brands for use in North America had been licensed to a company called Morris Mohawk in the Kahnawake First Nation enclave in Quebec, Canada.

At http://www.newcalvinayre.com:80/pate...r-enemies.html, Ayre writes about the Mohawks and their threatening warlike capabilities before referring to the licensing agreement in the following manner:

"It should be very interesting, then, to see what kind of mince-meat they make out of the Patent Trolls over at 1st Technology who are trying to bleed $50 million out of them…all because of some lame patent that 1st Technology claims to have over their Bodog domains.

"That's right…you heard me…their Bodog domains. Dr. Scott W. Lewis is the man behind 1st Technology and I'll bet any money he's wishing he was going head to head with me… rather than a Mohawk whose ancestors scalped 56 Americans during the Battle of Beaver Dams.

"Hey, I'm just saying."

Ayre goes on to publish the definition of "patent troll" as:

"Patent Troll (noun):

"1. A person or company that enforces its patents against one or more alleged infringers in a manner considered unduly aggressive or opportunistic.

"2. The troll takes (what it knows to be) a badly flawed, wholly illogical argument, and then vigorously defends it while mocking and insulting its prey. The troll looks like a complete fool, but this is all part of the plan. The victim becomes noticeably angry by trying to repeatedly explain the flaws of the troll's argument. Provoking this anger was the troll's one and only goal from the very beginning."

He ends the entry with a promise to provide "juicy" information and reports as the case progresses, suggesting that the Bodog dispute with 1st Technologies will henceforth be fought by the Mohawks and not Ayre and his company.

In an overtly risky move, the blog then displays photographs of what appear to be malformed unfortunates, captioned "The North American Patent Troll: Also known as a bottom feeder. You can usually find this creature sucking the bone marrow out of young children.

"This may be the only photo of Dr. Scott W. Lewis (left) in existence. Now, that's either his brother or his dad (right). We're not entirely sure. (Photo: courtesy BritFilms.tv)"

The entry notes: "My blog will be the official website that is tracking the dispute between the Mohawks and the Patent Trolls. I have access to both sides in this so I will have valuable (read: juicy) inside information."

UNQUOTE

I look forward to any further factual information emerging in this case to ensure we're dealing with fact and not speculation wherever possible in this discussion.

To that end, Alwyn Morris's response to the questions posed by ColdEye will be valuable imo.

At the moment there seems to be little cohesive and factual follow-up information coming from either Bodog or 1st Technologies. That may be on legal advice as lawyers often prefer not to show their hand too openly, but I believe that concern has to be weighed against the dangers of leaving the issues open to speculation.

Postscript: I've just visited the blog again, and there have definitely been changes to both layout and content on the 1st Technologies issue. IMO this material is still treading very dangerous legal ground.

[Casinomeister]

...Bodog has been in a death spiral for a long time now. I hope when it finally, and mercifully, crashes, that no one on the ground gets hurt. By that, I mean all those who are unaware of Bodog's legal woes, and still have money with Bodog!...

This is from your first post where you fail to mention that Bodog owes you $2300.

This is you, right?

Why isn't anyone answering? I am worried sick, as I have 2300 with Bodog, and I can't get ahold of them. Please, please, Roberto, help me. I know you and MR. Ayre are tight, I seen you posing with him in London. I never would have deposited with Bodog if not for that picture. Please, Roberto. Please. I'm begging you. Phone Mr. Ayre and tell him I need that money. He's a billionaire. Isn't he????

http://www.towforum.com/online-sport...tml#post169003

If you were aware that Bodog has been in a "death spiral for a long time now" why did you deposit money there?

This thread is beginning to become agenda ridden - agenda ridden postings are not welcome here.

[Casinomeister]

interesting article, jetset.

i searched for those usernames on casinomeister and we appear to have a match!

username "mortey" started a couple of Bodog threads here a year ago before getting banned.

You guys need to point this out to me right away. After a bit of digging on my end, I made all the connections. Paddy is using the forum for his own private circus.
http://www.casinomeister.com/forums/...stallment.html

He was banned here last year for making defamatory remarks about C.A. and Bodog without any referenced material except his blogs/websites. He also made up comments by me on his blog which were a bunch a BS.

Sorry for not catching this right away, but he flew in under the radar while I was away.

Bye, Paddy.

[NASHVEGAS]

Unfortunate that Paddy's past (and current underlying tone as Random points out of a vendetta) basically has killed a good thread which nonetheless has exposed and confirmed at least some important issues/information concerning the current situation of Bodog and Calvin Ayre..............Glad to see that Jetset has the original September 7th, 2007 blog of Calvin. It speaks for itself and hopefully all of Jetset's clients will at least chose to publish the well written article..........Hopefully, I can look foward to the book one day which may make Barbarians At The Gate look like a fairy tale,jmo.

[Casinomeister]

Unfortunate that Paddy's past (and current underlying tone as Random points out of a vendetta) basically has killed a good thread which nonetheless has exposed and confirmed at least some important issues/information concerning the current situation of Bodog and Calvin Ayre..............Glad to see that Jetset has the original September 7th, 2007 blog of Calvin. It speaks for itself and hopefully all of Jetset's clients will at least chose to publish the well written article..........Hopefully, I can look foward to the book one day which may make Barbarians At The Gate look like a fairy tale,jmo.

I don't see this thread as "killed" since there are a lot of interesting aspects to what's up with Bodog and its future; it's merely that the BS that was being spewed has lost a voice.

[NASHVEGAS]

I don't see this thread as "killed" since there are a lot of interesting aspects to what's up with Bodog and its future; it's merely that the BS that was being spewed has lost a voice.

I hope it is not killed also thus I said "basically has killed" which may have been a poor choice of words on my part............along with Paddy's BS(i.e. put down the straw,etc.) there was also some good info. provided that I was not aware of (i.e. Mohawks,etc) and Paddy at least seems to have somewhat easier access and/or better knowledge on certain issues. I did spend a lot of time especially on the history of the Mohawks researching and trying to decipher what was BS and what could be confirmed........That being said, it is not easy or a lot of fun trying to decipher fact from BS and maybe therein lies one of the problems on a public forum............I also can understand for various reasons why you can not allow that on a public forum.

[Rollo]

I think CA rubs a lot of people the wrong way... at first, I was really hoping that he would take a principled stand a la Larry Flint, but it looks like that's not going to happen.

He could be a cool guy for all I know, but his public image is pretty grating - all take, no give it seems.

Anyway, Bodog is really taking some heavy fire now. I don't know how long they will be able to continue opperating in this environment. I'm guessing CA is #1 on the DOJ's gambing hit list. He's rubbed his millions and lifestyle of the rich and famous in everyone's face and the DOJ holds grudges. I don't even think a gaming friendly DEM administration would give him a break at this point.

Anyway, he's surely not a billionare anymore, that much is certian. Bodog can't be worth much as no one in their right mind would invest in it given its mounting legal problems. I guess his net worth is the sum of his liquid assests and BD's short term revenues.

It'll be interesting to see what happens with it. I can say that after all his bluster, I'm pretty disapointed that he didn't go to the mat for the industry. I'd guess when the day of reckoning comes, he may even run off into the night with player deposits... a possibility Bodog clients should be really wary of.

[jetset]

New development from Gambling911. After an unusual silence on matters Bodog (I think it is fair to say that the 911 site has traditionally been very supportive of Bodog and Calvin Ayre) the following has appeared recently.

http://www.gambling911.com/NewBodog.com-091107.html

It's interesting and adds to the discussion here for two reasons in my view:

1) It suggests that the Bodog search engine specialists have succeeded in ameliorating the positioning damage caused by the 1st Technologies case and

2) It indicates the direction in which the Bodog strategy for handling this patent issue may be going, to wit:

QUOTE: Ayre has been on the war path this past week announcing to the world that "this battle will be fought on Mohawk territory", alluding to the idea that historically violent Canadian Mohawk Indians had assumed control of the Bodog.com domain name prior to the court ruling.

"The Mohawks aren't exactly known for backing down from a fight (case in point: the Oka Crisis); and they don't exactly take kindly to folks who try to steal from them," Ayre harps in his NewCalvinAyre blog.UNQUOTE

[NASHVEGAS]

An excerpt from The Wizard of Odds e-mailed newsletter that I just received...Dunno?................. http://WizardOfOdds.com/newsletters/2007-09-12.html From Michael Bluejay....
Bodog.com is gone!I'm working from Japan at the moment, and the other day I couldn't load Bodog.com. So I called the Wizard on my VoIP phone (free call, even though I'm in Japan, hah!), to see if he could load it. He could load it just fine, so I figured the problem was on my end. Then the site went down for the Wizard too. And for the whole rest of the world.
Seems that Bodog lost a lawsuit brought by a company that says Bodog has been using their technology to deliver the games to users over the Internet faster. Actually, Bodog didn't so much lose as they got a default judgement against them, since they didn't show up to the trial for some reason.

So the suing company got control of all of Bodog's domains. But they can't do anything with them, because the name "Bodog" is trademarked. So while losing the domains is a loss for Bodog, it's not exactly a victory for the company that got them.

While Bodog is trying to get their domains back, they moved all their stuff over to NewBodog.com. Works just like the old one. Same site, new address, no problems. I logged in to check on that bet I made that Congress won't override a presidential veto this year, which I detailed back in the May newsletter. My $50 bet is still there, waiting on the outcome of the bet.

But that's not the only Bodog news...

Bodog spins off its North American gaming operation!
Bodog recently licensed the rights to operate its North American gaming operation to another company, Morris Mohawk Gaming. What this means is that players in North America get served by one company (Morris Mohawk) and players in other places get served by the original Bodog. But this will be seamless for the player, since there's just one website. It won't look any different to the players. But behind the scenes, one or the other companies is going to be running the servers and taking care of the money, depending on the player's country.
Is this related to Bodog's recent loss of their domains? Absolutely. They now have another partner to try to get the domains back, since Morris Mohawk has a huge stake in them. Bodog founder Calvin Ayre says as much in his blog.

Another plus for Bodog in licensing off their N. American ops is that it should lessen their legal liability, in light of the U.S. crackdown on online gambling. If the U.S. wants to go after Bodog's operation, now they won't be able to go after Bodog itself, in theory.

Anyway, a good question that North American players have might be, can I still expect the same high quality customer service from this new company? The answer is Yes. Bodog didn't license their brand as an afterthought, the contract with Morris Mohawk stipulates specifically that M.M. must maintain Bodog's high standards for service and support, and if they don't, then Bodog can cancel the agreement.

Readers know that the main reason we chose Bodog as our advertiser is because Bodog is consistently reputable, and it's rare for players to have any problems getting paid. Rest assured that if that ever changes, we'll be looking for a more reputable advertiser. At present, though, both the Wizard and I feel strongly that there's nothing to worry about.

[lots0]

It suggests that the Bodog search engine specialists have succeeded in ameliorating the positioning damage caused by the 1st Technologies case

I disagree.

The fact that Newbodog now appears #2 for the search [bodog] means nothing as far as SEO goes.

There are very very few searches for [bodog]. In other words there is almost no competition among SEO's for the search [bodog], the bodog affiliates are the majority of sites appearing for the search [bodog] and the affiliates for the most part were not even targeting the the search term [bodog].

newbodog is not appearing in google for ANY 'money terms', like [online poker], [play poker], [poker game] or any of the other hundreds of 'money terms' that SEO's target to convert surfers to real money players.

SEO for Google is almost entirely based on hypertext links pointing to your domain. So if you 'lose' your domain name you lose your Google SEO as well.

Don't get me wrong, newbodog can (and most likely will) come back in the search engine rankings, given enough money, time and effort. But its gonna take them a while and it won't be near as easy for the SEO's at newbodog the 2nd time around.

I also happen to know that a big part of the SEO world is watching newbodog and it's attempt to rise quickly in the search rankings. This means that the Google Search Quality Team is also keeping an eye on them... and that usually means search engine rankings death for any site that practices hard core SEO...