This time on the ChiefsClash episode, we have Nadiya, the CCO of Relax Gaming, Jeff, the Founder of Ifrah Law and Itsik Akiva, another Founder but of Headway Consulting.
1. What are Sweepstakes casinos?
Itsik: Simply put this is a clever and legal way to enable us to offer an experience that is as close as possible to real money gambling without being defined gambling and without the requirement of regulation and licensing. On a practical level, what does it mean? That Sweepstakes gaming in this model is a social gaming website that offers users the option to play casino style games in either social gaming format, which is usually played with gold coins or any type of virtual coins, or a sweepstakes based format, which is what you call promotional play or sweepstakes points.
2. How are these practices legal?
Jeff: Well, as Itzik said, these laws have been on the sportsbooks for a long time and many operators have been doing this for a long time and there really hasn't been much controversy around it. The statutes in the states prohibit games of chance, so you have a consideration, you pay, you play a game of chance, you spin a wheel and you get a prize. If you win some sort of cash, that's gambling. So under the state laws, wherever you see prohibited games of chance, there's also an exception for free entry. Now, free entry doesn't mean that there's no money being exchanged at all on the platform. What it means is you have an opportunity under state law to obtain a prize and play some sort of game without having to pay money.
3. Is there a difference in the content that website offer to players?
Nadiya: Going back to some legal and compliance aspects, you need to implement different currency, and it's not one currency, it's two. So, most of the customers are using gold coins and sweepstake coins, but there are also custom currency, which makes additional burden to the game. The other thing is language, you have to be super compliant with the language, meaning that anything can link to real money play. So for example, you cannot use bet, it has to be play. You cannot use Gamble and there are some features in the game which are actually inside the game, you cannot change it, so you cannot offer this type of games because it's going to be uncompliant. There is a lot of work behind the scene to make sure that you're actually delivering the right content to your customers and they are fully compliant.
4. The best "bad" party I've attended in ICE 2024 was...
Jeff: You're gonna definitely call me an old man, but I did not actually go to any parties this year.
Nadiya: The best "bad" party I've attended in ICE 2024 was the Soft2Bet Aqua Shard party.
Shahar: The best "bad" party I have attended in ICE 2024 was having some hot tea with Itsik and Tal at the lobby on the first night after the show.
Itsik: The best "bad" party I've attended in ICE 2024 was sipping tea at our hotel lobby, with Shahar and Tal. Feeling old never felt so good!