US gambling whale Harrahs Entertainment joined forces this week with
AOL to build a co-branded cyberspace home for the popular World Series
of Poker tournament and its associated interest groups.
The new site will include free-play poker rooms, event updates and
other content in an effort to widen the tournament's audience. The
relationship between Harrah's and AOL will also allow 12 poker fans,
age 21 or older, to win a free seat at the $10,000 buy-in No limit
Texas Hold'em world championship event at either the 2006 or 2007
World Series
of Poker.
"We're thrilled to pair the best brand in poker with the
best brand in online games and content," said Jeffrey
Pollack, vice president of sports and entertainment marketing for
Harrah's Entertainment. "AOL's powerful reach will help
more people than ever before experience the fun, excitement and energy
of the World Series of Poker. This strategic alliance is an important
foundation for our growth strategy over the next 24 months."
"The renewed interest in poker has also been reflected
on AOL.com, where poker is constantly among the most popular games
on our service," said Ralph Rivera, vice president and
general manager, AOL Games. "Joining forces with Harrah's
to create the most compelling World Series of Poker-branded poker
destination online is a great way to satisfy our users' interests
in all things poker."
The announcement seized the opportunity to publicize the World Series
of Poker, which will take place next summer at the Rio All-Suite Hotel
& Casino in Las Vegas. During the 2005 World Series of Poker,
more than $52 million in prize money was awarded in the Main Event
alone, and every player who advanced to the final table won at least
$1 million.
Industry observers were also interested in the results of a new survey
released with the announcement and contradicting pessimistic reports
about a fall-off in global poker interest recently.
Conducted by Schulman, Ronca, & Bucuvalas (SRBI) the AOL Games
Poll was conducted by telephone April 21-May 1, 2005 among a random
sample of 1,005 people throughout America. The margin of error for
the entire sample is approximately +/-3 percentage points.
It showed that mainstream interest in poker has increased significantly
over the last year.
Almost half (47 percent) of Americans surveyed play poker in some
form. Among poker players, almost one in five (17 percent) say they
have played poker "more than ever before," and about a quarter
(26 percent) have taken up the game just in the past year.
More than one-third of the poll respondents (37 percent) watch poker
events such as the World Series of Poker on television, and about
one-in-10 (11 percent) have played poker online. When asked why they
play on the Web, most players said it was to learn the game or to
practice before playing at offline casino events.
The AOL Games deal provides WSOP with access to millions of players
using unique and exclusive high-speed and narrowband programming features
for online, PC and console gamers. AOL provides more than 150 online
games to approximately 8 million game fans per month, who have an
average monthly site dwelling time of over 3.5 hours.