Search Engines Know How to Regulate

Web portals such as AOL and Yahoo! have already made their first steps in the online gambling world by partnering with a sports betting company (the former) and introducing a poker portal (the latter). This is not the first step really for these companies. As search engines, they had a bigger role than many realize in the industry.

Now, with a third player, perhaps the biggest of all three or the biggest of them all, Google, is entering the online gambling world in a way. Voices commenting on the positive contribution to the regulation of the industry, in light of such government interventions such as the case was with the United States, are heard around the Internet.

Gamblers reach their online casinos in one of many ways either via direct marketing methods (advertising emails or banners across the Internet, for example), from recommendations posted at forums, chat rooms and blogs, via specific and professional portals or from search results on Google and other search engines.

Taking this information, the search patterns of the gamblers, the search engine can filter the sites and regulate the casino sites in the selection. The engine itself is able to regulate online gambling, a much needed measure that some governments (read: the United States) are not keen to do, instead opting to ban the industry and leave it to corrupt operators.

Sites that are popular can be noticed by the search engine and will also be linked to other betting sites and portals around the online gambling world. Corrupt casinos, for example, will fall off the search results and not be linked to other sites listed on the search engine.

This is a natural regulation system that is dictated by users and search engines. It worked well until the US intervened.