When the Iipay Nation of Santa Ysabel announced last week that it was launching an online poker room that would take away real money games from Californians, there was a shock in the online gaming industry.

California is the "whale" of online poker. With a population of more than 38.3 million, California is home to almost the same number of people as the Netherlands, Belgium, and Greece combined. If California were in Europe, it would be the 10th most populous state in Europe. 슬롯머신

In terms of GDP, California has the eighth largest economy in the world, with a GDP of $1.95 trillion. This trails only the entire United States, China, Japan, Germany, France, Brazil, and the United Kingdom.

That makes California a big prize. The online gaming industry wants the entire U.S. to open its market to regulated online gaming products, but California is the most important part of the puzzle.

Since 2007, there have been attempts to introduce regulated online poker into the state. But the efforts so far have been ineffective, as Native American tribes, which successfully run casinos that have significant political influence in the state, initially rejected online poker and only recently began to agree on legislation that could regulate the market.

Last week, Santa Isabel announced that it would take matters into its own hands and release a private table, an online poker room just for Californians.

When the announcement came out, the first question that many people asked was, "Is this legal?"

Martin Owens, a prominent gaming lawyer working on behalf of Santa Ysabel, believes the answer is yes.

Owens said, "Basically what you have are problems that have not been properly solved or have not been solved at all."

"Naturally, the interaction between tribal and state and federal powers regarding gambling is the first thing," Owens said. "Gambling on land is enough. But when you're talking about internet gambling, it's a whole new setup. Lawmakers haven't kept pace with this technology."

"There are 16 states and D.C. that haven't even defined what gambling is!" Owens added. "Just nine states haven't mentioned the internet at all when it comes to gambling. And most haven't updated their gambling laws in decades."

"The advent of the Internet has opened up jurisdiction issues," Owens said. "If there were elephants in this room, it's jurisdiction issues." Where and why are the bets made

"This is an issue that the authorities have been working to their advantage. Of course, it was on that server when the U.K. started betting on the internet. But Costa Rica has a law that says it happens everywhere except Costa Rica, because that's their legal advantage."

"On a neutral basis to this, I moved on to contract law," Owens said. "Under contract law, and also by commonsense, where a contract is silent about a place, a contract is considered to be made where it is practicable. That's where the contract can actually be made, and where the contract can be fulfilled if desired."

"Now all that's going to happen with internet gambling is the probabilities, the betting offers, the amount of money to bet on, checking your account for money and entering the solution to the event, the red 20 of roulette, the horses that cross the line, and so on," Owens said. "All these elements are gathered together is on the server of the internet gambling business."

Owens says Santa Isabel is fully compliant with California law because it's paid by the server.

Owens explained, "the 1998 (federal) Indian Gaming Regulation Act divided gambling into three categories for federally recognized tribes."