A new documentary about the saga that has unfolded in the last decade or so surrounding the world of online poker has met with great success in its effort to raise money for release via the crowd-sourcing website Kickstarter. The film, called BET RAISE FOLD, was seeking $20,000 worth of donations in order to move the project along to the next phase.
Goal met very quickly
Before the weekend was out, the target goal of $20,000 was met, and even exceeded. As we publish this, there are still 26 days remaining in the movie's fundraising campaign, and the group behind the effort is already looking at a surplus budget of nearly $4,000.
The minimum pledge is $1, with "rewards" for the donations ranging from a digital copy of the film at the lowest level of $15 all the way up to $10,000, which nets the generous donor a title of "poker god" in the film's credits as well as an executive producer designation on IMDB.
Effort to "humanize" the game
The makers of the film take viewers deep into the world of online poker for a variety of stated reasons, among them a desire to put a human face to a game that is often thought of as being cold and faceless, to clear up misinterpretations about Internet poker, as well as to help rebuild the image of the game as it remains stuck in what the film's producers call "a dark time."
On BET RAISE FOLD'S Kickstarter site, the filmmakers wrote, "One of the major goals of our film is to tear down misconceptions that the general public has about poker and online poker. Our film humanizes professional poker players and reveals the truth about poker culture, poker strategy, the poker community, and the incredible passion so many people have for the game."
Documentary is a timely one as online gambling regulation gains momentum
Access to real-money online poker, which for much of the 2000's occupied a nebulous place, legally-speaking, has been difficult at best for US-based players since the 2006 passage of the UIGEA, a bill that restricted certain types of financial transactions as they related to online gambling.
The market became even more compressed in 2011, when the United States Justice Department shut down US-facing online poker sites PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker as part of a crackdown on unregulated Internet wagering.
Since then, however, there has been some progress on the state level, as Delaware, Nevada, and New Jersey have all passed laws that will permit residents to place wagers via the Internet. Delaware and New Jersey will permit a variety of types of wagers, whereas in Nevada only online poker is allowed, with the first site there, Ultimate Poker, having launched at the end of April.
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