Last week will be better known as 'Black Friday', when the FBI shutdown domains of Pokerstars, FullTilt Poker, Absolute Poker/UltimateBet, the Dept of Justice indicted 11 members of the poker industry and froze some 75 bank accounts.

The online poker industry was gambling on US players vs the Department of Justice who were playing with an ace up their sleeve. Fearing 75 years in jail, Daniel Tzvetkoff was released, who apparently turned over the financial structure for online gambling to the 3 major poker sites which Tzvetkoff created the processing system.

Full Tilt Poker and PokerStars released statements, and changed their domain names.

Wynn Resorts and Station Casinos, land based casino operators both announced cancellations with PokerStars and FullTilt Poker. Online poker sites were looking for a way to circumnavigate A. B. 258, a bill that would restrict operators who have continued to operate within U.S. borders since the UIGEA passed in 2006.

This leave the window of opportunity wide open for the state of Nevada, specially for Las Vegas, a city that seemed lost in translation to online poker. Unable to entice players back into playing live tables, might just get what they wanted. A ban on US players playing online and being the destination for high stakes live poker.

Doyle Brunson seen this as an opportunity and tweeted...
"Now maybe we will see if these online "superstars" can play real poker. Ante up suckers!"

How does the US ban on online poker effect the industry and how far does it reach?

The other poker sites who did not use the same processor are starting to see an injection of American players, recent partnership of PokerListings with Cake Poker, Carbon Poker both will see a boost in players online. American players will look to fill the void of what is an American past time.

The players are not only the ones to lose because of the crackdown. Poker coaches, affiliate managers and webmasters are scrambling, scratching their heads wondering if their business was shutdown overnight too. The ripple effect has started and only time will tell how far it reaches.

How has this shutdown effected you?
Do you plan on moving to another poker site or just going to toss the chips in and go play live poker?