| Virtual Online Gambling Casinos |
| Tuesday, 03 November 2009 23:18 |
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Online casinos have come a long way since their early days with regards their graphical interface and digital audio which creates a very lifelike casino experience. However, one element has been lacking, which is a way for gamblers to interact with one another in a real time environment that mirrors the way they'd behave in a real life casino. Now that appears to have been addressed by the use of existing Internet technology which can allow gamers to interact in real time.One of the world's biggest online gaming companies, Bwin, is testing a tool which enables players to interact while they are active in virtual casinos by using a social media called Shoutbox. This tool provides an environment where players can comment on other player's bets and create buddy lists of friends they can then challenge to bets via social sites like Facebook or Twitter. Thomas Kiessling, CEO of Bwin sees this development as a key building block of the business using social interaction to further enhance the online gambling experience for players. There are also several similar developments on the way including a social software creation platform that will allow users to generate their own content for interacting with each other. This will include instant messaging, presence services, buddy lists and alerts. Kiessling feels that the continual development of more new products as well as the embracing of web 2.0 and social networking is set to be the way forward in attracting more business in the form of gamblers making the switch to online forms of gaming. With an annual IT budget of €80 million, Bwin has been very busy in the development arena. They have recently created a brand new poker platform that has taken three years and two hundred and fifty man years to complete. This new platform with its 24 hour live service for taking bets went live in the summer of this year and has the capability to be plugged into a third party website and provide the full featured gaming functionality which can be tailored to match their site theme. Accordingly, it can be seen that the major priorities for Bwin focus on their developing new products. It may com as no surprise to learn that of their 650 staff in IT, around 320 are application developers. This shows their commitment to development rather than the ongoing maintenance of their in place infrastructure. |