The online gaming group 888.com has announced that it has upgraded its poker software, changing it to meet its player needs. The upgrade and changes include the addition of new features, gimmicks and table views.

The upgraded software is now available with three table views – the classic view is the old 888 feel; first person view options; a 3D table with avatars; a clear view minus avatars and far more. It has attuned its all-in feature, which is one of the most powerful moves in poker. Though if the feature is used by mistake it can prove to be very costly. So the site has removed this feature button but a player can still use it by using a slider.

888’s Marketing Director Matt Robinson speaking about the upgraded software said, “The new software is our next step in our development. He added, “We wanted to provide them with software that would upgrade their poker experience.”

In another announcement the site has said that it had given away the second Shane Warne prize package. The winner this time was Nathan Perry from New South Wales, who was the lucky winner of the Ultimate Home Game Tournament. The winner along with eight of his friends played with Warne at Perry’s house and were served beer and pizza by a private waitress while playing on a pro-quality table with chips and cards supplied by 888. Shane also signed cricket memorabilia for his fans while at the game.

Speaking about the prize package, Robinson said, “Our Ultimate home game tournaments have become very popular in Australia. They are attracting Poker and Shane Warne fans from all across the country.” He added, “We want to give the fans a chance of a lifetime to play with Shane Warne at the 2008 World Series of Poker.”

Online gambling group Bodog has announced the launch of a new online poker tournament, which will be played out this summer and will imitate all the 25 Hold ‘em events of the 2008 World Series of Poker in Las Vegas.

The Bodog Poker ‘Mini Series of Poker’ will take place between May 30 and July 3 in Las Vegas.  At the end of these 25 events, Bodog will host a final tournament that will award three seats for the 2009 World Series of Poker tournament. This will make it the first site to award seats to the 2009 tournament.

The website will be running a Tournament Leader Board through the duration of the 25 tournaments. This leader board will decide which player will take part in the final, 27-player tournament. The top four players on the leader board will qualify automatically.

Players who are placed between 5 to 100 on the Leader Board will vie for one of 18 seats awarded in a Semi-final qualifier that will be held two days before the final. The remaining five seats in the final will be awarded from a wild card draw of players who have taken part at least three Mini Series of Poker tournaments.

The players who finish in the top 3 places at the Mini Series of Poker final will be awarded prizes worth $12,000 for the 2009 World Series of Poker Main Event.

The online casino group Jackpot Factory has announced that newly registered players on its site All Slots Online Casino has won a combined sum of $79,800 in the recently held Free $100,000 Slot Tournament. The win included a sum of $50,000 that was won as a grand prize by a player from Norway.

The tournament that lasted a month was contested by a record number of 1783 players and ended with a grand final. At the end of the tournament the site gave out cash rewards to 300 players. The winner of the tournament Per Magnus S, was awarded a free entry into it just a week before the tournament started.

In a joint statement released by the site and David Brickman who is the Vice President of Player Affairs at Jackpot Factory, ” we would like to congratulate all those people who won cash prizes. Our special congratulations go to Per Magnus.” The statement added, “the tournament was an international success, as it saw participation from players from 50 countries around the world.”

The joint statement went on to say that; “the tournament would be like to be remembered as one where new players did well. New players won almost 80 per cent of the total prize money. It would be interesting for us to see how these new players performed in the next free $100,000 slot tournament.” The winner of the tournament scored 71,065 coins in the final, while Sheila P who came second after scoring 2000 coins less then the winner won $10,000

A nineteen year old construction worker Jonathan Vargas picked the best six numbers of his life and claimed the massive $35.3 million Power ball jackpot that was declared on last Saturday. The worker said that he had three brothers aged 21, 14, 12 respectively and a sister who would be 15 this year. His mother turned 43 this year. All these were the winning ticket numbers. When asked at the press conference about the last number, he said, “I was just lucky, when I chose that number.”

According to the state lottery director of South Carolina, Ernie Passailaigue, there had been many power ball tickets that had been sold in the state that had won money; the construction worker was the only one who lived in the state. The worker studied at the Airport High School in Lexington County. According to the state lottery officials, the winner would take his winning sum in one lump sum payment of $17.3 million, instead of annual payments spread over a period of 29 years.

The winner revealed that he would be leaving his job and buying a house. He had no other big plans, but would be getting in touch with a lawyer and a financial consultant. He added, “I chose the winning numbers while at work, while having a bottle of juice. The expiry date on the bottle was the same date as my birthday and I then decided that my family would bring me luck.”

He went on to say, “I then called up my mother, who gave me the numbers that I wrote on a napkin. I was holding the napkin when I watched the draw.” Though this was the first time he was playing the lottery, his parents stated they had won a sum of $10,000 in a scratch-off game.

The website Online Gambling Insider has made a habit of awarding players with generous prizes every month. The site has made a point of offering its members the best in online gambling, but also goes a step ahead by offering members the right to enter free prize draws. It also offers guarantees for deposits made by players for sums up to $1000 at any of the online gambling sites it stands for.

There were 7 lucky winners during the month of April, one being Geoff B, an Australian who won a Nintendo Wii. After winning, he said, “I was both surprised and happy to know that I had won an award. I am thankful to both Casino Share and Online-Gambling-Insider.com.”

Peter K. from Leeds in the United Kingdom was the winner of an Apple iPod Nano, which was awarded to him by Casino Rewards. He said, “The prize is extremely good and I thank the sites for keeping their promises.” Salonico Boy from Greece was the winner of an Apple iPhone which was awarded to him by the Royal Vegas Casino. Speaking after receiving the award he said, “I am a simple player who loves playing online at the Royal Vegas Casino. I am grateful to the casino for considering me for such a nice gift.”

Ryan D, editor of Online Gambling Insider said, “It’s been another good month for people visiting our site. These seven players were lucky as they visited our site and were awarded great prizes.” He added, “Every month we offer our visitors a number of draws where they can win gifts like a Sony PSP, an Apple iPhone and an iPod Touch, which are awarded only by our site.”

It all went down at the Perlada Castle in Barcelona, Spain. After battling more than 2000 players to become a finalist in the $3 million guaranteed event, one man emerged as the winner of 888’s World Poker Crown.

The lucky winner, Jack Hinchey, a plumber from Toronto, Canada beat out fellow Canuck Michael Lawson for 1st place and the $1 million prize pot. Hinchey credits his granddaughter for inspiration throughout the tournament, turning her picture into a locket which he carried with him for luck. He stated that he would be giving notice at his plumbing job and paying for his granddaughters’ college tuition. Hinchey also stated that playing poker in Spain is “a lot better than being in a sewage pit!” Perhaps Hinchey’s turn of luck at poker will spawn a new career as well!

888’s World Poker Crown was broadcast over a live webcast (a first) and showed player’s hole cards as the action played out. In the final hand of the game Lawson held a pair of tens in the hole with Hinchey holding off suit KQ and the flop turning out K-J-6, all hearts. Lawson then went all in but Hinchey called with top pair, hit another king on the river after a blank turn to take home the huge pot!

One resident from the Tampa Bay area has won the $16 million Lotto draw that was held on Saturday night. The winner was lucky as he had invested an extra $1 and his winning sum got bigger by a sum of $10 million.

A second winner was also from the Bay area and won $268,000. He won the sum after he had bought a Fantasy 5 ticket. The winning ticket was sold in Largo. Both the tickets were the sole winners in the draw held on Saturday.

Jay Patel, who is the owner of the store in Bradenton where the Lotto winner bought his ticket was surprised to learn that one of his customers, was the winner. He stated, “ We are surprised as we did not expect that our customer could ever be among the winners.”

The independent, family-run convenience store at 1000 Carlton Arms Blvd sells around 1,000 Lotto tickets a week. Patel added, “ Most of my customers are local and there’s a good chance that the winner is someone I know.”

The lotto winner participated in a new feature that allowed players to bet an extra dollar and add $10 million to the jackpot. The original jackpot sum was $6 million. The extra dollar he bet boosted his win to $16 million.

A local man became a multimillionaire Saturday when he matched all six numbers drawn in Saturday’s Illinois Lotto game, making him the sole winner of a $7 million jackpot.

The winning ticket was purchased at Plaza Liquor Mart on 10th Street in Mount Vernon’s south side. While the lucky winner’s name has not yet been released, store manager Tammy Hopkins said he is “a local – a regular working guy,” she said. “We are so happy for him. We’re thrilled that one of our regulars was a winner.”

The man played his own numbers rather than purchasing a computer-generated “quick pick” ticket, Hopkins said, and came into the store Sunday to get a printout of the winning draw. He didn’t reveal he held the winning ticket until Monday, she said, when he came into the store to fill out a claim form.

State lottery spokeswoman Madonna Duncan said she had not received any information yet about the winning ticket holder.

The liquor store, located on 10th Street on the city’s south side, will receive cash equaling 1 percent of the jackpot. Hopkins said the store’s biggest previous lottery payout was $150,000.

Customers have been flocking to the store since word spread “like wildfire” that a regular hit the jackpot.

“It didn’t take long for word to get out. We were really busy during the first part of the day and I’m sure once more people find out, we’ll be even busier,” she said. “$7 million. Holy cow. Can you believe it?”

Winners can choose to receive a one-time lump sum payment that is about 51 percent of the advertised jackpot amount or they can receive an annuity that is paid in annual installments over a 26-year period.

Ten players will be contesting for the 888.com World Poker Crown which was launched yesterday. The tournament will have guaranteed prize money of $3 million, with the winner taking home the $1 million prize.

The online poker tournament lasted 11 hours and the total number of competitors was reduced from 2214 to 10 finalists. These ten finalists will be flown to Barcelona for an offline final table competition that will take place in 10 days. These 10 players include nationals from Canada, Holland, Italy, Poland, and Germany.

They will be treated as VIP’s along the way and at the destination. They will be flown by a helicopter that will take them to the Peralada Castle Resort. They are being given three nights free stay at the 5 star Peralada Hotel. While the winner will walk away with a $1 million prize, the other 9 finalists will vie for a share of $2 million.

Gigi Levy, CEO of the site, said “We believe that our players should enjoy the game. There is no better way for the players to enjoy the game then sending them to a resort in Spain, where they will get a chance in a lifetime to play in a tournament.”

The tournament will be broadcasted live on http://www.worldpokercrown.com/. During the live broadcast members of Pacific Poker, will be given the chance to play in special tournaments that are restricted, which will enable them to win one of the four World Series of Poker prizes that are worth $17,000 each.

The Party Poker Million VI Tournament has begun today, with players setting afoot on the MSC Poesia cruise liner from the Italian City of Venice. The eight day voyage aboard the ship will take them to several destinations across the Mediterranean and the ship will stop at several ports before they return to Venice.

Though most of the action will take place aboard the ship. There are players from 30 different countries who will be taking part in the tournament with most of them having qualified while playing online. Some of the players are Mike McDonald, Andreas Jorbeck, Brazil’s Christian Kruel, Soeren Kongsgaard, Florian Langmann, Alexander Jung and Finland’s Mika Paasonen.

According to a Party Poker Spokesperson, “There is a lot of excitement in the players as this is the first time the tournament is being hosted in Europe.”

He added, “According to our estimates, the total prize money for this tournament will be $1.3 million.”

According to the site, previous editions of the tournament have been held in the Caribbean and have attracted large number of players. The previous list of winners of the tournament includes Kathy Liebert, Howard Lederer, Erick Lindgren, Michael Gracz and Mike Schneider.

The first edition of the tournament was also the first Hold’em tournament which had on offer the first prize sum of $1 million. The tournament also had a series of other firsts that included a combination of direct entries and online qualifiers, the first to hold the final matches on a ship, and the first to see a lady winner in a million dollar tournament. Most of the players taking part in this edition of the tournament are qualifiers, who booked their seats while playing online.