Online poker would seem to make easy pickings these days and is being attacked from all angles recently. When the 1st June introduction of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA) came into force in the U.S. Another ruling in Switzerland, issued the day after the UIGEA took effect, this decision was greeted by the poker's supreme governing body as an erroneous judicial decision.

On 2nd June, the Swiss Court came to a judgement that poker was a “game of luck,” which will have serious repercussions throughout the country. The lower court ruling that was overturned ruled that Texas Hold’em was a game of skill, so therefore, participation was allowed in hotels, bars, private games. The decision by the Swiss Court overturns that ruling and since the Supreme Court decision, the only realistic venues where poker can are official casinos.

The International Federation of Poker (IFP), which taken giant sides towards becoming the sole regulatory body for poker, reacted with predictable outrage over the Swiss Supreme Court decision. The president of the IFP, noted poker writer Anthony Holden, made a statement on their website quoting “ another example of misguided poker thinking by courts and judges who simply do not understand the game – i.e. that poker is a ‘mind-sport’ of strategic skill far more than luck."

The IFP suggested that poker had reached beyond the debate of skill versus luck when the International Mind Sports Association (IMSA) recognized its virtues. He said, “ poker was accepted as a ‘mind-sport’ by the International Mind Sports Association, an organization recognized by the International Olympic Committee, which puts it on a par with chess and bridge as a game of skill.”

“Poker has also been invited by SportAccord, the general assembly of 150 international sport federations, to take part in the World Mind Games China, in 2011,” Holden stressed in the press release. Poker is expected to be a competition sport during the IMSA’s next World Mind Sports Games, to be contested during the London Summer Olympics in 2012.

April 2008 was the IFP's first introduction, and the IFP has been one of the most active agencies for the promotion of poker internationally. Holden elected president, the IFP’s primary goal has been to have the sport of poker recognized as a skill – or “mind” – sport instead of its traditional view as a game of luck. The IFP founded just over one year ago, earnt the “mind sport” designation from the IMSA and had been at the heart of lobbying to governmental organizations, through academic research and analysis, that skill is a much more critical factor than luck.

No one is quite sure what this all means for the online poker community of Switzerland, but it is yet another hurdle for them to overcome.