SBC News Voice of the Sports Betting Industry
SBC gains first hand insight on the current legal conditions and context of eSports by Bryce Blum, Director of eSports at Unikrn.
A lawyer and avid gamer Blum is at the centre of operations for Unikrn, a competitive platform aiming to take lead in the burgeoning eSports market, leading the operators business development and legal initiatives.
Bryce further maintains a full-time practice in eSports law through the law firm IME Law (Managing Partner). Blum details to SBC readers the complexities of building effective legal frameworks, for an intricate and unique subject matter such as eSports.
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SBC: As a burgeoning market, what are the legal conditions in which eSports wagering firms see themselves operating in? How is eSports legal criteria and agenda being defined?
Bryce Blum: At present, there hasn’t been any specific regulation of eSports wagering. For now, we’re operating within the existing legal framework for sports betting, though I could easily see that changing as eSports continue to push into the mainstream.
SBC: Can an appropriate legal framework help legitimise eSports as a sports? Is this an important factor to eSports business context?
BB: I don’t think our primary goal should be to legitimate eSports as sports. eSports are a different phenomenon entirely – this is competitive entertainment for the future. That being said, we absolutely need to build on the legal framework underlying eSports, and we should start by creating an overarching governing body for the industry. Such a body could help drive industry standards, increase consistency, and safeguard competitive integrity.
SBC: Esports is a fast growing market with many unique player and playing intricacies, how does this burden the development of legal and monitoring frameworks?
BB: It challenges the people creating the legal infrastructure to be as innovative as the industry itself. For instance, threats to competitive integrity in this industry include things like hacking, scripting, and DDoSing. In order to address these types of challenges, we have to be ahead of the curve from a technology standpoint—we have to development legal frameworks that identify and prohibit these types of actions, then make sure monitoring mechanisms actually catch wrongdoers.
SBC: In terms of the US market, what learning can eSports garner (if any) from the current debate regarding the legality of fantasy sports operations?
BB: I’m not sure there is much to learn. The gap between fantasy and traditional wagering applies to eSports in the same way it does to regular sports. At the end of the day, it’s a completely artificial distinction born of political expediency. We fully expect sports betting to become legal in the US, and don’t think there is much to glean from the controversy surrounding the current operation of DFS sites.
SBC: Finally outlining long and short term goals for eSports progress, what do you feel should be top of the pending agenda?
BB: Our primary focus right now needs to be on developing industry standards and enforcement mechanisms for safeguarding competitive integrity. The legitimacy of match results is paramount for any form of competitive entertainment, and eSports face unique challenges on this front: a diffuse group of competition organizers, the relative youth of the industry, and technological complexity. Unikrn intends to take a leadership role on this issue. We can and should unite as an industry; collaboration will be key moving forward.
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Bryce Blum -Director of eSports at Unikrn
