“Social casino” is a term that you may have seen or heard online, especially if you are a fan of casino-style games or are familiar with what has been more traditionally known as sweepstake casinos. But what does it really mean to be a “social casino”? Why do they call themselves a “social” casino? Are they a casino that aims to help solve social problems? Are they a casino that offers a social or a socializing experience? Or is it something else entirely?
These are the questions that came to mind when I stumbled across sites like StakeUS, who claims to be “America’s Social Casino”; Pulsz, who claims to be “The Best Play and Win Social Casino”; and WOWVegas, who claims to be “The Best Free-Play Social Casino”.
To make things more puzzling, a quick registration and brief look inside each site quickly revealed that the latter two sites don’t even seem to offer any sort of way to socialize with others on their sites and a glance at #3 of the chat rules over on StakeUS, purportedly the US-friendly version of the Stake brand of casinos, would seem to suggest that maybe the ‘social’ in social casino isn’t exactly meant to suggest socializing (or at least, not some place for you to be sharing your socials to KIT):
So then, could the “social” in “social casino” have something to do with social “-ism” (socialism)? Who knows? But, the more answers I’d find, the more uncertainty I’d have about whether or not I had found the right answer. Therefore, I’d like to invite you in and hear your thoughts as I share with you my journey and what I’ve uncovered about this oddly used term, so that we can figure this out once and for all, and answer the question: What exactly makes a social casino “social”?
We’ll go over what a social casino purportedly is and how sweepstake casinos had all started, as the two terms seem to be often used interchangeably when perhaps they shouldn’t. Then, we’ll consider the idea and venture into the possibility of there being a connection between social casinos and a socialist belief, to determine whether they share any common values or goals. Finally, we’ll get into the legal interpretations in an attempt to determine whether the sites calling themselves a social casino is really a misnomer, euphemism, irony, or paradox.
What ostensibly is a social casino?
As they would seem to describe themselves, social casinos are online platforms that offer a wide variety of casino-like games that can be played for fun, without the use of any real money. Unlike typical casinos where you have “pay to play” or are required to exchange your dollars for chips and put your money at risk in order to play their games, social casinos typically don’t require that you transfer money, make a deposit, or even to have any money at all for that matter, if you want to play their games. You do, however, still have to be the right age, interestingly enough.
Instead of using real money, they use in-house virtual currencies, usually referred to as or called “gold coins”, that are often given away for free to registered users on what seems to be at least a daily basis, sometimes more, wherein its believed their business income relies on the sale of additional gold coins from users who run out and want to play more. Some social casinos also offer what’s known as “sweepstakes coins” or “sweepstake tickets” in addition to their “gold coin” currencies, which separates themselves in their ability to be used to redeem various types of prizes, including cash prizes. These types of social casinos seem to be more well-known as sweepstakes casinos.
The History of Sweepstake Casinos
Sweepstakes casinos are a relatively new phenomenon when it comes to the online entertainment and gaming industry. They emerged in the late 2000s as a legal alternative to online gambling, using virtual currencies and sweepstakes contests to offer casino games without having to risk any real money.
The first sweepstakes casinos were land-based establishments that operated in the US since the early 2000s. They used software that mimicked slot machines and other casino games, but instead of accepting cash, they required players to buy prepaid phone cards or internet access cards. These cards also gave players entries to sweepstakes draws, where they could win cash prizes or other merchandise. However, these sweepstakes cafes, as they were called back then, faced legal challenges and crackdowns from various states, as they were all too soon considered a form of illegal gambling.
However, the idea of using sweepstakes contests as a way of offering casino games online began to emerge in the later 2000s, when it was discovered as a legal loophole to allow players to participate in a form of “online gambling” without having to risk any actual money.
One of the first to arrive on the scene in the US was Chumba Casino and is widely regarded as the first social casino to begin offering sweeps coins alongside their free and purchasable gold coins, launching back in 2012 by VGW Malta Limited (formerly known as Virtual Gaming World). For years, it topped the rankings of sweepstake casinos above its sister sites LuckyLand Slots, Global Poker, and Scratch Carnival which were all owned and operated by the same company, but each was catered to a particular gaming niche. Chumba, along with its counterparts, used gold coins and sweeps coins as its virtual currencies, and offered games such as virutal slots, blackjack, roulette, and video poker. Chumba Casino was able to legally operate in most US states under the various sweepstakes laws, which just mainly required that no purchase or payment was necessary to enter or win their sweepstakes contests. Chumba had also gone so far as to obtain licenses from Malta and Canada to ensure its legitimacy and security, helping to ease online visitors into this new and exciting world.
Since then, several other online sweepstakes casinos have emerged, offering a variety of games and features. Some of these casinos are operated by well-established gaming companies, while others are independent startups. Some examples of popular online sweepstakes casinos today include StakeUS, WOW Vegas, and Pulsz, while some lesser known brands that each have their own unique design and look would include McLuck, LuckyBird and DingDingDing. These casinos use different names for their virtual currencies, such as gold coins and sweeps coins, Wow coins and sweep coins, or gold coins and Stake cash. However, the underlying mechanics of how sweepstakes casinos work are the same across all platforms. However, being the sweepstake casinos that they are, at least seemingly by definition, they all seem to refer to themselves as “social casinos”.
Defining the “Social” Casino as a Social Business
The term social casino can be somewhat misleading and ambiguous, as it can have two different meanings depending on the context and the perspective of the reader.
On the one hand, if we consider a social casino as a “social business” then it might refer to a business (or casino) that is built with a fundamental social purpose of serving humanity, such as addressing issues relating to poverty, health, education, or environment; all while being financially self-sustainable and not paying dividends to its owners, as defined by Professor Muhammad Yunus, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate.
On the other hand, a social business (or casino) can also refer to a business that fosters social interactions among its customers or employees, similar to how high schools would host ‘school social events’ such as homecoming, prom, or grad night to give students a chance to connect with their peers and develop meaningful friendships. Whereas this meaning is more related to the concept of social capital, and refers to the benefits that people can gain from their relationships and networks in society. Social capital can enhance trust, cooperation, well-being, and innovation among individuals and groups.
Therefore, when an online sweepstakes casino chooses to call itself a “social casino,” it might make you wonder if its out to serve humanity and aims to create a positive social impact as a casino somehow, or if it intends to serve society in a way by trying to provide a social or socializing experience as part of being a casino. To determine which one is the case, we would normally need to look at the specific mission, vision, and values of the business, as well as its products, services, and practices. Needless to say, that info is about as hard to find as a free bonus drop that hasn’t been fully claimed yet (or in other words, you’re probably not going to find it that easily).
Alternatively, we could just ask the business owners or managers what is meant by the term “social” in calling it a ‘social casino’ to figure out what exactly it means, but when I tried, this is the answer I got from a community manager (who asked to remain anonymous when asked if I could share what they said):
So, the social part means its free or that it’s made for entertainment only? How does the term “social” represent that?
It would seem we weren’t going to get a straight answer and we were left to speculate on our own what is meant by their use of the term social and if it was meant to signify a social casino built for humanity or for hosting a socializing experience. But, to that regard, it would seem that many online social casinos fall short of either meanings, in one way or another. Conducting a simple online search by combing the terms ‘social impact’ and ‘social casinos’ together, you’ll find more results that focus on the negative impacts social casinos are having on society rather than those highlighting any of their potential positive social impacts. While from a social standpoint, most of them either lack features that would allow users to communicate and interact with one another, such as through a website chat room feature or forum, or the will have those features available but will also impose strict limitations on their use and the content allowed to be shared in those chatrooms.
For example, some sites may censor certain words or topics in the chat, or prohibit users from sharing any personal information or contact details in those chat rooms. These rules and restrictions seem to contradict the idea of a socializing experience being offered by the casino, as they discourage or inhibit any sort of relationship development beyond the website’s chat rooms themselves. This creates an amusing irony and confusion for the users who might have been expecting a different kind of social experience from a social casino.
Social Casinos is Short for Socialist Casino?
While seemingly far-fetched to say the least, there’s no definitive reason to dismiss it as different people will often have different interpretations of how a social casino (or sweepstakes casino) operates and what the term “social” in “social casino” might imply. Therefore, we’ll entertain the idea with a perspective that might suggest or associate the term “social” with the ideals of socialism, just for the sake of consideration.
Let’s say that social casinos are a form of social welfare or redistribution of wealth, in their case, which is a key aspect of socialism. According to this view, social casinos provide a way for people who may not have access to regular casinos or other forms of entertainment to enjoy a similar experience without the risk of losing their money. Social casinos also offer free virtual credits and tokens to players on a regular basis, or through various methods such as daily login bonuses, social media promotions, mail-in offers, or referrals and in a way, it can be said that these free credits and tokens being given away are a form of social assistance or subsidy that helps players who may not be able to afford to buy them be able to also have them. When considering this to be the case with sweepstakes coins, which can be redeemed for prizes that include gift cards and cash, one might argue that it offers a chance of prosperity equally to everyone. So perhaps, in some very imaginative way, sweepstakes coins can be seen as a form of social justice or equality that gives players a chance to win real money prizes or rewards regardless of their economic status.
Of course, this is just some far-fetched interpretation of how a social casino (or sweepstakes casino) operates that might suggest or associate with the ideals of socialism. There are obviously other ways to look at it and plenty of reasons to disagree with the view but ultimately, it depends on how one chooses to define and understand the terms “social” and “socialism”. So while there may be a “redistribution of wealth” occurring, in the sense that there’s a transfer of what is purportedly spent and lost by some users that would ostensibly be redistributed back to other users who had won, it is very unlikely that social casinos play any part in the determination of how the purported “redistribution” would occur, since the game outcomes are supposed to be based on randomly generated results, thus making it highly unlikely that there was any intention to provide some sort of social welfare from the social casino itself, as it would have had no way to ensure the redistribution was equally distributed and/or distributed to the proper social classes.
The Legal Definitions or Lack Thereof
Up until now, you’ve read me use the terms “social casinos” and “sweepstake casinos” interchangeably as if they refer to the same thing because according to what I’ve observed and have been told, they are the same thing. But, according to some sweepstakes casino review websites (such as here and here), which explain that social casinos only offer playing casino-style games using one type of currency and don’t utilize a secondary type of virtual currency for prizes while sweepstakes casinos do, then the aforementioned understanding may not necessarily be correct.
But, is it?
In a frolicking panic to confirm whether or not I had been hugely mistaken the entire time, I searched high and low for some sort of legal definition for either one of the terms and even tried to find at least some statement on a government-endorsed website that would make reference to social casinos and serve as a reliable and credible source but ultimately came up with nothing. That is to say, there’s not much to be found in the United States Code Subtitle IV, Chapter 53, Subchapter IV Prohibition on Funding of Unlawful Internet Gambling text, the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 text, or any number of the other chapters and subchapters of the United States Code relating to gambling practices, nor in the articles and legal library of the Federal Trade Commission website, or any other regulatory government body at the federal level to say definitively if there was a legal distinction that existed between social casinos and sweepstake casinos.
Dismayed at first, I soon realized that it was primarily because, that’s just it! Sweepstakes casinos and/or social casinos aren’t “gambling” websites per se and thus operate within, what’s already been mentioned as, a “legal loophole” as far as anyone is concerned (or more specifically sweepstake laws not gambling laws), so it’s not surprising that there’s really not any one specific section of law regarding the operations of a “sweepstakes casino” versus a “social casino” that we could ever hope to find and would be able to turn to for providing a legal definition of the term “social casino” in comparison to the term “sweepstakes casino”.
There are, however, a plethora of laws regarding how sweepstakes can be run, how they can be advertised or promoted, and numerous other regulations regarding the businesses that offer or run sweepstake contests, but that’s well beyond the scope of what we’re trying to determine.
Therefore, it’s worth noting that, while I’ve tried to find some federal regulation that might help answer whether or not there is any sort of legal distinction between the two that might also provide us with clues as to why they’re called social casinos, state laws vary widely and if such differentiation does exist at the state level, then that differentiation will be specific to that state and hasn’t been covered here (though I will note that, I for the California Gambling Control Resource Book under Division 7, Part 3, Chapter 1, Article 2 otherwise known as section “175369.1 Unfair acts prohibited,” there was no mention whatsoever regarding the qualities or makeup of a social casino or a sweepstakes casino, nor was anything like that ever mentioned among the other 49 occurrences of where the word “sweepstakes” appeared in the text). It’s also important to note that I am not an attorney or any expert of sweepstakes law by any means, so this article shouldn’t serve as any sort of legal resource or reliable authority in determining the legal applications relevant to sweepstakes and/or social casinos. All we’re trying to do here is figure out why in the heck do they friggin’ call themselves social casinos when they do offer a sweepstakes-style coin.
With that said, if you’re wondering whether or not a site being a social casino versus a sweepstakes casino has any significance whatsoever on the legality of whether or not you can play on them, then I would have a social responsibility to tell you that you should check your local laws and the laws of your state before playing on any social casino or sweepstakes casino site. (However, most sites will tell you which states they don’t allow user registrations from. For example, StakeUS does not allow the states of Washington, New York, Nevada, Idaho, Kentucky, Michigan, and Vermont to register a user account.)
Misnomer, Euphemism, Irony, or Paradox
At this point, it’s safe to say that a social casino and a sweepstakes casinos, for all intents and purposes, are one and the same. For those who feel I haven’t fully addressed the points made by those other sweepstakes casino review sites, let’s address the issue with the points they make: they believe the simple difference between the two is that social casinos are considered “social” casinos because they have a chat box on the site where players can communicate and are purely for fun where the player can’t win anything from them of value and/or suggests that the difference between them lies in the fact that sweepstake casinos use two types of currencies while social casinos do not. But as one will quickly notice in scrolling past the next 3 images, here are three proudly self-proclaiming “social casinos” as specimens for the next paragraph:
All three sites claim to be a social casino, to the extent that they’ll even claim being either the best, the number one choice or experience, or America’s “social casino.” All three sites offer two types of virtual currencies with both having no monetary value and only one of the two being used for the redemption of prizes. All the while, of the three, only StakeUS offers a site chat feature. So, how can all three claim to be, not just a social casino, but “the best” and “America’s #1” social casino when only one of them offers a site chat feature? Or, how are they all social casinos when they all offer a secondary currency serving the purpose of sweepstakes coins? These three ‘social casinos’ are among the top most well-known social casinos in the industry today and they collectively defy the definitions those sweepstake casino review sites have to offer.
~TLDR~ I bet they don’t know what makes it a “social” casino either!
So what will it be? Is calling a sweepstakes casino a social casino…
- …a misnomer? If a misnomer is a name or term that is wrong or unsuitable for something or someone then in this case, would calling a sweepstakes casino a social casino that does not foster social interactions or aims to serve humanity a misnomer imply that the term social is inaccurate or misleading?
- …a euphemism? If a euphemism is a mild or indirect word or expression that is used to refer to something unpleasant, embarrassing, or offensive, in order to avoid saying the actual thing then in this case, would calling a sweepstakes casino a social casino that does not foster social interactions or aims to serve humanity a euphemism imply that the term social is trying to hide or soften the reality of the something?
- …an irony? If irony is a figure of speech that involves a contrast or discrepancy between what is expected and what actually happens or is said, then in this case, would calling a sweepstakes casino a social casino that does not foster social interactions or aims to serve humanity ironic imply that the name is contrary to what one would normally expect from such a place?
- …or a paradox? If a paradox is a statement or situation that seems contradictory or absurd, but may actually be true or have some validity then in this case, would calling a sweepstakes casino a social casino that does not foster social interactions or aims to serve humanity a paradox imply that the name is self-contradictory or illogical, but may also have some hidden meaning or reason behind it?
It seems as if we may never know for certain if their choice to call themselves a social casino is accurately described by any one of those options (though personally I’d say it’s a euphemism for some, a misnomer for others, an irony for all, and a paradox as a whole — good grief!). But, what we do know is that it is very intentional and any attempt to define social for one platform might likely to be inconsistent in describing another.
So, regardless of whether they refer to themselves as a sweepstakes casino or a social casino, there’s no denying the fact that these social sweepstake casinos operate within very fine lines of the law. And, if nothing else, for all we know, the term ‘social casino’ is just the term their lawyers advised them to use to help avoid some sort of legal, psychological, or buzz-word-like association (perhaps?) and has nothing to do with any form of definition for the term social.
Leaves you wondering doesn’t it? What’s so bad about being called a sweepstakes casino? Is there a stigma we don’t know about? What about…
Oh the questions…the questions…
Feel free to leave a comment to share your thoughts on why you think they choose to call themselves a social casino!
And, if it happens to be your first time learning about sweepstake casinos and are curious to check one out then I’d highly recommend Stake.US for their transparency and commitment to users, a very rewarding VIP system and their offering of a Daily Bonus consisting of 1 SC* + 10,000 GC claimable once every 24-hours for the life of the account, just make sure you use this link to sign up!
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