This article first appeared in the Sep/Oct 2012 issue of World Gaming magazine.
Has anti-Macau “dirt” website CasinoLeaks Macau turned out to be a fizzer? Did we stop it?
Some of you may remember the detailed opinion piece I wrote on the CasinoLeaks Macau website back in our May/Jun issue. For those that missed it, visit our website wgm8.com and type “CasinoLeaks” in the search box.
The site is based in and operated from the United States. To sum it up, CasinoLeaks pours as much dirt as it can on Macau, expounding the evils of the city that has become my home. It waxes lyrical about how bad we all are, and rambles on pretending to be an authority on the Macau gaming scene, “exposing” all the behind the scenes “nasties”. CasinoLeaks actually isn’t a leak site at all. It just publishes information it finds on the public record by hiring local lawyers to do various legal searches. It has promised true leaks in due course, and solicits individuals to leak confidential information about Macau gaming to it.
I interviewed the man behind the site, Jeff Fiedler, while he was in Las Vegas. It transpires Mr Fiedler hasn’t even set foot on Macau soil for the best part of a decade. Fiedler claims the site’s purpose is to protect a tiny slice of the members of the Union he represents, but in my article I exposed what I believe to be his true agenda – a continuation of the China-bashing crusade he has waged for decades.
Fiedler promised daily updates to his site, and true to his word updates appeared almost daily from the site’s launch in mid-February until they very abruptly stopped on June 22. It’s now been more the two months since anyone’s heard a peep out of CasinoLeaks. The promised leaks have not been forthcoming. Perhaps the amazing flood of leaked information Fiedler was expecting simply didn’t materialize.
So what happened? Did our article set in motion a chain of events that stopped CasinoLeaks dead in its tracks? Has Fiedler got cold feet? Did the upcoming US election play a part? Or have they just got bored and given up since almost no one was listening?
We contacted Mr Fiedler by telephone and email, and put the question to him: why has CasinoLeaks stopped publishing information? As at the time of going to press, he has not responded. I’m not holding my breath.
Good riddance if you ask me.
[EDIT 31 August 2012: CasinoLeaks Macau website shut down today]
