I’ll confess to having been sufficiently out of touch not to have heard about the “Wynncore” parody site on which blogger Chuck Monster was laboring. Anybody who’s used the sluggish Wynn Resorts Web site will appreciate the home page (“Loading 6%”). One who didn’t was a certain Steve Wynn. Or perhaps General Counsel Kenneth Tourek was the person with the dim grasp of a concept known for centuries as “satire.” (Then again, Wynn Resorts is a relative newcomer to “your internet” and all that other crazy kids’ stuff, too. How ’bout them newfangled horseless carriages?)
Anyway, having evidently nothing better to do with his time, Mr. Tourek, Esq. delivered himself of a pricelessly pompous letter, in which refers to his employer and its assets as “famous” no fewer than four times. (Defensive much?) Tourek even has the brass to demand that Chuck simply hand over the domain name he registered, sans compensation. Getting pretty full of themselves, those Wynn folks. First, they stop sharing room-rate data with J.P. Morgan, followed by Wynn’s “Grumpy Old Men” stint on Fox News, then the Garth Brooks ticket posturing and now this stunt.
As Mr. Monster explains to his readers: “Anyways, the Wynncore website is an unfinished parody website which was meant to be a part of this years Trippies awards for ‘Worst Casino Website’. Thank you Wynn Resorts for ruining the joke.” People who behave like Wynn Resorts is doing deserve to be made objects of fun. Chuck, since lawyers are expensive, I’ve got four letters for you: ACLU. As for Steve Wynn, if he really wants to jump the shark, he’s built up a good running start.
Sign of the Times: There may be no more telling indicator of the depth of the ditch into which the casino industry drove itself than the title of the leadoff panel in G2E‘s Finance Track … “Gaming Bankruptcy and Reorganization: Issues and Strategies.” Panelists include Tropicana Entertainment CFO Rich Baldwin, someone who’s in a position to write the book on Chapter 11.
Former Mirage Resorts exec Barry Shier pops up on a subsequent panel, now affiliated with something called The Partner House. Shier seemed on a path to big things at Mirage, particularly when he was charged with opening Beau Rivage, but he’s been off the radar screen quite a while now. Then again, who thought Alex Yemenidjian would re-emerge as a significant force on the Las Vegas Strip? There are plenty of second acts in casino-industry lives.
Those masters of quality on a budget, Millennium Gaming CEOs William Paulos and William Wortman have found a new target of opportunity: New Hampshire. Using the Rockingham Park horse track as their base of operations, the Dollar Bills are helping to lead the movement to bring racinos to the Granite State (formerly symbolized by the now-vanished Old Man of the Mountain, left). Some reports place the number of slots proposed for Rockingham alone 
There’s continued apprehension about MGM Mirage‘s $8.5 billion, 7,200-unit CityCenter, especially now that hotel rooms there are going for less than ones at either the Venetian or Encore. (Thinking positively: Who knew CityCenter was going to be so affordable?) Business Week also frets that the metaresort will cannibalize existing MGM business. Since the company does not believe in cross-property marketing, managers at Aria will have just as much incentive to siphon business from Bellagio as from Caesars Palace. Or perhaps MGM enjoys a speedier recovery while — as analyst Matthew Jacob hypothesizes — everyone else’s road back is made even longer.
“It’s not legal, and anyone who thinks this is legal is wrong. They are guilty of a misdemeanor if they do this.” — Steve Wynn, who’s not a lawyer 
… here’s a foretaste of what we hope to see on the red carpet tonight. That, obviously, is Cheryl “The Body” Burke on the right, though Kym’s none too shabby in the curvature department, is she?
That’s clearly the best (and boldest) course of action when faced with a threefold threat: table games in Pennsylvania, work finally underway at SugarHouse (left) in Philadelphia, and slow-but-steady movement toward opening a racino at Aqueduct, near New York City. By the time the first of that trifecta comes into play, it will be too soon for some of Boyd’s Las Vegas properties to take up any slack from Borgata. Cash flow in the locals sector was -31% and net revenue -17%, driven down by decreased consumer spending, which had a concomitant effect on room rates, with August described as “incredibly slow.” Morgan expects an “elongated” recovery in this sector, whch translates as: not in 2010.
Back when Harrah’s Entertainment was surrendering to the cold, clammy embrace of Texas Pacific Group and Apollo Management, the bean counters assured CEO Gary Loveman that Harrah’s could carry almost $30 billion in debt and sustain a 20% revenue decrease.