Black Friday And My Future

First let me start with the fact that I can no longer play on PokerStars or FullTilt Poker.  I am literally depressed too.  Even though poker is just a money-making hobby for me at the moment, I was seriously considering making a job out of it.  All my plans and hopes were instantly shattered when the United States DOJ handed out the indictment of 11 individuals tied in with online poker.  Specifically PokerStars, FullTilt Poker, and Ultimate Bet/Absolute Poker.

I am so frustrated at the moment.  The only reason I have stayed at the job I currently have is because it was flexible enough to let me put in a considerable amount of time into my poker game.  Now that poker is basically gone for me, it is time to start looking for a new job.  I really hate my current job.  But the thing is what do I want to do? What skills do I have to offer?

The first question is much harder to answer than the second question.  I feel I have a ton to offer to a prospective employer. The only problem is….I just don’t know if I want to do it.  I just have lost the all “working for the man” lifestyle.  I want to be my own employer.  I don’t want to have to answer to a boss.  That is the problem, and I really just don’t know where to go from here.  As I have said before though, I guess I can be happy that I do still have a job in a time like this though.

So I have been thinking of learning how to program.  Maybe make some programs for Android (phones) or something.  Maybe get a job in programming.  I really don’t know.  But I feel like my personality really meshes well with programming; and if I get good enough, maybe I can start up a company.  Again, I just don’t know.

Was Gearing Up

Back on the poker debacle.  I haven’t hardly played that much at all this year.  I have been really busy working on my game.  I have basically been preparing for making the jump to play poker full-time.  I basically wanted to get all my ducks in a row.  I actually was thinking of making the jump at the turn of the year.  But since I had a pretty rough last couple months of ’10, and the fact that a possible blackout was looming if online poker was legalized and regulated, I decided to hold off for a little while longer.

I was really making great progress with my game.  I did some really in-depth analysis, and was ready to tackle what ever was thrown my way.  After all, I had to have some pretty big leaks to lose over 10k to one player at the end of 2010, right?

Cheated

Well, come to find out maybe I didn’t have as many leaks as I once thought.  Instead, I was playing against a player with an unfair competitive advantage.  If you recall, there was basically one player that was just giving me fits with 5 card draw.  In fact, I have never lost to one player the way I was to this player.  I was (and should have earlier) about to not play him due to the fact he was just better than me.  That alone is quite a lot, as I pretty much will play anyone.  I just have that much confidence in my game.  Yes, there is one or two other players I try to avoid, but if they REALLY wanted to play me, I would have.

But this one player that I was having fits with basically came out of nowhere and was sitting at all limits, and only playing heads-up.  I should have seen the red flags then, but I didn’t.  I mean how often does someone just come out of the blue and plays the better 5 card draw players and just absolutely crushes them?  In fact, this specific player was up on everyone he played except for one.  That “one” wasn’t even really a regular heads-up player either and his small profit was dwarfed by all the other players losses.

This “cheater” was eventually banned from PokerStars.  But the damage was done.  I lost well over 10k to him in a matter of a couple months, and I suspect that he easily made over 50k in that same time with all the opponents he was taking on.  I don’t want to name this “cheater” by name, though I should.  But here is the thing.  PokerStars banned him, but did not refund any of the players affected.  REALLY??? Ugh.  The thing is, once this player showed up and I was pretty skeptical; I emailed PokerStars about this player.  I basically just got a standard response email and it seemed I was just wrong about my assessment.  Remind you though, that just for me to send an email about possible cheating was totally out of character.  In fact, I have never done that before.  Though I have sent a couple “joke” emails asking that the “Doom Switch” be removed.

Anyway…about two months after my email was sent to PokerStars support, more evidence was sent to PokerStars about this player.  Some pretty damning evidence was provided too.  It was pretty obvious, that at the least this player tried to take advantage of the system.  Because of this evidence that was brought on by another player (I will not name names) PokerStars decided to ban this cheater from ever playing on PokerStars again.  But I later found out that PokerStars did not feel they had sufficient evidence to confiscate the cheaters account, thus paying back those that were affected.

What really upsets me is I was down maybe 1-2k at the time I first had suspicions and sent PokerStars an email.  I lost another ~10k over the time period until he was banned.  It was sad that a player had to find the evidence that was out there.  That should be the job of PokerStars security.  I was really let down by PokerStars.  But at least they did take some kind of action.  Full Tilt never did.

That’s right, FullTilt was still letting this player play!  Though, I wasn’t playing him anymore…he was sitting at nearly every limit.  I know they were presented with the same obvious clues to possible cheating that PokerStars was presented with.  The only thing that was ever sent in response from FullTilt, was just a standard response email.  Thanks!  Way to make me feel secure!

This type of stuff is the exact reason online poker needs to be legalized (though it’s not illegal, it just kinda like the Wild West) and regulated.  It will protect the consumer from this exact type of thing from happening.

What was this player doing?  I don’t really want to dive too much into the details.  I do know he had a program that assisted him with his play that no other player had access to.  Even if it just gave him a slight edge, that can be huge and the small edges can accumulate pretty quickly when playing heads-up.

The Aftermath

So after the whole cheating took place.  I was wondering what to do next, should I remove the PokerStars ad on my site?  Should I let everyone know what was going on?  Well I just didn’t know what to do.  But at the advice of the person who submitted the evidence-filled email to PokerStars, he asked that I keep it under wraps for a bit.  But now that time has gone by, and I am not dropping any names; I am letting the cat out of the bag.  What about still being loyal to PokerStars?  Well, I can’t play there anymore.  But really, they were the most secure site to play on.  It was just a shame that this happened and to be honest, I don’t know the whole procedure and righting the wrong over at PokerStars.

When all the smoke cleared from the cheating, lets just say my motivation for playing dropped to an all-time low.  I was having to scramble at the end of each month just to keep my supernova status on Stars.  But away from the virtual felt, I was analyzing what it was this player was doing “well”.  Now there are some things he did extremely poorly, but I think it was more as an image play.  This player, and his cheating ways, basically pointed me to some new directions as far as improving my heads-up game was concerned.  I slaved away at crunching numbers and probabilities.  I improved my game a ton over the first few months of this year.

I was all geared up to take my new-found knowledge to the tables……but then boom, I was not allowed to play anymore simply because I was an American.  Sigh, thank you Department of Justice!

This Blog and Other Websites

I am probably going to stop posting on this blog.  I am just going to let it expire when the time comes.  Sadly, I just don’t have the motivation to keep it updated.  I made a whopping 15 bucks from ads though!  Ha, I know it isn’t the most appealing thing.  Someone trying to make money from their blog, but I was simply just trying to pay for the cost of the website.  After all, I was hoping that I was providing some kind of entertainment/information to those that came to my site.

Instead, my time will now be focused more on some other sites that I have coming through the pipes.  They are strictly business-oriented.  Maybe, if I finish some of them before this blog reaches its deadline, I will provide links.

Again, I also plan to learn how to program.  I would like to make games and apps for computers/cell phones/etc.  This is my future, as I see it right now.

I will hopefully be able to play some poker a little here and there.  Whether it be on the smaller internet poker sites or a brick and mortar casino (closest casino to me is over 3 hours away).  I just don’t know.  But one thing is for sure, I will still keep myself in-tune.  I am looking forward to the day that this so-called “land of the free” allows me to have my hobby/perspective career back.

One thing I need to do is work on my holdem game.  Sadly, 5 card draw is just not that popular.  If it was as popular as holdem, I would already be a millionaire by now (assuming the same quality of opponents).  If I truly want to make the amount of money that I dream of, I don’t see 5 card draw as being a viable avenue.  However, it was a good start!

What could have been and more

One thing I never did was post my full name on this blog.  Mostly because I have bashed my current job situation so many times, I was worried someone at my workplace might come across it.  The day I was to turn pro in poker, I was going to title the post “Hello, My Name is Tommy ____”.  Well, that post is going to have to wait.  In fact, if poker is not legalized by time this blog runs its course.  I might start up another blog in the future, but it will likely just be a blog named after my name.

In fact, I have read how important it is to have a site under your name for possible networking opportunities.  I might create another website, just about me and maybe add a blog there.  It will likely have my work history and a resume for possible future employment opportunities.  Again, this is just a thought running through my head.  Right now I am still just in shock of the recent developments with online poker here in the USA.

Final words

I feel like I am leaving out a few things.  But if they deem to be important to mention, I may post again here in the near future.  But in the meantime, the best thing I can do is direct you to Poker Player’s Alliance’s website.  They are an organization that was created to fight for the right to play online poker.  So if you are from the United States, please email your local and federal representatives to protect this wonderful game of poker here in the States.

50 minutes, that is what the latest 60 minutes show should have been called. It really would have saved the show if they had just dropped this 10 minute segment on online poker.

First, let me say that online poker is not illegal in the US at this point in time though 60 minutes claims this to be the case. There is no law currently in place that makes the act of gambling online illegal, two laws that remotely come close to this is the old wire act established to prohibit people from making sports bets over the phone. The other is the UIGEA, or Unlawful Internet Gaming Enforcement Act. This act makes it harder for one to withdrawal and deposit funds onto sites associated with online gambling. But again, there is no law in place that says one can not play online poker.

I was really disappointed by this 60 minutes piece. Not only did they say that online poker was illegal, when this is not the case, but for an investigative report they seemed to have done 0 investigating (driving by a couple of buildings is not investigating). All of the information that was brought forward was already known by the poker community. All they did was put it in the lime light.

At no point through this segment did they mention other supposed scandals of the past, the UIGEA, or the PPA. They also left out some interviews with people like Greg Raymer, the ’04 World Series of Poker champ.

This truly was a lack of good investigative reporting and it makes me wonder how credible the other pieces they air are. If they continually get facts incorrect and leave out key information, then the show has lost all credibility in my eyes.

I realize that I will have a bias point of view when it comes to online poker, but I am trying to be as neutral as possible. I knew all this information before it aired. I just thought they would at least get the facts straight or bring in some new information into this black-eye scandal for online poker.

I also want to add, Absolute Poker and Ultimate Bet are the ones behind this scandal. There are other places to play that are much better in terms of security and customer opinions. Two that come to mind right away are Pokerstars and Full Tilt, both the more popular sites for American online poker players.

Well, the day is finally here. The much talked about 60 Minutes (CBS) piece will air this Sunday. It will involve the cheating scandals at Absolute Poker and Ultimate Bet amongst other online-poker-related topics.

I for one can not wait to watch it. I know it will do some immediate damage to the online poker industry, but hopefully it can do some long term good. The hope is that this will open people’s eyes to the fact that online poker needs to become regulated by the US to prevent this exact type of thing from happening in the future.

There are plenty of other reasons why online poker should be legal and regulated, but for more info on that check out the Poker Players Alliance Website.

More can be learned by visiting the Poker Players Alliance web page.

This is just one step in the right direction for online poker advocates. It is going to be really exciting if online poker ever does become totally legal in the USA. I can only hope that it will one day.

To take some excerpts from the PPA’s website:

Appropriate federal regulation can ensure that minors are kept out of sites,services are provided to problem gamblers and the proper taxes are collected. The current system does nothing to protect children, problem gamblers and it is allowing billions in tax revenue to go overseas.

Prohibitions don’t work. The UIGEA effectively bans online poker in the U.S. and drives those players underground. Meanwhile, poker continues to grow in popularity nationwide. 75 percent of Americans oppose banning online poker. According to national polling, a vast majority of Americans oppose federal efforts to ban online poker.

If you are not currently a member of the PPA, please do sign up by clicking on the picture I have posted in this blog update.