Bill's Poker Blog

Time Machine For Feb

2010-03-19T05:43:00-07:00

Sorry, I sort of forgot about my Time Machine posts which cover everything I’ve published in a specific month through the various years of blogging. So today I’ll give myself 7 lashes with a wet noodle and post Feb’s Time Machine and then tomorrow I’ll post March’s Time Machine.

Enjoy

Feb 2009

The Dumbing Down of Affiliate Managers
Hitler Makes a YouTube Video
Betsson Live in Estoril, Portugal
New Place in Malta
Some Upgrades to Bill’s Poker Blog
More On Sponsorships

Feb 2008

I’m F*cking Ben Affleck
Marginal Decisions, Mike “The Cheat” Matusow?, and Andy Black Cries . . . Again
Poker Rap
London Trip Follow Up
The Jew Problem
Elements of Poker, The Rooster, DoingBots, and a Dead Guy
Sometimes the Photo Doesn’t Match the Headline
Happy V Day – Off to London
Elements of Poker, Selective Aggression, and The Tax Man
Elements of Poker Has Arrived

Feb 2007

Why Party Doesn’t Accept French Players
Lee Jones Saves Online Poker
The Little Known Cost of the UIGEA: Britney Spears
Bill’s Blog Considered Expert Opinion
What a Difference a Few Payment Processors Make
Doyle’s Room Exits US Market. Wait, They’re Staying. No, They’re Gone.
The New Tuff_Fish?
FTP Resizable Tables
PokerBandits.ca Closing a Hoax
Cashout From TonyG Poker = Send Your Money to TonyG
Doyle Brunson Rumor Bogus – Gambling911 Not To Be Trusted
Doyle Brunson Arrested?
Pokerbandits.ca
More Bad News For Online Gaming: In the DOJ’s Crosshairs?
Former Senator Al D’amato Pitching Online Poker?
Brandi Goes to the Pole Instead of the Rail
Anatomy of a Cybersquatter
Buddha Call
Good Education on Money Laundering
NETeller says U.S. authorities seized funds
Repost From 2+2
Let The Games Begin: YouTeller Making False Claims?
Top 10 Myths About the UIGEA
MyWebATM = DOA?
Neteller Starting To Piss Me Off
WireCard is teh suck one!1!!1111
More Troubles In Online Poker Land
False Alarm: No Boycott

Feb 2006

Poker Graffiti
Online Gambling Causing Credit Card Debt
Two New Poker Books From Two Plus Two
GoldenPalace and the Olympics
PokerFilter: This Week In Poker News 02.21.05 – 02.27.06
ZeeJustin Responds To Online Poker Cheating Charges
ZeeJustin Gets Banned From Party Poker
Andy Beal and Phil Ivey
Poker Marketing Backfires
Fun Facts About Phil Gordon
Phil Gordon for President
Party Poker Troubles
Tie With A Flush
Forget A WSOP Seat, You Can Win A Hooker
Andy Beal Play By Play
Commerce, Paul Shirley, and a Win
PokerFilter: This Week In Poker News 02.14.05 – 02.20.06
Online Poker, Bubbles, Bursts, and Marketing
Katkin’s Lucky Horseshoe
Full Tilt Poker WSOP Promos
Jack King Off
Go Read Pauly’s LAPC Coverage
Moving Money
Poker Player Quote
TiltBoys Website Relaunches
PokerFilter: This Week In Poker News 02.07.05 – 02.13.06
Andy Beal’s Vegas Adventure
Another Night on Murder’s Row
A Poker Blog With Promise
Beating Blackjack with Andy Bloch
Heard at the Poker Table
Two More Pros Poker Blogging
Expect nothing from a hand. Play each street based on the information at hand.
Annie Duke Video Is Up

Feb 2005

A Couple of Nights At Commerce
Party Affiliate Problems?
How to Outplay Waitresses the World Champions Way
US Gaming Giant Harrah’s Joins Singapore Casino Race
The World Poker Bloggers Tour Aladdin Classic
Sign O’ The Times
Well, I’m Off
LA Poker Bloggers List
Feedback Needed
Google Fight: Phil Hellmuth vs. Dutch Boyd
Doyle Doing a Book Signing
Stages of Development
Vegas casino bets on RFID
Play Poker Like The Bros
Bloggers Aren’t That Bad
Seeing The World Through Their Eyes
Nowhere to go but down

Thanks for reading Bill's Poker Blog. You might want to check out his other sites:

Poker Job Search is a resource for people who are looking to get started in the online poker industry.

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Time Machine For Feb

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The Bill Rini Time Machine Man, I was just going through some things and...
The Week(s) That Was I hope everyone had a great (and safe) new...

Rush Poker at Full Tilt Poker – What Impact Will It Have on Poker?

2010-03-19T02:14:27-07:00

There has been a lot of talk recently about Full Tilt’s new Rush Poker. If you’re not familiar with it, basically the idea is that instead of waiting for hands, the moment you are out of a hand (it goes to showdown or you fold) you are whisked away to another table where you are immediately dealt into a new hand.

Well, I was having a beer fueled conversation with my good friend Hilly who had been in Bangkok less than 2 hours and he said that he thought that Rush Poker was quite possibly the single biggest innovation in poker in the last several years. That’s a pretty serious statement from someone of his caliber.

I couldn’t quite agree with him though. Even when I first heard about Rush Poker I was a little cautious about being overly positive or negative about it. Initially my view was that it would have an initial surge as people checked it out and got addicted to the crack-like nature of it but that most serious players would figure out that the edge that they lose in having data on their opponents or even knowing if someone just took a massive bad beat the last hand and was steaming would be too great to overcome simply by playing more hands per hour.

That was then, now I have even more concerns about how Rush Poker will impact players.

I do think that some players will be able to get in more hands with Rush Poker and thus may opt for it if they can play break-even poker completely based on math. If they’re on a rakeback deal the extra hands could make it more profitable for them in the long run but they will likely be giving up some BB/100 due to sitting down to a new group of players constantly.

But there are two potential problems with Rush Poker. The first is that it could tighten up the games. I notice that I don’t even get that little twitch to play KQo from EP that I might when I’ve sat there for half an hour folding hands. You can wait for good hands instead of playing marginal hands just to break the monotony. And since Rush Poker will have an initial appeal to action junkies even they can afford to wait around for good hands rather than playing any two.

The other potential problem is exactly the opposite of tightening up the game. It may burn out players too quickly. Players who don’t adjust and tighten up will blow through their deposits in a shorter period of time. I haven’t played enough to gather reliable stats on how many more hands you see but let’s just say that you get twice as many hands per hour playing Rush Poker as you do at normal poker. If you’re a losing player then you’re going to lose your money twice as fast.

Now, for a room the size of Full Tilt that may not be a problem because they have enough new players coming in that it may not have a huge impact but Full Tilt is pushing Rush Poker pretty hard (offering bonuses for earning just 10 points) so they may be pushing their players towards something that could hurt their poker ecosystem 6, 12, or 18 months down the road when their retention rates decline and their attrition curve accelerates.

Then again, the tightening of the game may offset the effect. You might find that more players get better more quickly than if they played regular poker because the biggest leak for most new players is starting hand selection. If they tighten up their starting hand selection they might end up losing less and thus playing longer before losing their money.

It’s hard to say and I’m fairly sure Full Tilt isn’t going to volunteer that data anytime soon so I guess all we can do is speculate.

I will say that how they’ve designed Rush Poker is impressive. Everything happens pretty seamlessly and stuff happens as you would expect it to. I can imagine all of the work that went into it from the time someone cooked up the idea until it was ready to go out the door and I have to give Tilt some kudos for doing such a great job on executing the vision.

If you haven’t tried Rush Poker you’re missing out. It’s like crack. You’ll have a hard time ending a session.

Check out Rush Poker on Full Tilt

Thanks for reading Bill's Poker Blog. You might want to check out his other sites:

Poker Job Search is a resource for people who are looking to get started in the online poker industry.

Rakeback Report Get the best rakeback deals from the biggest online poker sites. Learn how you can make a living playing poker.

Flop the Nuts Poker gives you up to date info on live poker events

Are you following me on Twitter? Why not?

Rush Poker at Full Tilt Poker – What Impact Will It Have on Poker?

Full Tilt Poker Website Redesign Full Tilt Poker who hasn’t really made any material changes...
Rake Races on Cake and Full Tilt Poker If you have some time on your hands next week...
Jason Newitt Sues Full Tilt . . . Howard Lederer and just about anybody else he can get his hands on kudos to Pokerati for catching this one. Anybody who has...

Google Likes Phil Ivey / Hates Phil Hellmuth

2010-03-18T22:37:20-07:00

I love the Google Suggest feature that offers suggestions on searches you might want to run based on searches other people have run in the past. Here’s what happens when you ask “Phil Ivey is ” and “Phil Hellmuth is ”

Phil Hellmuth is a douche

Phil Ivey is the stone cold nuts

Thanks for reading Bill's Poker Blog. You might want to check out his other sites:

Poker Job Search is a resource for people who are looking to get started in the online poker industry.

Rakeback Report Get the best rakeback deals from the biggest online poker sites. Learn how you can make a living playing poker.

Flop the Nuts Poker gives you up to date info on live poker events

Are you following me on Twitter? Why not?

Google Likes Phil Ivey / Hates Phil Hellmuth

Ban Phil Ivey and Patrik Antonius from Online Poker? REVISITED For whatever reason a lot of other poker sites...
Phil Ivey Goes Absolutely Mental and Freaks Out Okay, not really but this is probably the most emotion...
Phil Ivey and Howard Lederer Dance Off Send your own ElfYourself eCards ...

The Red Shirts Are Coming, The Red Shirts Are Coming

2010-03-18T05:39:52-07:00

Warning people how to act on judgement day

I recently mentioned that despite reports of huge crowds demonstrating against the Thai government I hadn’t seen much. Well that changed yesterday when I went to my Thai class yesterday. Sukhumvit (probably the busiest street in Bangkok) was crawling with red shirt supporters of fugitive former PM Thaksin.

I stepped off the BTS at the Asok station and all I could hear was loud Thai music blaring. At first I thought some idiot BTS employee was rocking out to some traditional Thai songs and decided to kick it up to 11 but as I got further into the station it became more and more obvious that the sound was coming from down on the street.

I peeked over the rail and – holy crap – red shirts for as far as the eye could see in both directions. My first instinct was to get right back on the BTS and get the hell out of there but then I thought those famous last words, “Hey, what’s the worst that can happen?”

As I walked along the overhead walkway my phone rang. It was my girlfriend. She said “Baby, there’s red shirts all over Rama IV Road. You should be careful. They might be heading up to Sukhumvit.”

Of course, I could only partially hear what she was saying because the red shirts were all over Sukhumvit and blaring music, shouting through megaphones, and honking their horns. I just held the phone out over the street a few seconds and then shouted back “I know! There’re already here. Don’t worry. I’m going inside.”

Of course, I didn’t go inside. I went down the steps onto the sidewalk and watched as they filtered past.

They seemed pretty happy. I would later find out that they had just come from the current PM’s residence on Soi 33 where they splashed blood all over his gate and cast a spell on him (or something like that).

Although I have no fear for my own personal safety it is interesting to watch this whole situation sort of degenerate into near absurdity.

The protest was scheduled to run from March 12 – 14th. On the 15th the red shirts made a demand that the PM dissolve parliament and hold new elections. The PM said “Hahahahahahaha Uh, no.” (I’m paraphrasing). Having had their bluff called the red shirts spent all day Tuesday donating blood which they then threw at various government related buildings on Wed.

But what really shows how desperate Khun Thaksin has become was a statement he made via video conference to his supporters. Here’s the media report on the broadcast.

Thaksin Draws Comparison between Abhisit and Hitler
UPDATE : 17 March 2010
Thaksin said via a video conference call to the Red Shirt protesters that the government has been bribing protesters to leave the rally.

The ousted premier also claimed that Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva has a mental disorder similar to Adolf Hitler’s.

At the Red Shirt rally at Phanfa Lilat Bridge in Bangkok, fugitive former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra made another video conference call to his supporters.

Thaksin has accused the government of trying to bribe some protestors into leaving the rally and said that someone laced the protestors’ water with poison.

However, the ousted premier thanked his supporters and asked them to remain patient, saying that the current government has a hearing problem.

Thaksin also talked about the yesterday’s blood collection. He said that despite the disapproval of many people, the Red Shirt protesters have done the right thing in sacrificing their blood for democracy.

In his speech to the Red Shirt protesters, the fugitive former prime minister claimed that Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva has some psychological condition similar to Adolf Hitler’s.

Thaksin added that just like the German schizophrenic dictator, Abhisit does not like to talk alone, has problems controlling his ambitions, and violent tendencies.

Thaksin also said that Abhisit is surrounded by homosexuals with emotional problems.

Toward the end of this call, Thaksin thanked his supporters again and urged them to continue their fight against the government for the sake of the younger generations.

However, he warned the protesters that the government might resort to violence since Abhisit has a mental disorder.

From TAN Network

I guess one of the good things you can take away from this is that Godwin’s Law has held up yet again.

The line about being surrounded by homosexuals with emotional problems I think is a reference to a rumor going around the red shirt camp about Abhisit having been caught on film or video (changes depending on who’s telling the story) having sex with a ladyboy and that if exposed Abhisit would have to leave the country due to the embarrassing nature of the images. So, in effect, this ladyboy is in control of the government and is controlling Abhisit like a puppet.

Ahh . . . just another day in Thai politics.

Thanks for reading Bill's Poker Blog. You might want to check out his other sites:

Poker Job Search is a resource for people who are looking to get started in the online poker industry.

Rakeback Report Get the best rakeback deals from the biggest online poker sites. Learn how you can make a living playing poker.

Flop the Nuts Poker gives you up to date info on live poker events

Are you following me on Twitter? Why not?

The Red Shirts Are Coming, The Red Shirts Are Coming

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A Taste of Thailand Hey look Ma, I canz writes my own name I...
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Should I Change From Poker to Chess?

2010-03-18T04:54:33-07:00

Following hot on the heels of my post “5 Hottest Female Poker Players You’ve Probably Never Heard Of” (circa 2007) Ego TV has produced a list of the 7 Sexiest Female Chess Players.

Alexandra Kosteniuk

Sanja Dedijer

Regina Pokorna

Valquira Rocha

Anna Sharevich

Arianne Caoili

Eva Repkova

Willing to give up poker for chess?

Thanks for reading Bill's Poker Blog. You might want to check out his other sites:

Poker Job Search is a resource for people who are looking to get started in the online poker industry.

Rakeback Report Get the best rakeback deals from the biggest online poker sites. Learn how you can make a living playing poker.

Flop the Nuts Poker gives you up to date info on live poker events

Are you following me on Twitter? Why not?

Should I Change From Poker to Chess?

Google Likes Phil Ivey / Hates Phil Hellmuth I love the Google Suggest feature that offers suggestions on...
Sunday House Cleaning Quick shout out to Bonus Whores who are the...
New Year’s Eve in Bangkok New Year’s Eve in Bangkok is always fun. Many people...

The Week(s) That Was

2010-03-16T07:52:46-07:00

I ran across a great article on eGaming Review’s website that I wanted to highlight. Before I do, I should point out they often post articles of mine and have run some quotes from me in their print mag but that had no bearing in singling this article out.

Dominik Kofert’s article on what the real reason for the decline in poker is, should be required reading for anybody involved in running a poker room. Dominik is someone I have the pleasure of knowing and having worked together with him on some things in the past. He runs one of the largest poker training sites, Poker Strategy, and is one hell of a smart dude. So maybe I’m biased.

Basically he’s saying that poker rooms are way too focused on short-term gains. I’ve said very similar things in the past. Poker rooms often run promotions that produce short term pops in revenue but threaten to burn players out more quickly. Personally, if I’m running a poker room and I’m only going to make $1 off of a player I would rather do it over a year than in one session. That $1 taken in small chunks over a long period produces liquidity on the site and as a result translates into more than one dollar when you factor in how much action from other players that $1 eventually generates.

The problem is often a matter of people who don’t understand poker running a poker room. That’s especially true when you have casino people in charge. For them, you steer your customers to your highest profit offerings so you can make as much as you can off of them. Casino games don’t require liquidity. It’s hard for casino-minded people to grasp how important liquidity is to running a poker room. So they use that casino mentality to run a poker room and try to take the money as quickly as they can not realizing that they could be killing their own poker business 6 or 12 months down the road.

I think a lot of networks and their skins are seeing exactly that today. They’ve been so focused on catering to the VIP players due to the large amount of rake they generate that they failed to recognize that the recreational, losing players are where these guys are making their money. Once you kill all of the fish in the pond and if you don’t invest in restocking the pond you’re going to starve to death.

But that goes back to the casino mentality. You comp your whales. You keep them happy because they blow a lot of dough with you. But in poker, your big whales actually have a detrimental impact on your poker ecosystem. They’re sucking up all of the money from the layers of fish below them.

The guys you should be comping are the loyal and consistent players who deposit $100 or $200 every month and have been on the site for a long period of time but don’t generate huge amounts of rake. Poker rooms traditionally look at that guy and say “Look, we have players who generate more rake in one month than this guy has in two years, screw him.” But where are those guys who generate more rake in one month than this guy has lifetime making their money from? Him!!!

Without that dude and hundreds of others like him your sharks/whales will bolt on you faster than you can offer to comp them.

But most poker rooms don’t look at it that way. They salivate that the thought of landing a guy who generates $10,000 a month in rake. But I would rather have 100 guys generating $100 a month in rake than one guy generating $10,000. Or 1000 guys generating $10 a month in rake. Because that $10K a month guy will come if you have enough of these smaller guys. You don’t need to comp him or kiss his ass. Where’s he going to go if you’re serving up a fish buffet every time he logs in?

So props to Dominik for saying what far too many poker rooms have no clue about.

On Bill’s Poker Blog

Badugi Poker: Game History and How To Play
Incredible Odds
Nothing Happens in Bangkok

On Poker Job Search

Affiliate Security Manager – Online Poker
International Media Executive – Online Poker
Domain Portfolio Manager – Online Poker
Italian Fraud Investigator – Online Poker
French Fraud Investigator – Online Poker
Russian Fraud Investigator – Online Poker
German Fraud Investigator – Online Poker
Bi-Lingual Fraud Investigator – Poker Security – Russian
Bi-Lingual Fraud Investigator – Poker Security – Portuguese
Business Analyst – Poker Experience
Fraud Operations Manager – Online Poker

Random Linkage

Pokerati writes about Phil Gordon and Rafe Furst receiving honors from the Prevent Cancer Foundation. Good for them. I’ve known Rafe and Phil since my Tilt days and both are really committed to using poker to raise money for cancer research. Hats off to both of them.

Photocred to yeowatzup

Thanks for reading Bill's Poker Blog. You might want to check out his other sites:

Poker Job Search is a resource for people who are looking to get started in the online poker industry.

Rakeback Report Get the best rakeback deals from the biggest online poker sites. Learn how you can make a living playing poker.

Flop the Nuts Poker gives you up to date info on live poker events

Are you following me on Twitter? Why not?

The Week(s) That Was

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Nothing Happens in Bangkok

2010-03-14T21:36:31-07:00

I mentioned not too long ago that things were starting to heat up around Bangkok. Fugitive former PM Thaksin was about to find out from the Thai supreme court whether or not the government was just in seizing $2.2 billion from him after the coup that threw him from power. Well, the verdict came down the last Friday in Feb and the word from the court was that about $1.1 billion was properly seized but the rest was his.

Sort of a win-win or lose-lose depending on how you look at it. Well, it wasn’t that easy. Once the supreme court said that he had obtained these funds via illegal actions while in power that brought every government agency to now take a crack at old Khun Thaksin.

For instance, now that it’s been declared that he used his office to benefit companies that he held significant ownership in the government is now looking at those companies and their officers and directors. Part of how Mr. Thaksin sidestepped the issue at the time was “selling” his shares to his children, housekeeper, and some others close to him. Well, the court said that the sale was a farce and that he was actually in control of those shares but . . . get this . . . the tax boys are saying regardless, those people never paid taxes on the proceeds of the later sale of their shares so they owe millions in back taxes. Not a great day to be a friend of family member of the former PM.

His supporters figured they couldn’t get a rally going on such short notice (uhm, the court had announced months ahead of time what day they would render their ruling – but let’s forget about that) and they would stage a “massive” rally in Bangkok March 12 – 14. The local press has been going absolutely nuts talking about where the protesters are staging, how to avoid trouble, what emergency rations you should keep in your house if all hell breaks loose, etc.

Depending on what numbers you believe, about 300,000 – 500,000 people have amassed in the capital to basically say “Hey, give the rich dude back his money.” Well, I guess to be fair, they’re saying that removing Thaksin via the coup was illegal and thus the government in charge is not a legitimate government but let’s be realistic . . . this whole thing is about Thaksin wanting to get back in power so he can overturn his conviction, declare that his money was seized illegally, and take control again.

So, you would think that the place is on the verge of civil war, right? Really, things seem pretty calm. Other than the police being everywhere and the military situated in key places where protesters might make trouble I’ve really seen nothing that would lead me to any concern.

In fact, so many people were so concerned about potential violence that on Friday night traffic was the lightest I’ve seen in Bangkok in as long as I can remember. I asked some local business owners about the impact and they’ve said that foot traffic from tourists is definitely down but their regular customers are still coming.

As for me, even though there was a supposed large gathering of protestors about two and a half blocks from my apartment I’ve only seen two protesters. It was actually funny on Friday, my building manager stopped me when I went down to the mini-mart and said “Khun Bill, maybe today you can stay in your room. Not good for you to go outside today. Maybe go outside Bangkok if you can.” She was obviously very stressed as were the security staff in the building.

But other than some isolated fights here and there between Thaksin supporters and those who wish he would just STFU, not much has really happened.

In poker related news I met up with Tim from Pokerology for some pool and shop talk at Sports Academy last week. Then he headed down to Phuket with some friends and met up with one of the Poker Affiliate Solutions regulars, Hazo, down there.

Hazo called me on Friday to say that he was coming up to Bangkok. He and I had exchanged some emails recently. He’s moving to Thailand and so I gave him some advice on where to hunt for apartments and such.

We missed each other on Friday due to some mobile phone malfunctions on Hazo’s part but we met up at a Thailand Friends event for one of our member’s birthdays. After the birthday party I took him over to one of my favorite haunts on Soi 22 where a friend of mine owns a bar.

There’s a rumor that one of my good, good friends and former Party cohorts will be here on the 18th. He’s almost made it to Bangkok once or twice in the past so I’m still regarding it as rumor until I actually see him sweating profusely in the hot Bangkok sun but I’m keeping my fingers crossed.

photocred goes to Women Learning Thai

Thanks for reading Bill's Poker Blog. You might want to check out his other sites:

Poker Job Search is a resource for people who are looking to get started in the online poker industry.

Rakeback Report Get the best rakeback deals from the biggest online poker sites. Learn how you can make a living playing poker.

Flop the Nuts Poker gives you up to date info on live poker events

Are you following me on Twitter? Why not?

Nothing Happens in Bangkok

The Red Shirts Are Coming, The Red Shirts Are Coming I recently mentioned that despite reports of huge crowds demonstrating...
An Arresting Development in Bangkok I had been doing some research for a post...
New Year’s Eve in Bangkok New Year’s Eve in Bangkok is always fun. Many people...

Incredible Odds

2010-03-10T23:10:31-08:00

I had the pleasure of meeting a local musician here in Bangkok the other night. Actually I had seen him playing over at Moonshine’s once or twice but he stopped in to say hello to my friend Jack and we were introduced formally.

Tony is an older American guy. How old, I don’t know but he’s got a look that says he’s been around before. Nice guy though and always quick with a laugh.

Several months ago Jack told me an incredible story about Tony that I wanted to share. It was a few years ago and Tony was playing a gig in one of the local bars in Bangkok. During the set he noticed a young guy sitting in the audience wearing a US Army fatigue top with the same unit patch as his old unit in Vietnam.

Obviously the man was too young to have been a vet (at least a Vietnam Vet) but it intrigued him so when he finished his set he went over to the young man’s table and introduced himself saying that he had served in that unit during ‘Nam. As the man stretched out his arm to shake his he saw that the nametag on the top was the same as his last name, which he mentioned to the younger man.

The young man explained that he had purchased the fatigue top at a small market on some side street in Bangkok just that afternoon. He thought it looked cool and was able to bargain down the price to something fairly cheap so he bought it.

Tony said, “Well, can I ask you a small favor? Can you open up the jacket pocket and see if there’s anything sewn inside the pocket?” The younger man obliged and there was Tony’s name on another nametag sewn inside the pocket.

Tony had sold all of his gear to a military surplus shop when he finished his military duty after Vietnam and had been traveling around the world since. But somehow his fatigue jacket had followed him around the world and ended up in the same bar he was playing a gig in.

The reason I bring this up is so many people argue that online poker must be rigged because something with a low statistical probability occurs to them. Maybe they have been dealt aces three times in a row or whatever. To them that proves the game is rigged.

But anytime the probability of something is greater than 0, given enough trials, it is expected to happen.

If my math is correct, getting dealt pocket aces three times in a row should happen approx every 1 in 2,385,443 hands. That means that the chances of it happening are still greater than 0. And if you take a room like PokerStars and let’s say they deal a billion hands per year, it is not unusual for that to occur 419 times a year.

So, your opponent catching pocket aces three times in a row has a low probability but it’s expected to happen to 419 people per year (assuming 1 billion hands dealt). Does it prove anything about whether or not the game is rigged? No.

I mean, what are the odds that Sammy Farha with AT would flop AAT against Oliver Hudson with pocket tens in the very first hand in the WSOP main event at the featured table? I’m not even going to do the math but it’s not very likely.

But because it’s live people are willing to accept that it’s just poker. When it happens online many of those same people assume it’s because the game is rigged.

That’s one of the reasons when anybody says something like “You never see anything like that ever happen in a live game,” I immediately dismiss anything else they’ve said or are going to say. Because I can post YouTube videos all day long showing highly unlikely events occurring during televised programs.

And out of all of the hands played how many have been televised? A low percentage to be sure. So if you can see these low probability events occurring from a rather small sample size then people saying they’ve never seen it in a live card room either aren’t playing very many hands or their experience is the true statistical anomaly.

photocred to Steve Snodgrass

Thanks for reading Bill's Poker Blog. You might want to check out his other sites:

Poker Job Search is a resource for people who are looking to get started in the online poker industry.

Rakeback Report Get the best rakeback deals from the biggest online poker sites. Learn how you can make a living playing poker.

Flop the Nuts Poker gives you up to date info on live poker events

Are you following me on Twitter? Why not?

Incredible Odds

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Badugi Poker: Game History and How To Play

2010-03-03T19:07:51-08:00

This is now the third article in the series I’ve written on Lowball Poker games at Bill’s blog and will cover Badugi Poker. The post will take a look at Badugi poker history and provide a short how to play Badugi guide. If you want to check out the other two articles in my series then here are the links:

Introduction to Lowball Poker
Razz Poker and the World Greatest Gambler

I’m hoping everyone’s enjoyed what I’ve written so far and finds this article interesting as well.

Badugi Poker History Then and Now

Badugi is one of the newer games to hit the live and online poker scene. It is thought that the game was first invented in South Korea around the 1960’s but obviously it’s impossible to pin point it’s exact conception. Paul Eskimo Clark a poker player who served in the USA army during the Vietnam War is credited with bringing the game back to America and although he claims to have invented the game as well it’s pretty clear it was being played over in South Korea well before the war broke out.

When Badugi poker first hit the Las Vegas poker scene it was mainly played at the higher limits, it is traditionally considered to be a real gamblers game which at the time was really attractive to the high stakes players in Vegas. The truth of the matter is though that there is a lot of Skill involved in Badugi and like in any form of poker the better players end up with the money in the long run.

Today Badugi is played in various live mixed cash games and it was reported that at last years World Series of Poker Greg Raymer and Todd Brunson among others where playing $400/$800 Badugi in the side games. Badugi doesn’t yet have a dedicated WSOP tournament but there is plenty of action online at PokerStars who include it in their SCOOP and WCOOP poker tournament series.

How To Play Badugi Poker

It’s not actually that difficult to learn how to play Badugi, in fact if you’ve ever played 2-7 Triple Draw then you’ll probably get the hang of it pretty quickly. The first thing you need to know about Badugi is that it has its own unique hand rankings system. The system is a lowball hand rankings system in which an unsuited A-2-3-4 would be the holy nuts, you only get 4 cards when playing Badugi. Any hand that has 4 cards of different suits and numerical value is known as a Badugi and your aim is to make the lowest Badugi possible. Pairs and suited cards will count against you.

Any hand of Badugi poker starts with the posting of the blinds, the dealer then deals each player 4 cards. A betting round takes place which is followed by a drawing round. During the drawing round players can draw as many or as few cards as they wish, choosing not to draw is known as standing pat. There are a total of three drawing rounds when playing Badugi and once the final drawing round and final betting round has taken place the hand goes to a showdown, much like in any Triple Draw game. The winner is then determined and the pot is shipped in their direction.

The above is just about as much information as you need to play a hand of Badugi but if you’re interested in finding out more about the game then why don’t you check out one of my newest sites: Badugi Poker, it covers how to play the game, strategy, drawing odds and where to play online.

Next week I’ll close out the series with an article on 2-7 lowball poker games.

photocred to RodrigoFavera

Thanks for reading Bill's Poker Blog. You might want to check out his other sites:

Poker Job Search is a resource for people who are looking to get started in the online poker industry.

Rakeback Report Get the best rakeback deals from the biggest online poker sites. Learn how you can make a living playing poker.

Flop the Nuts Poker gives you up to date info on live poker events

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Badugi Poker: Game History and How To Play

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The Week That Was – Goodbye February

2010-03-01T00:45:36-08:00

This week was an insanely busy week for me. On my ThailandFriends website we pushed a relaunch out the door which not only meant the normal rush to make the launch date, firefighting all the glitches that we didn’t discover in testing, and complaints from members – some of whom have been on the site for 5 or 6 years – about what they like and don’t like, but we had scheduled a relaunch party for Saturday. And not just a little thing but a massive party on the rooftop pool with DJ, food, booze, and even some *ahem* hired coyote dancers.

So not only am I running around worry about the website but I’ve got to go buy 10 cases of this and a case of whiskey and yadda, yadda, yadda.

Anyway, here are some pics from the party:

As you might be able to gather, our new slogan is “Are You On?” The t-shirts actually seem to be pretty popular. I had about 50 made to hand out at the party and such but I’ve worn mine several times before the event and I constantly have people asking “On what?” and then I show them the back with says ThailandFriends.com.

The event ended just as the last pool party we had at this venue, with most people getting wet whether they liked it or not. This was one particularly devious pool tossing.

Sorry for the quality. I’m no Spielberg. Plus we just had the ambient light to work with.

I had drinks Sunday night with a former Full Tilter in town for a short holiday. Just his luck he got in around 1am on Sat night which means he missed my party and Sunday was a Buddhist holiday which meant that no bars were allowed to open (restaurants could serve booze but unless you had a restaurant license you had to close) so he got a very limited view of what Bangkok nightlife is all about.

I was able to get around to actually posting something on this site though.

Low Ball Poker by Dave
A Taste of Thailand
Razz Poker and the Worlds Greatest Ever Gambler
The Sky is Falling for Affiliates

If you missed it, give the “The Sky is Falling for Affiliates” a read. It’s been retweeted a few times and I’ve received quite a bit of private emails from affiliate managers and affiliates making comments about what I’ve written. I would say that generally, many people, as much as they hate to, agree with the overall message. Nobody is happy about it but they realize that the poker affiliate model is changing.

Poker Job Search

I know this may seem like a bit of a joke after the affiliates post on this site but there is a Poker Affiliate Manager position being advertised out there. If you speak Dutch, someone is looking for a Dutch Affiliate Manager. Last but not least, someone is looking for an Online Community Manager to work out of Gibraltar.

And if you don’t have a rakeback account on Full Tilt Poker yet, you better get cracking. Check out Rakeback Report for information on getting 27% rakeback on Full Tilt before they cut the affiliate payouts.

Thanks for reading Bill's Poker Blog. You might want to check out his other sites:

Poker Job Search is a resource for people who are looking to get started in the online poker industry.

Rakeback Report Get the best rakeback deals from the biggest online poker sites. Learn how you can make a living playing poker.

Flop the Nuts Poker gives you up to date info on live poker events

Are you following me on Twitter? Why not?

The Week That Was – Goodbye February

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