The Recreational Poker Writer

For a couple of months now I’ve been aware of an anniversary of sorts coming up on the calendar. No, I’m not talking about me and Vera’s anniversary (although that’s coming up, too). Rather a poker-related one.

It was exactly 10 years ago today I wrote my first article for PokerNews.

I’d been writing on this blog for over a year by then. My memory is a little fuzzy, but I believe that PN article had to have been the first poker-related bit of scribbling for which I’d ever been paid. Which means, in turn, it represents the first, tiny indicator of what would become a big life pivot about four years after that -- away from full-time teaching and into full-time freelancing.

The article was a short one, just five paragraphs -- “Poker Bill Fails to Pass Louisiana House.” Pretty standard stuff, and the kind of thing we’d end up reading (and some of us writing) over and over for the entire decade that followed.

But even if I might look back with ambivalence (and even a little cynicism) at such a slight morsel of reporting, I do remember the excitement at seeing something I’d written show up on the site.

I’d placed some articles in academic journals, wrote columns and book reviews for The Charlotte Observer, and even had some poems published before (no shinola). But this was something new and different.

Like a lot of poker “enthusiasts” then (and now), I couldn’t get enough of poker -- playing the game, thinking about it, reading about it, and writing about it.

Getting paid even just a little for a poker article offered the same sort of thrill as winning those first few real money pots when playing online. In neither case did I think a career was in the offing, but both involved realizing a small profit from doing something that was already fun and intellectually stimulating.

I have Haley Hintze and John Caldwell to thank (again) for having recruited me to write that first article way back when. And a ton of other folks thereafter for giving me opportunities and helping guide me to become more than just a “recreational” poker writer.

Even now, so many years later, it doesn’t seem like a “regular” gig, even if that’s what it has been for quite a while. The constant flux of the poker world -- with people always coming and going -- is one obvious reason for that feeling, I’m sure.

But another is the fact that there’s still a lot of “play” involved when doing such “work.” And that’s a very good thing, whatever your job is.

Photo: courtesy Carlos Monti / PokerStars blog.

The Tomko Story

Hear about this weird story involving Poker Hall of Famer Dewey Tomko and an anti-online op-ed that appears to have been attributed to him without his consent? (That’s Tomko pictured, natch -- from a Flipchip photo.)

If you haven’t, Nolan Dalla’s blog is a good place to go for an initial introduction to the story. In fact, his blog post “Who’s the Imposter Behind the Dewey Tomko Hoax?” is itself the most interesting part of the story, as there Dalla reports on having asked Tomko directly via phone about the editorial that appeared on the Press of Atlantic City website back in March.

The editorial speaks of the dangers of online gambling, advocating against it with some specious arguments about collusion. The piece is attributed both to Tomko and a person named Bill Byers, but as Tomko told Dalla he knows nothing about the article or why his name has been attached to it. (Meanwhile the article continues to appear on the Press of Atlantic City site without any corrections or disclaimers regarding its authorship.)

Follow links in Dalla’s post for some more backstory to the op-ed and response to it in the poker community. Then check out Rich Ryan’s discussion of the situation over at PokerNews in his “Five Thoughts” piece published today, as well as Haley Hintze’s follow-up on the story at Flushdraw in which she does some detective work to try to start to answer the question posed in Dalla’s post title.

There’s more to the story than is contained in all of these sources, it seems, including details regarding the apparent involvement of figures associated with anti-online gambling lobbying efforts as covered in Haley’s piece.

Kind of funny, actually, how the big dangers some of these folks routinely list when it comes to online gambling/poker -- namely collusion and being able to misrepresent oneself online -- seem also to be tactics possibly being employed by the lobbyists as they work together to create confusion regarding who is saying what about the issue.

(EDIT [added 5/7/14, 8 p.m.]: Well, this one got a lot twistier and odd over the last 24 hours. My original title for the post was purposely ambiguous with its reference, potentially alluding either to the Press of Atlantic City article, Tomko’s seemingly true story as told to Dalla, or the entire complicated “story” being reported on by others. More meanings seem possible now.

The signoff suggesting there may have been some sort of online identity-borrowing going on still seems partly possible, though it doesn’t appear today as though it was a simple case of Tomko’s name being used without his knowledge or permission. [In other words, there’s some question, it seems, regarding his “story.”]

Today the original March op-ed was pulled from the PoAC site, but not before more complications arose suggesting that Tomko may have indeed at least had some knowledge of it and the planned attribution. For those wanting help sorting it out, check out the following posts from today:

“The Curious Case of Dewey Tomko and the Disappearing Op-ed,” Steve Ruddock

“Updating the Dewey Tomko Controversy -- What (Apparently) Happened,” Nolan Dalla

“Dewey Tomko-signed Editorial Yanked from Press of Atlantic City Site,” Haley Hintze)

The 2,170-Player Chop

Spent a short while today finally taking some time to read about the resolution of the Borgata brouhaha from January. As you’ll recall, the first event of the 2014 Borgata Winter Open was canceled with 27 players remaining thanks to allegations of cheating committed by one player, Christian Lusardi, by means of introducing counterfeit chips into the event.

Have to use that word “resolution” tentatively, I suppose, as it seems like there will be more to come from this one, namely potential lawsuits filed by unsatisified players. In any event, about 10 days ago the New Jersey Department of Gaming Enforcement released its “Final Order” directing the Borgata how to distribute both the $1,433,145 in prize money that had yet to be won in the tournament (i.e., the total of the prizes scheduled to go to the top 27 finishers) as well as $288,720 more in revenue the Borgata had collected from entrants.

That adds up to $1,721,805 total. Somewhat surprisingly, the DGE decided not just to award money to the final 27, but also to refund $560 entry fees to 2,143 other players “who may have been impaced by the alleged criminal conduct who were eliminated from the event” without cashing.

The refunds to eliminated players total just over $1.2 million, leaving about $521K for the final 27. The DGE directed the Borgata to distribute that money “in equal amounts of approximately $19,323 to each of the 27 entrants” who still were alive in the event at the moment it was canceled. The Borgata also issued a statement reiterating the DGE’s directive and making known its intention to comply.

Many have been critical of such a “resolution,” in particular pointing out how the final 27 players, otherwise due to play for over $1.43 million, together came away with just over a third of that total.

Today I listened to respected Tournament Director Matt Savage (not the TD at the Borgata) on the latest Two Plus Two Pokercast explaining why he found the resolution unsatisfactory and also troubling in terms of how it might affect tournament poker going forward. Savage’s point was that given such a resolution, players aware of cheating in future tournaments may well become reluctant to make their awareness known to tournament officials out of fear that they may themselves lose potential winnings should the tournament be canceled.

I said back in January that there didn’t seem to me any wholly satisfactory way to resolve the situation that would prove satisfying to all concerned, but it does seem as though there were several different ways it might have been resolved that would have been preferable to the one chosen. And as Mike Johnson and Adam Schwartz pointed out on the Pokercast, of all the possible scenarios imagined by both players and observers prior to the DGE’s order, few (none?) ever considered the possibility that nearly two-thirds of the unawarded prize money would not only not go to the players still alive in the event (and due to divide it up), but would go to eliminated players instead.

Anyhow, for more on the “Final Order” and what it lacks, check out Savage on the Two Plus Two Pokercast (he appears during the first hour) as well as Haley Hintze’s discussion over on Flushdraw.

Supergrins

Was following a little of this story that popped up within the last couple of days regarding a new online poker site, suddenly appearing and available to U.S. players in all states -- i.e., rogue, not regulated -- and awkwardly-named Superwins.

Kind of a minor blip on the poker radar, this, but somewhat humorous given the apparently obvious connections between the new site and the fraudulent Lock Poker site from which the great majority of players have not been able to cash out their funds for many months now, more than a year in some cases.

The new site shares all of the same promotional jibber-jabber, conditions, bonus offers, and apparently the software is similar, too. And as was quickly sorted out in the forums and by others, the site’s domain is registered to Lock’s CEO, and some inquiries have apparently uncovered that the two sites share a player pool to some extent, making Superwins a “skin” (more or less).

It appears a fairly transparent Plan B (or F or G or whatever) by Lock to drum up some capital, although the fact that the word on Superwins has gotten out so quickly would seem to have prevented the site from ever gaining any momentum in that direction. Sure, there will be some uninformed suckers depositing on Superwins, but I think we’re well past the days that a new “U.S.-facing site” (as we would call ’em) can make much if any splash.

You can read a rundown and some commentary on the shenanigans over at Flushdraw. The part of the story that was most silly to me -- and also notable to Haley Hintze who authored the Flushdraw piece -- was the lame ad/review for Superwins on the Poker News Boy website where the new room is being promoted with surprising vigor.

That PNB rates the new room 9/10 is funny enough, although we must compare their 10/10 rating for Lock Poker for some idea of the fantasies perpetrated over there (and note as Haley does how PNB is owned by a Lock affiliate manager). The review’s odd syntax, sentence fragments, and breathless tone add further grins.

In fact, the more I look at it, the more every detail seems as though it could possess dual meaning, from the “big ambitions” of the site to its list of “popular methods” for depositing. Like a postmodern palimpsest with “straight” significances and built-in parody overlapped right on top of each other.

It wasn’t that long ago, though, that we were paying a lot more attention to new sites like this. Just after Black Friday they caught the eye of many, and some (like Lock, in fact) successfully attracted business. And before that there were dozens, some suspect, many appearing legit.

I guess it is the (increasingly dim) memory of those ads and that earlier era when the context for them was different -- and knowing that context is no more -- that makes looking at this new site and those trying to promote it as all the more risible.

Linking Out

Dealing with an overstuffed inbox at the moment, so I thought I’d post something today linking out to a few items worth checking out elsewhere.

Brad Willis penned an interesting op-ed for the PokerStars blog today titled “Before the bubble” occasioned by the anniversary of his playing his first ever WSOP event back in 2005. Brad does a nice job recounting the wonder associated with that experience, then moves into some observations about the current status of both his own poker playing and the tourney scene, generally speaking.

It’s a thoughtful piece that gives poker players much to consider regarding some of the reasons why we got into this game in the first place, and why it’s important now and then to remember those reasons particularly when encountering others just coming into the game as we once did.

Also worth reading is James McManus’s review for The Wall Street Journal of Ben Mezrich’s new book, Straight Flush, which weirdly celebrates the fraudster founders of Absolute Poker.

Last August I wrote about having seen Mezrich pop up on CNBC for a brief segment in which he previewed his plans to write the book, noting then how worrisome it seemed that he apparently either misunderstood or was willfully diminishing the frankly villainous behavior of his story’s principals, people responsible for the first major online poker cheating scandal (and cover-up), who caused the loss of millions by investors, who committed bank and wire fraud, who violated the UIGEA, and who failed (along with UB) to return player funds post-Black Friday.

I’ve yet to read Straight Flush, but from McManus’s review it sounds as though Mezrich has followed through on his plans to champion the “brilliant kids” of AP. As McManus states in his review, it’s “a story of failure, tendered as almost its opposite.” The review is titled “Bluffers and Bandits” -- probably a more appropriate title for the sordid saga -- and ultimately calls out Mezrich for being motivated by an ethically compromised greed not unlike that of his subjects.

Haley Hintze is also working through in greater detail several problem areas presented by Mezrich’s book in a multi-part series over on Flushdraw that is doing a great job explaining both the AP story as it actually happened and Mezrich’s numerous deviations from it.

Finally, BLUFF Magazine this afternoon debuted a new video feature called “Stump the Kevmath” featuring our favorite poker Twitterer doing his best to take on some WSOP-related trivia challenges. Guaranteed to produce a few grins.

Okay, now I have filled your inbox... get to it.

Lock’s Stock in Peril

I continue to follow the worsening situation at Lock Poker which I wrote about last week. More details regarding the non-payouts, ever-shifting policies, Two Plus Two refusing their adverts, and various other dramas concerning sponsored players (and their perceived responsibility/culpability) continue to emerge every day.

For a good catch-up on the situation since last week, check out Haley Hintze’s most recent articles on Flushdraw regarding Lock: “Lock Poker Malaise Deepens as Trade Values Crash, More P2P Restrictions Allegedly Introduced” and “Monitoring the Lock Poker Spiral: The Shane Bridges Blowout.” (There’ll probably be more on Flushdraw to come.)

Also, Todd “DanDruff” Witteles’s thread-starting post (as “Kilowatt”) on Two Plus Two from Monday titled “Lock Shady Practices 101” provides another thorough summary of the situation up until a couple of days ago.

There are numerous, rapidly-growing threads on Two Plus Two regarding Lock. In some ways I’m surprised to see so much response, not because complaints aren’t warranted but because I hadn’t necessarily realized the site had earned so much traffic. It certainly seems that within the crippled U.S. online poker scene of the last two years, Lock had carved out a significant place.

And now with Lock’s final crash starting to appear imminent, there’s a certain canary-in-the-coalmine feeling that the whole “rogue” approach of small sites trying still to serve U.S. players is about to blow up once and for all.

I was intrigued a little this morning by a post from 2+2 moderator “SGT RJ” in the humorously-named “Lock Poker Crisis Containment Thread.” I say the name is funny because the thread -- begun less than a week ago -- is now approaching 1,400 posts.

In her post, SGT RJ offers some advice to posters as well as to those burdened with the unenviable task of trying to get funds off of Lock. She also makes a distinction between 2+2 posters and others who might have played on Lock. Or who, I suppose, might even be thinking of signing on and depositing on Lock.

“If you are knowledgable about poker in general, and frankly if you’re on 2p2 and following these mess of threads,” writes SGT RJ, “you’re probably more tuned into the poker world than 95% of the regular joes who play.”

She goes on to say “I think it’s part of our responsibility as poker players to not give business to owners and sites who have demonstrated, time and again, that they do not have the players’ best interests at heart.”

We circle back, once more, to that unavoidable conflict in poker, namely, the fact that it is a game based on self-interest that also requires cooperation among competitors in order to exist at all.

The idea of more informed players being “responsible” for the community as a whole in a situation like Lock is certainly more obvious to us post-Black Friday than it was before. I’m thinking back to Bill Rini’s provocative post from a while back titled “Who to Blame for Black Friday?” which I opined on here a bit in “Talking Black Friday and Blame.”

This notion that for online poker to work at all there has to be a sincere working together among all parties -- including a shared responsibility and trust -- is a new thing, I think, at least for those of us in the U.S. The tone of responses from players to Ultimate Poker’s first week of operation perhaps reflects this changed mindset, with many seeming to demonstrate patience and a willingness to remain hopeful and supportive of the site as it experiences various early growing pains.

In any case, I tend to agree with SGT RJ about players needing to avoid Lock if possible. And perhaps there’s a further need, too, for those who know about Lock’s problems to make an effort to publicize those issues to those who don’t (an idea reflected in the new “#LockPokerSucks” hashtag on Twitter).

Jerry Buss (1933-2013)

Like everyone else I was disheartened by yesterday’s news that poker player and L.A. Lakers owner Jerry Buss had passed away. I tend to spend a lot of time perusing websites dedicated to either poker or sports, and it was remarkable yesterday to find so many well considered tributes penned about Buss and praise for the legacy he managed to leave in both spheres.

On the poker side, Haley Hintze wrote about Buss yesterday for Flushdraw, discussing his WSOP cashes (and one final table), his popularity in L.A. cash games, and his having turned up on various poker shows over the last few years (including High Stakes Poker, Poker After Dark, and the NBC Heads-Up tourney).

Meanwhile, Grantland’s Bill Simmons spent part of his Monday morning writing about Buss and his importance to the NBA in “The Lakers Lose Buss, the NBA Loses a Titan.” A frequent critic of other NBA owners’ decision-making, Simmons highlights Buss’s positive contributions both to the success of the Lakers (who won 10 titles for him while he was owner) and to the league as a whole.

Both pieces help convey Buss’s character as a genuinely giving person who often put others’ welfare and interests ahead of his own. Both touch a little on the contrast between the “playboy” image sometimes applied to him (thanks largely to his poker-playing and frequent appearances with younger female companions) and the modest, friendly personality that won him many friends and fans.

Buss was obviously an intelligent, creative thinker, earning a Ph.D. by age 24, realizing substantial success in real estate, and then as an NBA owner helping build a consistently-winning, wildly popular franchise. He was also highly competitive, a trait many former Laker players and high-stakes poker players have been talking about a lot for the last couple of days as well.

I never met Buss and in truth my experience with him at the WSOP pretty much entirely consisted of reporting occasional hands he played and once in a while overhearing some interesting table talk. As others who played with him have been unanimously attesting to over the last 24 hours, he was certainly an amiable presence at the tables, never seeming to mind frequent questions from other players (or even from the rail) about the Lakers or questions an NBA owner.

I remember once Buss being at the WSOP and playing in an event while the Lakers were making another NBA playoff run, and recall his telling someone how the team seemed to perform better without him being there, thus explaining his decision to be in Vegas rather than attending games. (Haley discusses that story as well in her piece.)

I also recall covering a $2,500 Omaha/8-Stud/8 event in 2011 (the last year Buss came to the WSOP) and overhearing lots of questions to Buss from others asking for his thoughts about various NBA players. I also wrote a post here sharing some reflections on the relaxed atmosphere created by the players in that event, the sort of thing that often provides a ready context for fun table talk and characters to emerge.

It sounds as though the WSOP might be considering renaming an event after Buss in recognition of his friendship and positive influence on the poker community. The NBA also will surely be focusing some effort toward remembering Buss and his important role during the league’s period of dramatic growth.

All seems appropriate and deserving. And as a fan of poker, basketball, and friendly people who serve to build communities rather than break them down, I, too, wanted to commend Buss for his positive contributions and influence.

The GPI’s Tinkering

There are a few different topics floating about the poker world at the moment that seem worth discussing, one of which is that announcement this week by the Global Poker Index that they were “suspending” two players from their rankings thanks to allegations regarding their having cheated at the 2009 Partouche Poker Tour Main Event final table.

You’ve heard about this already, I imagine, both about the cheating and the GPI’s action, and so I won’t needlessly delve too deeply into the particulars. The players concerned are Jean-Paul Pasqualini and Cedric Rossi who finished first and second, respectively, at that year’s PPT ME final table.

A video compiled by the player and writer Nordine Bouya was posted a couple of weeks ago and presents what appears to be some fairly damning evidence of collusion occurring between the pair. For a rundown of the story of the video and what it shows, see Haley Hintze’s report over on PokerFuse “2009 Partouche Poker Tour Cheating Allegations Further Tarnish Tour’s Legacy.”

Yesterday the GPI decided to make a formal announcement regarding their decision to remove Pasqualini and Rossi from their rankings. Actually the 2009 tourney happened outside of the 36-month period on which the current rankings are tabulated, but as Zokay Entertainment CEO Alex Dreyfus spells out in his article on the matter, the primary motivation here is to use the GPI as a mechanism to help discourage cheating and better conditions for players, generally speaking.

Dreyfus acknowledges that by making such a decision regarding what is otherwise a stats-based ranking system the GPI perhaps puts itself in danger of sliding down a “slippery slope” when it comes to delivering judgments regarding particular players and their eligibility to be considered in the rankings. He also notes that the GPI isn’t even ready to commit to having been convinced that Pasqualini and Rossi did, in fact, cheat, saying that “we are not claiming that we know they cheated” and adding that such a finding is “up to the casinos and the overseeing regulatory bodies to decide.”

In other words, it’s a somewhat awkward stance being taken here by the GPI to remove a couple of players from their rankings when neither were ever disqualified for cheating from the tourney in question, nor is it even clear there will be any sort of retrospective handling of the matter (e.g., a post-tourney DQ-ing of the players and/or attempt to recover winnings).

Rich Ryan posted an op-ed over on PokerNews today in which he disagrees with the GPI’s decision to “suspend” Pasqualini and Rossi from the rankings. Rich draws analogies from other sports (baseball, cycling) to talk about how various forms of cheating have affected the record books in those contexts, concluding that he dislikes how making subjective decisions about players’ results being compromised ultimately lessens the overall strength of the GPI’s ability to assess and compare players’ tourney performances.

I’m mostly with Rich, I think, regarding his stance on the issue. That is to say, I’m not really sure the GPI needs to worry too much about this sort of policing of its rankings, although I also understand where Dreyfus is coming from with his broader goal to use the GPI to help improve the game and the experiences of the players.

That said, I’m less apt to agree with the assumption that the GPI rankings are in fact wholly objective. Even if the rankings are entirely based on players’ performances, a host of decisions have been made regarding the various criteria for weighing those performances that are, in fact, subjective. It’s a nifty measuring system, no doubt, that certainly works to provide a different and more thorough way of measuring players’ performances than comes from, say, a panel’s votes or by polling players. But as we all know, an entirely objective measure of performance in poker tournaments doesn’t really exist.

Anyhow, check out Haley’s report and Ryan’s op-ed, and decide for yourself whether the GPI should or should not be “suspending” players from its rankings, or the degree to which the issue even should matter to the poker community.

Re-Entry: Atlantic City

Limited space to scribble this morning, as I’m heading off for another poker-related voyage.

I actually have two tourneys I’ll be reporting from coming up here in rapid succession, both up in the northeastern part of the country. The first takes me to Atlantic City for the World Series of Poker Circuit event at Harrah’s (a $1,675 buy-in event, with re-entries). Then I’ll be headed to the Sands in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania for the Main Event of their Sands Bethlehem Deepstack Extravaganza (a $2,500 event, also with re-entries).

This’ll be a return trip to AC for me, as I was there previously for the WSOP-C back in March 2011. Was a memorable trip and tourney, in part because it was won by Brian Ali (who I was able to meet and play with this past summer in Vegas), and Ali knocked out most of the players at the final table, including one named Ellis Frazier (much to the delight of pun-seeking bloggers).

Yesterday the poker world’s attention was suddenly focused on Atlantic City thanks to the Wall Street Journal’s report that PokerStars is looking to purchase the Atlantic Club Casino Hotel in AC, a deal that is in limbo while New Jersey continues to debate an online gambling bill that would allow casinos to operate sites. The article explains how if such a bill were passed, Stars would likely move to obtain a license to operate in New Jersey.

Speaking of that NJ online gambling bill currently under consideration (Assembly Bill A2578), that bill was recently revised to remove language that might have prevented PokerStars from returning to the U.S. because of its so-called “bad actor” status (i.e., for having taken U.S. customers post-UIGEA). Haley Hintze explained that change and its possible implications in an article for PokerFuse yesterday.

Put together with PokerStars’ deal with the DOJ (and purchase and relaunch of Full Tilt Poker), all of this adds up to a possibility that Stars could well find its way back to the U.S., with Atlantic City the avenue through which such re-entry would occur.

All very interesting to consider as I plan for my own re-entry into Atlantic City a little later today.

Will be curious to see how AC is holding up after Hurricane Sandy barrelled through six weeks ago. I’ll probably hop back on here starting Sunday to file some travel reports along the way. Meanwhile, have a good weekend, everyone!

Palmetto Poker: The South Carolina Ruling (Recommended Reads)

Once upon a time I used to post fairly regularly here about various federal bills and state-level cases and/or debates about poker’s legality, especially the online variety.

In fact, whenever I’m asked about how I started the blog and the early days (in the spring of 2006), I usually mention how it began as a simple outlet to discuss my own low-limit adventures online, then when the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 was signed into law a few months later (in October), I found myself writing about all sorts of other things happening in the poker world.

In some ways, that development probably helped ensure the blog would become less inward-looking and more interesting than if I had simply stuck with talking about hands and uncertainly mimicking other, more able writers of strategy and theory. The whole UIGEA mess and other, subsequent legal machinations would continue for years thereafter, and I was sufficiently energized by the whole situation to keep writing about every new bill or development.

But as I’ve mentioned here before more than once, I never felt all that equipped to analyze what was happening. I’m a decent reader, I think, even of sometimes opaque legal documents. And so I thought it was somewhat useful at least to summarize what I thought was happening, if only to help with my own understanding. But even there I was never wholly confident.

Thus one day when I was asked by a site to be the “legal correspondent” who’d report on such things, I had to decline. I knew I could fake it to some extent, but I also knew I wasn’t really the best person to do such reporting. And on top of that, by then (a couple of years ago) I’d gotten a little fatigued by the whole situation, which seemed to involve a lot of variation on a tired theme -- namely, nothing was getting passed, arguments were never conclusive, and those debating legislation or ruling on cases themselves often seemed only partially to understand the first thing about what they were discussing.

Not to mention it was the same friggin’ story over and over and over again. It was like reporting on the same exact hands repeatedly, only with different players. Except there was never any final all-in or resolution to come.

So I mostly stopped writing about that stuff. Sometimes I’m tempted, though, such as last week when the South Carolina Supreme Court came down with an interesting, conflicted ruling regarding the legality of home games. But now I’m more apt just to read others’ summaries and analyses than to attempt my own, and I’ve just read some good ones I thought I’d recommend.

One comes from our lawyer friend Grange95 on his crAAKKer blog, who provides an excellent explanation of the unusual split ruling delivered by the five judges. In fact, the first part of the title of his post -- “Same Song, Different Verse” -- kind of evokes that idea I’m referring to that we’ve heard all of this before many times over. Although as his explanation shows, there were a couple of new twists involved here.

In this case, two of the judges ruled that a regular SC poker game with a low buy-in (just $20) but which saw the host take a rake to cover expenses and which advertised online in order to attract players was indeed illegal gambling according to a century-old statute. Meanwhile, two other judges dissented, while the fifth agreed with points made by both sides before ultimately concurring with the “plurality opinion” (i.e., the judges who found the games illegal).

After providing a nice, clear explanation of the ruling, Grange95 adds some analysis that also looks ahead to how this particular ruling may affect future developments. The fact that the whole “skill-vs.-luck” issue was mostly set aside in this case as irrelevant (by both sides) is intriguing, as is the way the ruling kind of throws things back to the SC legislature to try to craft a better, more up-to-date law regarding illegal gambling. I also find interesting the way all of the judges seem to have voiced a kind of “common sense” or pragmatic view of how the kind of game being spread in their case (with a rake, and soliciting players online) differed from “casual games” played between friends in a private residence (with no rake, and not advertising to attract players).

Grange95 thinks new legislation is a likely next move in South Carolina, and isn’t too optimistic about what may result from a modernized illegal gambling law (i.e., “Things Could Get Worse For Poker Players”). He also has some interesting things to say about the Poker Players Alliance and its relative impotence both in this case and generally speaking. So check out Grange95’s post for a full rundown of what happened in SC last week and what it may possibly mean going forward.

Rakewell, a.k.a. the Poker Grump, added some thoughts regarding the case as well that serve as a good follow-up after reading Grange95’s post. He sides with the dissenting view in the case, and offers some thoughtful criticisms of the majority’s argument and of the strange I-agree-with-the-dissenters-but-concur-with-the-plurality position of the judge who cast the swing vote.

Grange95 also recommends a PokerFuse article reporting on the case written by Haley Hintze which provides a good, short digest of the case and its implications.

There are other articles in the usual places regarding the SC case, but most just echo each other and none seem to offer anything close to the thoughtful summary/analysis provided in the above-mentioned posts. So if you’ve been hearing about this SC business and were looking to learn more, check out those posts.

A funny side note... when searching around for other reports and/or analyses on last week’s SC ruling, I quickly came upon an article from early 2009 on the same case reporting on the ruling that subsequently was appealed to the SC Supreme Court. It sounds like the defense then made a lot of the whole “skill-vs.-luck” issue and that the judge there even went so far as to acknowledge hold’em to be a game of skill while nonetheless issuing his guilty verdict.

Seems like a competent enough article, I guess. I wonder, though, if the author really knew what he was talking about.

Meanwhile... Reid-Kyl

We’re careening toward the end of another Congress, to be punctuated again by one of those weird little stretches between elections and the start of the new year. I’m talking about the so-called “lame duck session” when certain legislation that has been avoided during the pre-election period sometimes gets entertained.

And once again, talk about some sort of federal online poker bill sneaking its way through before the Congressional finish line has arisen. Turning into kind of a tradition, really.

You’ll recall how two years ago the month of December was dominated by talk of the “Reid Bill,” a.k.a. the Prohibition of Internet Gaming, Internet Poker Regulation and UIGEA Enforcement Act sponsored by senator Harry Reid (D-NV).

Looking back through my old posts from the end of 2010, I see how I was distracted enough by the story to write several times on the topic, the titles of those posts kind of describing in shorthand form the narrative’s trajectory: “Getting a Reid on the Situation,” “Adding to the Cacophony: More on the ‘Reid Bill,’” and “Zombie Bill Dies, UIGEA Monster Lives.”

This time we’re hearing about a new federal bill, dubbed the “Reid-Kyl bill” thanks to the co-sponsorship of former UIGEA architect Jon Kyl (R-AZ). This full title of this one is the Internet Gambling Prohibition, Poker Consumer Protection, and Strengthening UIGEA Act of 2012.

A summary of this bill began circulating in September, and I’ll admit that at the time I didn’t pay too much attention to either the bill or the chatter surrounding it. I might cite having been too busy to pay it much mind as a reason for my neglect, although in truth, despite having devoted a lot of posts to trying to sort through various legislative intrigues over the years, I’m mostly bored by the topic.

Also, the bits of early commentary on the Reid-Kyl bill I did catch seemed to suggest it had so little hope of passage that it wasn’t worth too much attention. (I am referring to commentary by people I tend to trust.) In other words, kind of like “Full House with Johnny Chan,” there didn’t seem to be much future for the bill, and so my response was necessarily muted.

The very first item in the Reid-Kyl summary talked about undoing “the impact” of that DOJ memorandum that became public in late 2011 which offered the opinion that the 1961 Wire Act only applied to sports betting -- that is, what opened the door for states to start exploring licensing and regulating online poker (and other non-sports related gambling) on their own. Later comes the talk of online poker, which would be permitted although with the provision that states or reservations could opt out if they wished.

Also present in that summary was an item indicating that in order “To deter U.S. players from patronizing illegal sites, the bill makes explicit that any property involved in or traceable to a gambling transaction in violation of the new act (including winnings) is subject to forfeiture.” That item understandably raised some eyebrows, insofar as it represented for the first time talk of players potentially being penalized for playing on non-licensed sites.

Late last week a full-text draft of the Reid-Kyl bill surfaced, and with it discussion about the bill has been revived. QuadJacks provides a copy, if you’re curious.

The actual bill appears to correspond fairly closely to the summary in pretty much all respects. However, the big news accompanying the publication of the actual bill was the apparent omission of that business about the feds being able to grab the funds of players who patronized unlawful sites.

This take on the Reid-Kyl bill -- repeated on practically every poker news site -- was largely influenced by the Poker Players Alliance. In an article for Pokerfuse last Friday, Rich Muny, the PPA’s Vice-President of Player Relations, is characterized as having “asserted that this language [about player penalties] is now completely absent from the current bill draft.” Muny is also quoted suggesting that the removal of such language was largely due to the PPA’s influence as a lobbying organization. Referring to the legislators, Muny says “They knew we would likely oppose a bill with player penalties and were willing to answer us on that.”

So if you peruse the news sites, you see that in most of the articles about the full text of the Reid-Kyl bill being made public the focus is on that “player penalties removed” message.

There’s a problem with that reporting, though. It’s wrong.

The bill does contain a short section (“Bettor Forfeiture”) that describes “any property, real or personal, involved in a transaction or attempted transaction in violation” of the Reid-Kyl bill and explains how it that language would be added to Section 981(a)(1) of Title 18 of the United States Code. That section of the U.S. code spells out all sorts of offenses resulting in property being “subject to forfeiture to the United States,” including any property (including money) that’s used to traffic weapons, commit fraud, support or plan acts of terrorism, or break a host of other laws.

Reader “TA Miller” left a comment on the Pokerfuse article pointing out the significance of that section in the bill and how it does in essence represent what could be considered “player penalty.“ And Haley Hintze has provided a lengthier examination of the PPA’s misinterpretation of Reid-Kyl bill which adds some further speculation about whether this section about “bettor forfeiture” might possibly apply to U.S. citizens playing from abroad on sites the U.S. considers unlawful.

As Haley rightly points out, any bills spelling out ways for governments to start seizing player funds introduces something fairly alarming into the equation for U.S. citizens playing online poker -- namely, the idea that playing itself is an act that can be penalized, just like funding terrorists or breaking other federal laws can.

That said, much like talk about future installments of “Full House with Johnny Chan,” this whole discussion is probably mostly about something that ain’t never going to happen. It appears doubtful that the Reid-Kyl bill has much chance of actually becoming federal law. (I’m not even sure if the bill’s sponsors are wholly serious about pushing it through.) Rather, it seems much more likely that within the next year or so we’ll be talking about online poker being played in the U.S. via state-level licensees and regulation.

But who knows, really? Things can get weird after an election and before the new Congress steps in. Or weirder, I should say.

(EDIT [added 10/24/12]: Chris Grove, author of the Pokerfuse article referenced above, clarifies a few points while also responding to some of Haley’s analysis in an article posted yesterday on his Online Poker Report website titled “Reid/Kyl, Haley Hintze and the PPA.”)

The “Very American” Story of Online Poker

I mentioned yesterday how I’d started my class once again, that American Studies course called “Poker in American Film and Culture.” I’ve taught it several times now, and each semester am adding certain readings, moving others off the “required” list and onto a “recommend” one. I’ve also been gradually accumulating more and more examples of poker in film, showing different clips in class along the way to emphasize various topics we cover.

One scene I know I’ll be showing at some point this time around is from the 1968 film The Odd Couple which I just wrote about in a new “Pop Poker” piece for PokerListings.

I also noted in yesterday’s post how we begin the semester reading an excerpt from Poker: Bets, Bluffs and Bad Beats by Al Alvarez, taken from the first chapter titled “The American Game.” It is a neat way to kick off the whole discussion or “argument” of the course that poker is distinctly “American” and thus worth studying as a way to learn more about American history and culture. Reading the excerpt also introduces Alvarez to the students, whom we’ll read again later on when we pick up The Biggest Game in Town.

By talking about the syllabus, reading that Alvarez excerpt, and then soon after starting James McManus’ Cowboys Full (from which we’ll read a lot during the first few weeks), we quickly gather lots of examples of so-called “American” values or ideals. Thus do we focus a lot at the start on ideas and concepts like freedom, liberty, equality, democracy, capitalism, self-reliance, the “frontier spirit,” the “American dream,” the importance of being rewarded for one’s work, and the inclination to take risks and gamble. And how poker could be regarded as a game that neatly reflects or is shaped by all of these ideas and concepts.

Of course, when we use the adjective “American” in class we do it in the context of academic inquiry, not jingoistic sloganeering. That is to say, it is understood that while there is much that is great about the U.S., not everything that is “American” is automatically “good.” There are a lot of things about the country and American culture that aren’t necessarily admirable, and some of those less than admirable characteristics also find their way into poker.

Speaking of The Odd Couple, Alvarez includes in his chapter that great Walter Matthau quote about how “the game exemplifies the worst aspects of capitalism that have made our country so great.” The quote points out in an humorous way how there are both positive and negative aspects to the game and the country.

I found myself thinking further about referring to something as “American” as a kind of uncritical defense when I heard Ben Mezrich, author of Bringing Down the House (about the MIT blackjack team) and The Accidental Billionaires (about Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook), talking on CNBC about his plans to write “a big new book for next summer” that appears to cover the rise and fall of Absolute Poker. Mezrich appeared on the panel show Squawk Box as a guest host, and while there was given a chance to talk about his own writings, past and future.

Mezrich enthusiastically characterized the story as being “about a bunch of college kids who launched the online poker world out of a dorm room essentially” -- kind of a nutty, highly misleading thing to say about the AP guys who hardly “launched” online poker, having come into it years after its beginnings.

Mezrich continued, revealing he has a strange take on the story’s principals, too. “They’re brilliant kids who built an empire in a way, and now they’re being persecuted, hiding in Antigua or whatever, and because they did something to me that was very American,” said Mezrich. “It’s an intersection of 21 and The Social Network,” he added, alluding to film adaptations of his two best-known books.

The misleading here becomes more grievous, I’m afraid. Those “brilliant kids” now being unjustly “persecuted” are the same ones who were involved in the original superuser scandals and subsequent cover-ups, the bilking of millions from investors, various forms of bank and wire fraud, violating the UIGEA, and the failure to return player funds following Black Friday.

Hardly heroes, in other words, although it sounds like Mezrich might be angling towards shaping them into such with his version of the story. See Haley Hintze’s response to Mezrich’s weird take here, as well as this article on PokerFuse that notes how Mezrich may himself in fact have ties to the AP “frat boys” that might be influencing both his decision to write about them and how he’s approaching the task.

Mezrich describes AP’s founders as having done something “very American,” a superficial defense of the entrepreneurial urge that motivated them to build their “empire.” But clearly there was an abundance of unchecked greed there, too, perhaps also an “American” trait though here pursued to the point of abandoning morality and engaging in criminal behavior damaging to many, many others.

Mezrich certainly seems to be glossing over (or missing altogether) some obvious points in the story in this early, abridged pitch of his book. We’ll see where Mezrich goes with his project, which obviously could change. After all, as the Absolute Poker frat boys well demonstrated, things don’t always go as originally planned.

I will give him this much, though -- there is perhaps something “very American” about the story of online poker’s rise and fall in the U.S., as well as the stories of some of the more nefarious characters in that narrative.

I think when I use the phrase my meaning is a little different, though.

Epic URLs; or, Something Wicked That Way Went

Got a lot out of PKRGSSP’s latest podcast, the one from Tuesday featuring Steve “Chops” Preiss of Wicked Chops Poker, pro player Jon Aguiar, and Pokerati’s Dan Michalski. Interesting discussion throughout regarding the current state of things in poker, with Dan throwing in some interesting thoughts about legislation and the so-called poker media, too.

Chops was there, of course, to talk primarily about the Epic Poker League’s recently-updated bankruptcy filings, including the revelation of those hundreds of internet domains the league purchased. And, of course, to discuss how Wicked Chops had in fact been recruited early on by the FS+G crowd to be part of the whole enterprise, though eventually did not get involved.

When those URLs became public last week, I tweeted how someone writing a book about the whole EPL saga could pick chapter titles from the web addresses, among which one finds indications of all sorts of behind-the-scenes ideas, strategies, and/or paranoid fantasies.

You’ve probably at least heard about the list, I imagine, if not skimmed it yourself. Haley Hintze wrote a post for Kick Ass Poker last week titled “Hundreds of LOLs: Federated Sports & Gaming’s Domain Registration Stash” in which she transcribed all 451 of the URLs. She also added some commentary pointing out how the grabbing of so many domains illustrates “paying way too much attention to image, and not half enough to the ABCs of getting the job done and getting the business set up right.”

Over half of the domain names include “epic” in one form or another, including matching “epicpoker” with various country suffixes as well as putting the word “epic” next to all variants of poker as well as other games (e.g., epiccheckers.com). Other domains cover all sorts of misspellings (to prevent typosquatting), envision potential product tie-ins (e.g., epictequila.com) or partnerships (e.g. maximpoker.com), and so on.

Also listed are URLs like epicpokerfail.com, epicpokersucks.com, and fuckepicpoker.com, some of which were among those I had in mind when suggesting the use of the web addresses as chapter headings. Such would be chosen as titles for the last chapters of such a book, I’d imagine.

When I made that comment I was also thinking about the nearly 100 URLs involving the word “wicked” or “wickedpoker,” the reason for which Chops discussed on the PKRGSSP show and in a recent blog post over at Wicked Chops. A most curious part of the story, too, that would rate at least a chapter, maybe more.

As Chops explains, an earlier idea by FS+G had involved naming the professional poker league the “Wicked Poker League.” Thus do we see all of those URLs appearing in the list, but that is only part of the story.

Interestingly, the plan to give the league this obviously terrible name was being pursued independently of FS+G’s effort to recruit Wicked Chops as a media content provider, although it seems clear the two were connected. It sounds a lot like FS+G was looking to co-opt whatever value the Wicked Chops Poker brand has for its own purposes, apparently trying to do so without letting the Entities know what was up. Listen to the PKRGSSP show and read Chops’ post for further details about the order of events and how it all went down.

To summarize it all, there was some negotiating happening between WCP and the FS+G to partner up in some fashion early on, and eventually those talks evolved into WCP simply managing web content for the new league. However, the FS+G asked for certain conditions regarding the ownership of intellectual property to which the WCP couldn’t cater, and that deal fell through.

Meanwhile, the FS+G had apparently decided to call its league the Wicked Poker League, a decision that was made without any consultation with WCP. Upon being informed of the plan, WCP “lawyered up” (to use Chops’ phrase) in an effort to protect their brand, and at some point shortly afterward the idea was dropped in favor of going with Epic Poker League as a name.

Having heard a little about all of this before -- though without many specifics -- I knew when I saw the list of URLs that there was a reason for the inclusion of all of the “wicked” and “wickedpoker” addresses. I also knew last year that there had been some sort of related falling out between the Wicked Chops guys and the EPL crowd that perhaps partly explained WCP’s antipathy toward the league as expressed in some of its reporting about it.

That said, if you go back and read WCP’s posts about Epic you can see occasional, tempered expressions of hope regarding the league appearing amid all of the cynicism. The fact is, a lot of people wanted to see the thing survive somehow and perhaps even realize some of those ambitious goals to help influence mainstream culture’s view poker in a positive way. I was hopeful, too, having been recruited to help contribute to the blog that appeared on one of the few URLs (epicpoker.com) that actually got used.

But like Haley says, there obviously was way too much attention being given to HTTPs than ABCs, not to mention a ton of other failures in planning, organization, money management, and just about everything else having to do with the enterprise.

I’m imagining another book, a fiction, portraying a world in which all 451 of those URLs were put to meaningful use. A sprawling, episodic adventure in which an “Epic” empire rose to prominence, taking over not just the gaming world but all areas of culture.

Just imagine! A world in which citizens of the Federated Poker Union would closely track the Global Poker Index to follow their favorite Epic Poker Players. Where adults would buy Epic Poker Lottery tickets and gamble at the Wicked Sports Book, the younger crowd would earn degrees at Epic Poker University, and the children would happily play with their Tickle Me Danny dolls. Meanwhile, the creators would toast each other, clinking Brunson Cups filled with Epic Scotch while collecting royalties from the Epic Cashier.

Went a different direction, though. Too bad. Would’ve been, you know... like really, really big.

Kind of a Big Deal Kind of Banned

Sorta followed that hubbub yesterday involving Daniel Negreanu and his battle to link to his latest video blog over on the Two Plus Two forums. That Kid Poker actually received a temporary ban from the mods over at 2+2 added some fuel to the fire, causing the flames to rise high enough to be seen from further away than would have otherwise been the case.

If you’re genuinely curious about all of that, check out Negreanu’s own explanation of what happened (according to him, natch), as well as Haley’s overview of it all over on Kick Ass Poker. You could wade through various threads over on 2+2, too, for info, if you had even more time to kill.

The crux of the biscuit was the fact that in his latest video blog -- or “weekly rant” -- Negreanu used the first several minutes to advertise the new live-betting iSeries poker series in which he’s participating in Ireland next month.

The series involves poker tourneys shown live (with hole cards) online, with the players being sequestered and viewers being given opportunities to bet on the outcome as well as a host of other prop bets along the way. All but the Americans, that is, who are summarily excluded from participating in anything of this nature because we can’t be trusted to make adult decisions on our own.

It sounds like the first event is going to feature a 10-person, £10,000 buy-in, winner-take-all sit-n-go involving Negreanu, Phil Hellmuth, Faraz Jaka, Marvin Rettenmaier, Tobias Reinkenmeier, James Dempsey, Devilfish Ulliott, Carlos Mortensen, Maria Ho, and Eoghan O’Dea. Later events will feature bigger fields, although the overall concept will remain the same with viewers getting to bet on who they think will win, who will be the first to bust, where players might finish, and so on. Here are the live betting odds over on Paddy Power, if you’re curious.

One wrinkle of significance is the fact that the participants will be receiving a cut of the juice taken on bets placed in which they are involved. Thus Negreanu does stand to benefit from advertising the iSeries event and getting bets placed on him.

That appears to have been what bothered the powers that be at 2+2, as what had previously been just a weekly video in which Negreanu opined on various topics had this time literally begun with a commercial promoting iSeries followed by Negreanu’s further explanation and endorsement. Kind of funny the temp ban of Negreanu would come regarding a video in which he appears wearing a t-shirt that says “I'M KIND OF A BIG DEAL” (an Anchorman quote).

In Haley’s article she speaks of Negreanu’s video blogs as having “jumped the shark” after only a few weeks, with the iSeries promotion evidence to support that evaluation. I’m not as bothered by it, although it is tedious to have to sit through someone selling you something you either aren’t interested in or cannot buy at all. Kind of felt the same way in a previous video blog of Negreanu’s in which he drew us in with some poker talk, then included an anti-meat, pro-vegan segment.

That said, just as this is my blog and I get to decide what I post here, Negreanu can include whatever he likes in his video blogs, and if people don’t like it, well, they don’t have to tune in.

I get 2+2’s impatience with the spam-like nature of the video, although it’s also clear the forum benefits tremendously from Negreanu’s willingness to participate over there. That may well be a thing of the past, however, given the way Negreanu has reacted to his temp ban.

As far as the iSeries concept is concerned, in his video blog Negreanu talks about the current state of televised poker, noting that it is in need of something to rejuvenate it as a spectator “sport.” He likens poker to football and other sports on which betting is done, and suggests it is time for poker to offer something similar.

He may be right, although listening to this line of argument from within U.S. borders doesn’t really provide much cause for enthusiasm. We’re having a hard enough time over here getting our goverment to let us play poker at all, let alone bet on the successes and failures of others playing it. For us, this simply is not a road down which our over-protective overlords will allow us to wander.

So to address the iSeries in “big picture” terms, I’d say I hope it doesn’t make too big of a splash, if only because it further associates poker with outright gambling or sports betting, and thus makes it a harder sell to legislators on this side of the pond. That said, it could well prove something of a shot in the arm for poker in the ROW (Rest Of World).

In any event, I’ll probably be watching. Just as I’ll probably look in on Negreanu’s next video, too, in which I imagine he will be returning to rant mode once again, with 2+2 a likely target. I mean I gotta do something with all this extra time while I’m not playing, right?

A Man-Made Monster is On the Loose! (Black Friday)

We keep talking about Black Friday. And we will for a long time to come, too.

Headlines yesterday regarding Brent Beckley, one of the 11 targeted as part of the “Black Friday” indictment and civil complaint unsealed back on April 15. Beckley pleaded guilty to a couple of the counts against him -- conspiracy to violate the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act and conspiracy to commit bank fraud and wire fraud. Here’s the DoJ’s press release announcing Beckley’s plea.

As Haley Hintze points out over on the Kick Ass Poker blog, Beckley wasn’t exactly one of the founders of Absolute Poker -- as was his stepbrother, the also-indicted AP founder Scott Tom -- although he did come in early on and served as the director of payment processing. Beckley now likely faces up 12-18 months imprisonment (or more) while also being made to give up $300,000. His sentencing isn’t scheduled to happen until April 2012.

Stuart Hoegner (a.k.a. “Gaming Counsel”) has a new blog post over on Pokerati in which he discusses Beckley’s deal, interpreting its terms to suggest that Beckley may not be cooperating with the DoJ in quite the same way another of those indicted on “Black Friday,” the payment processor Bradley Franzen (who pleaded guilty to three counts back in May) might be.

Meanwhile, two other “Black Friday” defendants -- Chad Elie (another payment processor) and John Campos (former Vice Chairman of the Board and part owner of SunFirst Bank in Utah) are fighting the charges at this point, having filed a motion earlier this month to have the charges against them dismissed. (See Subject:Poker’s report on that motion.) That probably ain’t gonna happen, meaning that barring any deal those two will be going to trial in March 2012.

One other indicted on “Black Friday,” the payment processor Ira Rubin, was arrested back in late April in Guatemala. I believe he’s still in custody and is apparently nearing some sort of plea agreement.

It seems doubtful at present that any of the others indicted will be coming to the U.S. either to make pleas or fight the charges against them any time soon. Those include Isai Scheinberg (PokerStars founder), Paul Tate (Director of Payments for Pokerstars), Ray Bitar (CEO of TiltWare/Full Tilt Poker), Nelson Burtwick (Director of Payments for TiltWare), Scott Tom (of AP), and Ryan Lang (another payment processor), all of whom remain “offshore” like the sites with which they are associated.

Remember the separate civil complaint targeting the sites -- the one amended back in September to add more allegations against Full Tilt Poker as well as the names/accounts of Ray Bitar, Howard Lederer, Chris Ferguson, and Rafe Furst -- seeks the forfeiture of a big bunch of cabbage (i.e., $3 billion) but isn’t bringing criminal charges or aiming to imprison anyone.

Also worth remembering is the fact that the still-pending deal involving Group Bernard Tapie and FTP -- the one “brokered” by the DoJ (and on which the DoJ hasn’t really commented, as far as I know) -- involves dismissing those civil claims against FTP but doesn’t affect the “Black Friday” indictment or amended civil complaint.

We’re coming to the end of 2011, and thus instinctively are encouraged to look back and think about the year’s top stories in poker. Obviously Black Friday will be topping all such lists this time around.

But really, just about every poker-related story from 2011 is going to be related in some fashion to the sudden shutdown of the online game in the U.S. following the events of April 15. Probably most of them in 2012, too.

UB Data Leak

At some point within the last couple of weeks, a large amount of information concerning player accounts on UltimateBet was made available on the web. The information was contained in a number of Excel and text files -- like 150 or so -- and could be downloaded by anyone in possession of the URL.

The files are all dated around the middle of last month. Late last week someone posted a link to the page on the Two Plus Two forums, then deleted the post just a few minutes later. However, a small number of people -- including the moderators at 2+2 -- were able to obtain the URL and get a look at what the files contain.

One of those mods, Noah Stephens-Davidowitz, reported the leak on Subject:Poker early Friday evening. Haley Hintze got a look at the files and posted about them on her blog on Saturday afternoon. And Todd “Dandruff” Witteles (formerly of NeverWinPoker / DonkDown) also saw the files and shared an analysis on his new site.

The page linking to the files was taken down late Saturday, was back up again briefly early this morning, and is now down again. If you’re curious about what information is contained in the files, take a look at those three linked-to articles mentioned above. While there is certainly information most of us wouldn’t want spread around too liberally -- e.g., date of birth, mailing address, email address, phone number -- there doesn’t appear to be any specifics such as bank info, social security numbers, or the like contained in the files.

There’s some mystery about who is responsible for the leak (a rogue customer service employee?) as well as the possible reasons for the data having been sorted and assembled in this way (to sell to spammers?).

As Haley points out in her post, while some alarm is being expressed about this leak (e.g., in a new Two Plus Two thread started in response to the S:P article), it is not as though information provided to online poker sites hasn’t already been shared or sold or otherwise “leaked” around many times over. As Haley explains, “Most players are just commodities to the online sites. That’s the real why and how of it. Your data is secure as long as the site rakes in money, but once the squeeze comes, all bets are off, and anything that can be grabbed and sold is usually fair game.”

As I’ve written about here before, I had accounts on both Absolute Poker and UltimateBet.

I opened my AP account in October 2006, just a few days after the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act was signed into law. It was right about that time that the company that owned AP bought out the company that owned UB. Talk then suggested the player bases would be consolidated, but instead AP and UB continued to operate independently. (It was not until July 2008 that the two sites would start touting themselves as the “Cereus network.”)

Then in August 2007, AP and UB offered to allow players to move funds back and forth between accounts on both sites. In early September 2007, I decided to do just that and moved some money from my AP account over into a new one on UB.

Within weeks the insider cheating scandal at Absolute Poker became public, and I immediately decided to withdraw all of my funds from both AP and UB. Getting my money out of AP was simple enough, but I had a hell of a time getting my measly roll off of UB. I finally did get my funds, but not after enduring a lot of frustration and absurdity first, details of which I shared in a post titled “UB Kidding Me.”

Shortly thereafter I began posting fairly frequently about the Absolute Poker scandal while also suggesting neither AP nor UB were sites to be trusted. Then in early March 2008 the UltimateBet scandal first hit the fan in a big way.

Thus I had an active AP account for a little over a year, and one on UB for just a couple of months. Just as with other online poker sites, I never gave either AP or UB any information I wasn’t comfortable sharing (e.g., I never gave credit card numbers, bank account numbers, my SSN, etc.).

Since Black Friday, the Full Tilt Poker fiasco has mostly eclipsed the equally-bad-for-poker mess that was/is AP/UB. Whereas the two Cereus networks had previously been the standard for dishonesty and fraud in online poker, FTP has swiftly evolved into the industry’s current benchmark for the-worst-it-can-get.

Thus while a few are anxious about it, the general outcry at the UB customer info leak has seemed mostly muted. I agree that it isn’t as though we should be all that surprised at the news that online poker sites have sold our information if there were a buck to made from it. But I do think this latest development should be remembered and included in the long list of ways UB managed to screw over its players. And the game.

Does kind of recall late 2007-early 2008 writing about this, though. Back when cheating and scandal in online poker was still relatively new. And for many, still something that seemed like it could be dismissed.

Following the Story of the Story (AP & UB)

Yesterday there were a couple of poker-related news items that grabbed my attention. Yours too, probably. Both concerned the Cereus network’s terrible twins, Absolute Poker and UltimateBet.

One was the news that Haley Hintze has a deal with Dimat Enterprises to write a book covering the insider cheating scandals at the two sites.

Just about anyone who has heard of the scandals is aware that Hintze has been investigating this twisted, troubling tale for quite some time. Since they first started to appear in the fall of 2009, Hintze’s “Still Conjecturin’” posts regarding the scandals have been required reading for anyone with any interest in what happened (and has continued to happen) at AP and UB. As someone with such an interest -- and as a fan of detective stories! -- I can’t wait to read Hintze’s account.

I have a couple of other reasons for being excited about the news of Hintze’s forthcoming book. For one, I’ve long thought she was one of the better writers/thinkers in this little field, and so would be interested to read anything Hintze wrote, regardless of the subject. I’m also a fan of Dimat and Matthew Hilger (whom I had a chance to interview for Betfair back in April 2010). I’ve found books published by Dimat have been of consistently high quality both in terms of content and presentation, which makes me even more pleased about yesterday’s news.

See Hintze’s blog for more on the book announcement. Also, check out Hilger’s Internet Texas Hold’em site where a special thread has been set up for discussions about the book. Some fun title suggestions being batted back and forth there at the moment.

The other AP/UB news item from yesterday concerned the announcement that both sites were cutting loose all of their sponsored pros, which I believe includes one from AP (Trishelle Cannatella) and 10 from UB (Eric Baldwin, Brandon Cantu, Bryan Devonshire, Prahlad Friedman, Maria Ho, Scott Ian, Adam Levy, Tiffany Michelle, Joe Sebok, and Dave Stann). That news comes on the heels other stories regarding raids in Costa Rica, bankruptcy rumors, and what appears to be a steadily decreasing likelihood of players ever recovering funds from accounts on the two sites.

In the wake of that announcement, much of the subsequent focus yesterday afternoon fell upon Joe Sebok, who as both a UB sponsored pro and “media and operations consultant” for the site has drawn a great deal of attention from the poker community over the last year or so.

After a week of Twitter silence, Sebok penned a blog post yesterday in which he addressed the news of his parting with UB and reflected on his tenure with the site.

When Sebok first signed with UB, I wrote a post (“The Sebok Surprise”) in which I likened my impression of the move to sweating a friend who looked as though he might be misplaying a hand. Judging from yesterday’s post, it appears Sebok did just that. Sounds like his holding was never that strong, he thought he had more chips to play with than he did, and his read of others at the table was way, way off.

Sebok joined UB in September 2009, coincidentally right around the time Hintze started publishing her “Still Conjecturin’” posts. I suppose one could say that over the last 20 months both have been similarly motivated to publicize the story of the scandals.

But if it’s true both shared a similar goal, one was obviously much more efficient than the other when it came to achieving it.

Five Years

On April 28, 2006, I published my first post on Hard-Boiled Poker, titled “What’s the Rumpus?” The idea to start a blog had come perhaps a week or two before. Not quite spur-of-the-moment, but close.

There was no “five-year plan,” I can assure you. There wasn’t even a second-post plan, to be honest.

I had brooded a while over what to call the sucker, and somewhere along the way thought up the Shamus character behind whom I’d sort-of-hide for the first part of the blog’s history.

I’ve written before here about how I’d begun with an idea to write about poker -- primarily my own low-limit misadventures -- while employing the “hard-boiled” style of the detective novels I loved (and eventually tried to follow in my own novel). It only took a few weeks to discover I couldn’t keep firing out posts about gathering scratch and setting up patsies and running grifts while keeping a straight face. So, much as players eventually find the style that suits them best, I soon settled into a more reasonable “voice” with which to continue.

The passage of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 in October also affected the direction of the blog. I’d scribbled some about the WSOP that summer and other items in the poker “world” not having to do with my own circumscribed experiences. But now there was lots else for a blogger identifying himself as an “online poker player” to consider.

On April 28, 2007, I was in the midst of publishing a series of posts about a trip to Vegas with Vera Valmore. Posts from that trip described (in absurdly comprehensive detail) some low limit sessions, meeting cool cats like Paul Seldon (one of the very first readers of HBP), Tom Schneider (who’d go on to become the WSOP POY that summer), Wade Andrews (of Hold’em Radio), and Howard Schwartz (proprietor of the Gamblers Book Shop), and an especially entertaining ride on the Deuce titled “What Happens In Vegas Gets Spread All Over the Internet.”

It wasn’t the first time I’d been to Vegas, but it was still a place full of new experiences for me. Had no idea at the time that before long I would be spending entire summers there.

Wasn’t long after those Vegas trip posts I got recruited by John Caldwell and Haley Hintze (then) of PokerNews to help out with some articles over there that summer while the first-string scribes were away to cover the WSOP. That association continued afterwards, and eventually led to my joining the team of bloggers at the WSOP the following year.

On April 28, 2008, I wrote a post titled “Celebrating Seconds” in which I commemorated the blog’s second anniversary with an account of a runner-up finish in a “Saturdays With Pauly” PLO tournament.

Looking back at that post causes me to think that it came at a time when I was probably enjoying playing poker more than I ever had before or perhaps even since. I was also enjoying writing about poker, and excited about the opportunities I getting to write more.

On April 28, 2009, the blog’s anniversary came and went without my even noticing. My post that day was titled “Time Is Money; or, the Return of the Waiting Game.” (Maybe I was in a hurry and hadn’t the time for sitting around celebrating birthdays.) The post followed up an earlier, much-viewed one sharing a story from that year’s SCOOP involving Daniel Negreanu complaining about opponents stalling as the cash bubble neared.

On April 28, 2010, I was just about to leave my full-time job to focus entirely on freelance writing. I’d made the decision many months before, but it would be a couple of days later (on May 1) that the move would become official.

Not too surprising to see I was in an especially self-reflective mood on that day, as evidenced by the post “Detour: Four Years of Hard-Boiled Poker.” That one tells the story of the blog fairly well, if you’re at all curious about that.

Speaking of telling my story, earlier this week I had the chance to do so in an interview with Mike Owens over on CheckRaze. And tonight I happen to be appearing as a guest on “Keep Flopping Aces,” the podcast hosted by Lou Krieger and Shari Geller. (The timing there is coincidental -- it was “Black Friday” and all that has happened since that I’ve been invited to discuss on KFA, not this here blog.)

If you’re interested in hearing the show, it starts at 9 p.m. Eastern time tonight (Thursday, 4/28) over at Rounder’s Radio. You can listen live, and later the show will be archived.

Events of the last couple of weeks had caused me to think about this fifth anniversary of the blog a little differently. I’ll admit I even had a moment -- a couple of days after “Black Friday” -- where I thought maybe this would be a fitting place to write a final post and move on to devote more time and energy to other, non-poker writing. Or perhaps to announce my intention to scale back and post less regularly. After all, I have posted every weekday here since January 1, 2008 (and on some weekends, too).

But it seems after five years of this there’s more to write about than ever before. Even if, as an American with no money in accounts that haven’t been shut down by the feds, that “an online poker player” descriptor is currently inaccurate.

So the scribbling will continue.

Can’t begin to say how appreciative I am of everyone -- all of the way back to my buddy Paul who came on here back in June 2006 to say “Nice blog shamus. Keep up the good work!!!” -- who has spent time reading and responding to all these many “musings” over the past five years.

As I was writing about earlier this week, the blog has led to a lot of interesting, exciting opportunities for me over the years. But most importantly it has been the means by which I’ve gotten to know countless people -- including many amazing, creative, funny, smart people I today unhesitatingly list among my closest friends.

Thanks again, everybody. I’m so grateful this here blog enabled us to get together.