With the negative tone of poker news lately (can’t say I’m innocent of that) its great to hear about someone laying down a good old fashioned poker challenge to try and stir up some excitement in the world of poker. World famous poker player and recent opponent of Tom Dwan, Daniel Cates aka jungleman has put out a challenge for this year’s Prague poker festival.

Jungleman is offering to play anyone who thinks they can beat him with some pretty high stakes. The minimum buy in will be 100, 000 Euros. This will be a live event streamed online with just a 15 minute delay. Its sounds like quite a fun challenge that some big names could certainly get behind. And what about a mystery new poker genius on the European stage?

Most folks are thinking that Tom Dwan will accept the challenge as a rematch of their previous game. Jungleman on the other hand seems happy [...]

Bloomberg.com, well established and widely regarded economics and news site published an op-ed piece supporting the passing of online poker legislation. In fact the folks over at Bloomberg showed the logicality of supporting online poker over other forms of gambling such as state lotteries. They explain how seeing online gaming regulation as a moral issue is without logic.

The article continued by explaining to readers a little more about the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA). It also explained the happenings of Black Friday for those not yet in the know and basically presented the current state of online gambling and gaming in America.

It was nice to see the comments following the article were for the most part positive and well formed. Having the endorsement of such a large news and finance medium can only help the cause of online gaming legislation.

The reach of Bloomberg includes public education, private businesses, the world [...]

Like many state law makers some folks in Maryland are proposing that online gambling be legalized to improve the state budget deficit. The Super committee of six republicans and six democrats have been formed into a think tank and have to find $1.5 trillion to help fix the national budget. Governor O’Malley of Maryland who is not a member of the Super Committee opposes legalizing gaming in his state as he fears it will take money away from the long established state lottery.

His argument against online poker continued as he pointed out that live slot machines and casinos contributed greatly to the funds for Maryland’s public education. If folks turned to the online version of things that money would be lost or at least have to be found from somewhere else in the budget. O’ Malley’s opinions have not found favor publicly or among online poker fans.

And why should it? O’Malley is [...]

This week saw a discussion and hearing on American online gambling and the possibility of federal regulation held by a subcommittee of the US House Energy and Commerce Committee. Overall the hearing is being viewed as a positive step forward.

After opening statements by the Subcommittee’s chairwoman, the subcommittee on Commerce Manufacturing has six people with different gambling related backgrounds speak about the state of American gambling and what steps should be taken to move the country forward.

Parry Atfab, Chairwoman of the Board of Advisors of FairPlayUSA was the first speaker who used her unbias and logical argument to explain that the present gaming laws needed to be strengthened to protect American consumers. Regulation at a federal level would help prevent such things as Black Friday in the future. As Atfab explained the lack of American laws has players using out of country sites that give them little protection as American consumers. Indeed by [...]

Another case of Black Friday fallout appears to be the coverage of poker in mainstream media, more specifically television. This year’s WSOP final table has a changed scheduled and an expanded coverage. Because of the decline of major television poker such as Full Tilt and PokerStars many poker TV shows have disappeared from the airwaves. The extended coverage of the main event final table is both an attempt to keep poker on the air and perhaps enjoy an increased audience and advertising revenue.

ESPN are the fuel behind the WSOP November Nine fire beginning coverage a day later beginning on November 6 instead of November 5 as previously advertised. The break in coverage will now be between the final table and the final three rather than the final table and the final two. There will only be a 15 minute delay between actual play and air time making the coverage for all intent and purposes live.

The [...]

Yes ladies and gentleman every time we turned around in the poker world lately we find another Full Tilt story creeping up behind us. This time its a civil suit between the state of California and the Full Tilt crew. It seems everyone wants a piece of the Full Tilt pie. California is suing for damages in the amount of $900 million and hopes to turn the allegations into a nation wide class action lawsuit.

According to both Pokernews.com and the LA Times the state is being represented by Lary Kennedy and Greg Omotoy of Los Angeles. The couple are alleging fraud, deception, money laundering, not reserving money from player accounts and illegal raking of individual game profits. Its more of the same just on a larger scale.

This is the fourth or fifth law suit filed against Full Tilt since the online poker crumbling began on Black Friday. Others include one from a few players claiming [...]

The events of Black Friday continue to have a ripple effect for American poker. This time it’s the cancellation of the television poker tournament National Heads-Up Championship (NHUPC). With no budget for advertising, promotion or pricey entrance fee for professional players the tournament has been canceled indefinitely.
PokerStars and Full Tilt were major advertising players in the NHUPC but of course they are banned from operating in any way shape or form on American soil. Without the thousands, even millions of dollars in sponsor money the landscape of live American poker tournaments is changing rapidly. Getting poker onto the television is all about money from the producer’s side. Apparently the folks over at NBC have not given up on televised poker just yet. Another one of these blasted wait and see periods follows.

Are there any American poker organizations capable of funding such a massive tournament? If they are they aren’t ready to step up to [...]

After Black Friday even the poker sites that weren’t shut down got a little antsy about staying in the American market and accepting new American players. At first the Merge Gaming folks were not going for this jumping on the chance to drive new traffic to their sites. They drove too much traffic too quickly and ended up having to close their virtual doors to American cash players at the beginning of the summer to recoup. Now it seems there ducks are all in a row and they are coming back.

Under the Merge Gaming network are a number of popular yet humble poker sites such as Black Chip Poker and Pokerview. And with Bodog closing its doors Merge looks ready to pounce once more on the players wandering aimlessly through cyber space. Their payer sign up increases daily and they are pulling up the ranks of global poker sites. But what about the risk?

A quick [...]

Who is on top in the world of poker used to be measured by fans, by popularity and of course media appearances. The GPI has really straightened this out sharing the best and the brightest every week across the poker world. Since my personal favorite Phil Ivey felt out of the top 300 there has been a little shuffling around the poker point chart. But Erik Seidel’s unbelievable lucky streak continues to keep him in the top spot.

Here’s the top ten for this week as reported on GPI website:

#1           Erik Seidel           2586.96

#2           Jason Mercier    2545.04

#3           Bertrand Grospellier       2503.67

#4           Eugene Katchalov            2473.83

#5           Sorel Mizzi          2341.12

#6           Fabrice Soulier  2257.90

#7           Thomas Marchese           2058.11

#8           Scott Seiver        2003.33

#9           Shawn Buchanan             1986.96

#10         Juha Helppi         1970.14

Juha Helppi is a new poker name for me and maybe for you too. Helppi comes from Helsinki, Finland and made his professional poker debut at WPT Aruba. He has over three million in poker earnings and [...]

Like many involved in the world of professional poker well known on and offline magazine Card Player is looking for new ways to keep people in the poker game and attract young folks since the online poker world took its hit on Black Friday. That’s why they are launching the Native American Casino Poker Tour soon to be known as the NACPT.

With around three hundred Native American owned casinos currently operating in the United States, the NACPT has lots of options for national tournaments. The first NACPT will be held at the Choctaw Casino and Resort in Oklahoma. There will be buy ins as low as $100 and the tournament will run from December 1 through December 11, 2011. Winners will receive a seat in the WSOP Choctaw tournament to be held in January of 2012.

The winner of the NACPT will be featured on the front cover of the print version of Card Player magazine [...]