[IcemanDan]

A lot of people arguing that poker is not gambling have made good points towards determining that poker is a game and skill, and not luck. IMHO, that does not remove it from under the umbrella of gambling.

If you remove poker from gambling, you place it in a category of actions that, as we usually understand them, are clearly NOT gambling. There is some logic in arguing that many things are based on unknown events in the future, and therefore either they should be called gambling or poker should not.

The definition along the lines of "placing money on uncertain outcomes of events" is clearly not adequate.

The fact of the matter is, almost nothing in life is 100% certain. Can I say with 100% certainty that my employer will never go out of business? Then maybe I'm gambling with my labor every day I go into work. Can I say with 100% certainty that I won't get into a car crash today? Then maybe I'm gambling with my life every time I go drive.

I can see a lot of strength in the argument that investing or running a business is LIKE gambling. But at the heart of buying stock in a company is purchasing actual partial ownership of that company. If that is gambling, then why isn't buying art, or a house, or a car, or baseball cards gambling?

Why? Because they aren't actual bets themselves. Buying Apple stock today is LIKE betting that its value will increase in the future, but it is not exactly that. Playing poker, however IS betting (that you have the best hand, that your opponents will fold, etc), and therefore gambling. Perhaps you can "beat" the game, but winning does not cause the game to not be gambling.