Poker - Luck vs. Skill from a different angle

[indianaV8]

I believe the examples you give are different by nature. If two guys bet against each other without rake involved, the expectation is that you break even, so if the sums are irrelevant to their bankrole (and even if they are) - it's even money, at least it's not EV-, so you don't really care.

And you get some TV time -> You become famous pro -> you get sponsoured to play, write books etc.

Golf, etc is also like irrelevant money I believe.

And losing everything on craps - that's called compulsive gambling ;-)

I mean if you want to persuade your mother or friends that poker is skills, take you hands history (hopefully with big #hands and +BB/100h) and show them some math - 2 sigma from the normal distribution; 97% statistical confience whatever (read chapter 1 of Mathematics of Poker) + give them few examples of guys that dropped MIT to play poker and do this for a living and they'll get it, that works at least for me very well ;-)