Is anyone reconsidering decision to play poker professionally?

[registrar]

Isn't the illegality going to be in the providers receiving money from US citizens?

Can't you just keep your roll in, build this up and take out your substantial winnings for life? Or is the fear that the sites are going [censored] up?

[NoahSD]

[ QUOTE ]
Isn't the illegality going to be in the providers receiving money from US citizens?

Can't you just keep your roll in, build this up and take out your substantial winnings for life? Or is the fear that the sites are going [censored] up?

[/ QUOTE ]

Well.. I'm not entirely sure that the law only applies to deposits. Also, when fish can't deposit, lots of us will become losing players.

[registrar]

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Isn't the illegality going to be in the providers receiving money from US citizens?

Can't you just keep your roll in, build this up and take out your substantial winnings for life? Or is the fear that the sites are going [censored] up?

[/ QUOTE ]

Well.. I'm not entirely sure that the law only applies to deposits. Also, when fish can't deposit, lots of us will become losing players.

[/ QUOTE ]

Naturally, the following is easy for me to say because the legislation doesn't directly affect me and I am not versed in the arguments that have led to its creation.

However, if the issue is that committed poker players will continue to find means to play online, but that fish won't, thus making life tougher and less profitable for the professionals, isn't that a good thing?

Obviously, all winning poker players win through game selection and targetting weaker players. That goes with the territory. But, online, these days we have unknown and unkowable players able to lose whatever their credit ratings will allow while not facing the immediate unplesant consequences (no long walk home, no broken down slouching from the tables). This has to be a bad thing.

My best mate is a drug dealer. He's been doing it for twenty years. He only sells pot. He provides a decent, honest service to respectable pillars of the communinty: honest, decent, white middle class folk like myself. But his most profitable clients are the useless arseholes buying an eighth of skunk a day. This is clearly not doing them any good. It's difficult to justify in moral terms but, hey, where do we draw the line?

Nonetheless, I do feel uncomfortable if our main concern over this legislation is not freedom for the individual, stinking hypocrisy or whatever, but rather the fact that we're not going to make so much money now by fleecing people who are prone to desperate and destructive impulses in the same way as I wouldn't want to serve booze to an alcoholic, drugs to a smackhead or credit to a shopaholic.

If the consequences of this legislation is that committed and professional US players can still get a game (and surely sites will be set up to cater for you in zones beyond US govt. control?) but that trailer trash (if that's your term) can't blow the gyro (welfare) in an evening of tilt, is that such a bad thing?

Incidentally, I feel this applies much less, morally, to MTTs but I always feel pretty dirty taking easy money on low limit cash tables.

I'm not trying to sound holier than thou (I guess I'm succeeding though) but I hope that like Douglas Adam's dolphins you have a better place to go because if all online poker is is a chance for well-educated and advantaged people to profit from the flaws of the less able and favoured then, well, I could make a variety of analogies.

[Rizen]

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I am wondering whether I should consider going back into the software field due to the current turmoil. I am wondering what the effect on poker in the US is going to be.

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Patience everyone. Let me get the obvious out of the way first, this sucks. Now that that's done, there is no reason to go into panic mode. The US market for online poker is just too big. There are a lot of things that can happen at this point, some good and some bad. In a weird way, this could end up being a GOOD thing for poker players. I know it's tough to see that now, but a consolidation among the major sites isn't always a bad thing.

It's easy to push the panic button now, but someone will cater to the US market, and provided they enlighten the fish on how to get there, we'll still be able to play.

I'm trying not to stay overly optimistic or pessimistic, but there *IS* a 6 BILLION dollar market for online poker that didn't just disappear this morning. Someone, somewhere will cater to it. The real issue will be once the smoke blows over if the games remian fishy, or if we're all playing against one another in less +EV situations. It also may quickly become better to be a cash/SnG player than a MTT player if there is a significant dip in US participation, since Europeans tend to play cash more. That's one reason why I try and stay diversified and good at multiple formats/games.

Yeah, this sucks. In the long run we may look back at this as the day online poker died. We also may look at it as the day online poker was finally forced to innovate and improve to attract players, or the day online poker stood up and pushed for broader acceptance/regulation. We also may look back at it as merely a speed bump in the road that ultimately means very little.

Let's not jump ahead of ourselves. I for one, am very pleased with my decision to go professional and am still very much adopting a 'wait and see' attitude towards all of this. I urge you all to do the same.

-Rizen

[ginzorella]

Rizen..

I respect the opinion and the positive approach. But I cant share in the optimism. "Someone will cater to the US market" is not good enough. As you see already today, any legitimate business.. 888, Party gaming soon to follow... Will be forced to cut all US ties, because they are now under the microscope, and if any legit business takes money from a US bank or takes money from neteller that took it from a US bank.. its an indictable offense. NO LEGIT entity will allow itself to be subjected to this, NOT for any reason, whether the US market is 6 billion or 6 trillion. All businesses that dont want to deal with the US govt, will cut all ties to US clients..and I mean all. The big public ones will go first, since they are most visible and have most to lose in terms of shareholder interest. The private firms may wait little bit longer, but they have no option, they want to accept wagers or $ from a US client, they risk losing it all.

This isnt panic.. its reality. For the people who say teh companies will fight it? Are you serious? These are not US based firms running poker sites... They have NO footing and no rights here, they can pay for lobbyists and thats it. Dont you think if the US based casinos could stop this bill they would have? They couldnt... and its ridiculous to think a foreign run poker site will have an ounce of say in this.

this taken from partygaming article today...

"PartyGaming, the operator of the world's biggest poker website, saw about £2.32 billion wiped off the value of its shares after it said it would suspend all real money gaming business with US residents once President George W. Bush ratifies a new law that outlaws the processing of internet payments by banks and credit companies."

I know everyone wants to hold out hope.. but the online poker world is not in our hands.. never has been. This is only the tip of the iceberg.. It will get much worse as any and all firms will sever US ties in hopes of maintaining their image and business. The big companies are already doing it first business day.. and their stock values were cut in 1/2... that means Neteller too..

hate to be negative on this.. but this is reality.. Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.

ginzorella

[FortunaMaximus]

It's a transition period for a legitimate industry.

Relax. The dominoes will fall where they may.

Don't panic. Just... If some of y'all are damn good at poker, and can adapt to fewer fish. DO IT.

Rizen's got valid points. So does the gimmick.

[registrar]

Sites will spring up catering for US online poker players. There's entreprenuers from Swaziland to Kamchatka licking their lips at the prospect. There's no way that the US can enforce their laws beyond their borders. (Well, there are lots of ways that they can, do and will but the point remains valid).

The issue is how comfortable US players will feel about transactions involving large sums of money taking place beyond the jurisdiction of the US govt. There are two ways to look at this. Either, they will feel no more comfortable than they did in the days of the Texas road gamblers. Or nothing will change because the status of online poker in the states has always been questionable and love for the game drove players to the internet and their example made the fish feel safe to do the same. Overseas poker sites will be reliable because that it is the most sustainably profitable course of action. And money will pass hands enabling the good names of Pokerstars etc. to do their business in some way shape and form somewhere. If Pokerstars, for example, with its global brand name, loses 70% of its customers because, essentially, its location what's going to happen in a captilist, globalised economy?

[BadgerPro]

[ QUOTE ]
Patience everyone. Let me get the obvious out of the way first, this sucks. Now that that's done, there is no reason to go into panic mode. The US market for online poker is just too big. There are a lot of things that can happen at this point, some good and some bad. In a weird way, this could end up being a GOOD thing for poker players. I know it's tough to see that now, but a consolidation among the major sites isn't always a bad thing.

It's easy to push the panic button now, but someone will cater to the US market, and provided they enlighten the fish on how to get there, we'll still be able to play.

I'm trying not to stay overly optimistic or pessimistic, but there *IS* a 6 BILLION dollar market for online poker that didn't just disappear this morning. Someone, somewhere will cater to it. The real issue will be once the smoke blows over if the games remian fishy, or if we're all playing against one another in less +EV situations. It also may quickly become better to be a cash/SnG player than a MTT player if there is a significant dip in US participation, since Europeans tend to play cash more. That's one reason why I try and stay diversified and good at multiple formats/games.

Yeah, this sucks. In the long run we may look back at this as the day online poker died. We also may look at it as the day online poker was finally forced to innovate and improve to attract players, or the day online poker stood up and pushed for broader acceptance/regulation. We also may look back at it as merely a speed bump in the road that ultimately means very little.

Let's not jump ahead of ourselves. I for one, am very pleased with my decision to go professional and am still very much adopting a 'wait and see' attitude towards all of this. I urge you all to do the same.

-Rizen

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I echo Rizen's statement. I will wait and see how this plays out. I have kept my working bankroll on Stars but have withdrawn my money from Party and cashed out of Neteller for the time being. My only reason for cashing out of Party is because I've never trusted them much in the past and had only deposited there for the Blackjack promotion that never took place.

I'll requote this one more time:

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I for one, am very pleased with my decision to go professional.

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Depending on how this all plays out I guess I may move and start playing live. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[mornelth]

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The issue is how comfortable US players will feel about transactions involving large sums of money taking place beyond the jurisdiction of the US govt.

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Hello, where are all of these transactions take place now??? PS keeps their (and our) dough in Scotland (i think).

I'm sure there is (or will be) a way around the legislation. If it's not found yet, it will be soon, and all message boards and e-mails will be FLOODED with information on how to do it. I'm sure the way (loophole) will be found before 270 days are over.

I, for one, will probably NOT be playing any poker tonight since I need some sleep badly, but I'll be back on tomorrow night, playing 20/180's and maybe Stuper (dead money alert, yo, grab 'em before the government shuts it al down, ZOMG)

[ginzorella]

This is pretty simple ...how most people are sugar coating it boggles my mind...

Swaziland huh....

1. If you run a LEGIT business,public or private, you will close your doors to US customers. If you want to risk litigation, then you proceed and find a way..underground. Same goes for the players.. If you want to risk it you can go ahead and circumvent us laws.

2. The average US poker player will NOT go through the trouble of wiring 1k to a newly set up Bank of Scotland acct.

Put 1 and 2 together.. and tell me what the results of this are....

This may be a "legitimate business" ... Its just not legitimate in the US. And now the govt has found a way to police it, by throwing laws on the institutions holding the cash.


ginzorella