Gambling or Poker?

[MicroBob]

The 2+2 authors have stated that poker is gambling.

The fact that you are +EV doesn't take away from the fact that the outcome is uncertain. It's still gambling.


I can play poker full-time as my sole-source of income for 30 years. and I can show a profit for each and every year I played. Hell, I could show a profit for each and every month I ever played.
And it would STILL be gambling.
It just happens to be gambling with a positive expectation.

[Lester B]

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My entire point of the post was to say that I think there are many more winning players out there who are losing so far overall.

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Winning players that lose overall? This is contradictory in itself. Do you see why? (sorry to use that catch phrase for the 10 millionth time, It seemed appropriate though...)

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When I say poker is not gambling, I look at it like this....

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When you say poker is not gambling, you are missing the [censored] point and maybe you outta re-examine your misguided understanding of the word. ANYTIME you wager on an outcome that is not a 100% certainty it is considered gambling. Get it?

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Also, sorry if I sounded like a dick, I realize this post is pretty weak, but I was bored as hell so.....

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You were bored so you decided to match wits with a bunch of experienced people who know what the hell they're talking about? All the time defending your own nonsense with incoherent [censored]?

Your post was neither interesting or provocative.

[thing85]

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My entire point of the post was to say that I think there are many more winning players out there who are losing so far overall.

When I say poker is not gambling, I look at it like this....

Poker is a game that some play for a living. Nobody plays craps, slots or other actual casino games for as a career. So if Chip Reese has made his living playing poker for over thirty years; how can you call that gambling?

I would agree that for most it is gambling. For a good player to allow for variance, and actually figure out they are a winning player, they must have a proper bankroll. Most likely there is a large group of players out there, who if they had better patience, would be on the plus side of the balance sheet.

Also, sorry if I sounded like a dick, I realize this post is pretty weak, but I was bored as hell so.....

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gam·ble
v. gam·bled, gam·bling, gam·bles
v. intr.

1. To bet on an uncertain outcome, as of a contest.
2. To play a game of chance for stakes.
3. To take a risk in the hope of gaining an advantage or a benefit.


Also, it's uncool to take shots at people who appear to know more than you do.

[bigt2k4]

this is for you butcho22

[headturner1]

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this is for you butcho22

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bwahabhbahhbahbahbahbhbahbwwhbahahhab!!!!!!!!!!!!1 1111111

i love the baby in the microwave that was awesome.

[IDN101]

This is an issue of "Ego Management", rather than "Bankroll Management".

Ian

[Fabian]

Butcho,

Glad to see a more humble approach to posting. I see what you're saying and we've all had similar thoughts about how safe poker can/will/should/might feel in terms of a steady nice income. Like I wrote earlier though, there are no guarantees, even for good and even for great players. Especially the way poker has evolved in the last few years (moving online) has resulted in an even more volatile game (larger swings, results wise). Lower winrates and higher standard deviations. Stuff like that. So I do agree with you about that, many players who think they're winners might be losers on a good run.

[jman220]

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For a professional poker player, it's only gambling if they are playing outside of their bankroll.

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Poker is in fact gambling. Reread (or probably read for the first time in your case) Small Stakes Holdem, by Ed Miller, or Theory of Poker, by Sklansky, for an explanation as to why.

[fep]

Butcho, please consider that if everyone on this board disagrees with you there may be a chance you are wrong.

Poker is gambling. Even if you play a +EV game you are still gambling. This is an important distinction which Miller Sklansky and Malmuth really drove home in SSH and that most posters here accept. And this isn't important just from a semantics perspective, it's also important to accept from a strategy perspective. Perhaps that's why you're getting such a strong response.

[MicroBob]

NYTimes article today on the slight downturn in the poker-fad.

It mentions Phil Gordon giving a speech before a bunch of stock-traders and evidently Gordon subscribes to the idea that if it's +EV it doesn't really count as gambling somehow.


From the article:

"I am not a professional gambler — I have never gambled a day in my life," said Mr. Gordon, who became a full-time poker player several years ago after he made about $2 million exercising stock options earned as a high-tech entrepreneur. "What I am is very similar to what you do. I'm a strategic investor."

"All I'm trying to do is get my money in and invest as often as I possibly can," he told his audience. "Every time I put $100 into the pot I expect to take $100 or more out."

The gambler reinvented as investor, shrewdly calculating expected values and other statistical realities, is one face of contemporary poker, and Mr. Gordon is an advocate of the game's new business-minded mantra.



NY Times article