[revlis87]

As someone who knows some of the teenage young poker players personally and others by word of mouth from the ones I do know I will say the following. A lot of the "balla" stuff has really calmed down in the last 6 months or year. People spent wildly when they made the first 100 k or whatever it was but once the reality of decreased earning potential (relative to the party days, etc) and taxes and all that stuff took hold, a lot of us have started to think long term. I'm not sure how many of us really are investing well - but most if not all of the players I know who have been around for 2-3 years are semi-intelligent with their money and are thinking about the future. In a sense, natural selection has already rid the poker world of a lot of the real degens who ran up big bankrolls and the rest of us are learning slowly but surely about the opportunity we had.

I remember I was in Paris for the WPT in summer 2006 and an old, friendly live poker pro who I think has been around for awhile told me something along the lines of "kid, you have the whole world in your hand. don't [censored] it up." It's stuck with me for a long time.