[VitoT]

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Spoken like someone who doesn't play for a living.

What's so bad about playing to make money? Why should "pride" have anything to do with anything? Even if it IS about ego, isn't money the score of the game, and therefore the one making the most money is still winning?

To say "it's all about money" as a BAD thing makes no sense to me.

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I do play for a living, for almost an year now, and making a very good living out of it, and of course this is a big bonus for me, but i'm not planning to do this for the rest of my life, i owe poker a lot of my economics skills, and some other ones, but i just don't like the general community involved. I play only cash games on online poker, but planning to move to europe soon, so i will play sometimes live too, maybe the big tournaments also.
And that's the problem of the game, you think money is all that matters, for sure it is a part of it, that's maybe the reason some chess players moved to it, but it is not all.
until those kiddies keep thinking of the game like it's only for money, it won't ever have a reputation of a real sport, cause they will always be afraid of playing the best.
You can't compare it to tennis, or golf, cause there are the best competing the best and not avoiding them, and the rise of many online players was pre-legislation, and i'm not sure they been there if they started to play after (i'm talking mostly about players up to 10/20 who dropped out of it). The pride issue for me is not that important, but i'm talking about real competition and challenge. If you talk to Roger Federer, or some other athlet about what they are doing, they will talk about anything but the "money they are making", they will talk about it just if they getting asked to, but it isn't there goal in life.
the thing is i never thought like that, and i do think that online players do have mathematical abilities, probably better then the live players abilities, but they are just so bad in other aspects, which i found are maybe more important, and that's why i think the best players are the live proffesionals.