From today's Wall Street Journal

[sixsixtie]

anybody have the full article?

[Grasshopp3r]

Yes, he has been soliciting poker hands for a long time. http://www.pokernomics.com/index.htm

This was from May 3.

http://www.freakonomics.com/blog/

Those of you who’ve been reading this blog for a while, and especially those of you who play poker, may remember a research project called Pokernomics, which is meant to determine what makes a person a good (or bad) poker player.

Lately, the question has become more than an academic one. As explained in this morning’s Wall Street Journal:

The skill debate has been a preoccupation in poker circles since September, when Congress barred the use of credit cards for online wagers. Horse racing and stock trading were exempt, but otherwise the new law hit any “game predominantly subject to chance.” Included among such games was poker, which is increasingly played on Internet sites hosting players from all over the world.

There has since been a strong pushback from a group called the Poker Players Alliance, which recently held an exploratory conference at the Harvard Faculty Club — replete with Harvard faculty like law professor Charles Nesson, who hopes to, as he puts it, “legitimate poker.”

The article, written by Neil King Jr., is a very interesting one — although I do wish it explained the real dynamics of the online poker debate, which, as I understand it, primarily concern the lack of taxation and regulation. The luck vs. skill thing, in other words, is more of a fancy fig leaf than anything.

Anyhow, the article is well worth a read, even if you don’t know a thing about poker. In fact, the article assumes that you may not know a thing about poker:

Poker is at heart a betting game in which players compete against one another for a growing pot of money. Players win either by getting the others to fold their cards or by having the best hand, ranked according to a hierarchy.

(If I were a betting man, I would bet that those sentences were added or requested by King’s editor.)

King’s article also links to the blog written by Annie Duke, a poker champion and, let’s not forget, a rock-paper-scissors champion, too. Duke offers a simple but compelling argument (attributed to David Sklansky and Duke’s brother Howard Lederer) for poker as a game of skill and not purely chance.

The gist is this: forget about winning at poker, and think for a moment about losing. Is it possible to intentionally lose a poker game?

The answer is yes, of course. Is it possible, meanwhile, to intentionally lose a game like Baccarat or roulette or craps?

No, it’s not — which means that you have no control over the outcome, which means that they are entirely games of chance. And which means, in Duke’s argument, that poker, therefore, is not.

[ocdscale]

[ QUOTE ]
The gist is this: forget about winning at poker, and think for a moment about losing. Is it possible to intentionally lose a poker game?

[/ QUOTE ]

This is a very strong argument because it goes into the heart of the game, which is not what cards you get, but how you bet when you get them.

[MicroBob]

there are some blackjack and video-poker games that can't be beaten in the long-term even with advantage play.
Yet it is still extremely easy to intentionally lose at these games.
A 'skilled' player simply loses less, that's all.

But since playing perfect strategy can't beat the game either i'm not sure if that makes these games-of-skill or not.

[fishyak]

And actually, that is the argument I prefer. Lots of hands end WITHOUT a showing of hole cards. How is winning those hands a game of chance?

And one argument not from the article. Why is it that the pro's consistently place better in the poker tournaments than the amateurs? If made subject to statistical testing, the only answer would be skill.

[neverforgetlol]

Obviously it is skill or no one could make a living off of it, they and everyone else would be breakeven (ignoring rake).

[mingorama]

Would love to see Howard Lederer issue an open challenge to anyone that doesn't believe Poker involves skill.

[blueflame]

[ QUOTE ]
will poker follow the same fate as blackjack? Will the game HAVE to be changed, for the worse, the same way blackjack had to be changed to "save" it? Your views?

[/ QUOTE ]

nay, bj is against the house, bro.

[jbrent33]

[ QUOTE ]
Would love to see Howard Lederer issue an open challenge to anyone that doesn't believe Poker involves skill.

[/ QUOTE ]

In the Stu Ungar biography there is mention of Billy Baxter fighting a court battle with reguard to the amount of taxes withheld from his tournament winnings. He sued and said he should not be taxed at the same rate as a lottery winner, but rather a professional (doctor, lawyer etc.). According to Cardplayer, the appeals court judge said, "I find the government's argument ludicrous, I wish you had some money and could sit down and play poker with Mr. Baxter."

[GTL]

[ QUOTE ]
Obviously it is skill or no one could make a living off of it, they and everyone else would be breakeven (ignoring rake).

[/ QUOTE ]

this is not necessarily the case. does the house require skill when they spread roulette?