Poker Blog and Poker Gossip

Holland may be the next country to go about legalizing online poker, following in the footsteps of France, Italy and the US. These plans were set in motion a year ago, when Holland had created the Jansen Committee, a group of legal experts, judges and political advisors, for the purpose of analyzing and reporting on the country’s existing gambling laws.

This report which was published recently recognized poker as a skill game and stated the Committee’s approval of the legalization of internet poker in the Netherlands. However, the report also clearly stated that any other forms of gambling such as online casino games like blackjack and roulette, bingo and sports betting should be left as they were and not legalized. The report also mentioned providing a limited number of permits to offshore internet gaming companies.

According to the report, “The Commission doubts that a single new entrant in the poker market will be able to capture a significant market share based on the illegal operators, and sees a monopoly and therefore an insufficient basis for a successful channeling. For this reason, the Commission recommends a new ‘Internet system’… explicitly designed to bring illegal poker operators under a legal regime…based on a limited number of permits given to a term.”

As per the existing laws the only form of sports betting permitted in Holland is via the De Lotto company. De Lotto currently enjoys a monopoly of sportsbetting and although its position and the Dutch government’s support of it was contested by Betfair and Ladbrokes, De Lotto still retains its stronghold in Holland’s betting market.

This announcement did not satisfy the Remote Gambling Association, a London trade organization that represents legal internet gaming companies in Europe and the UK. The RGA was not at all happy with Holland’s decision to hold back on legalizing online casinos and any other form of gambling. This decision will also allow De Lotto to retain its monopoly.

“This is clearly a missed opportunity to follow the same path as other jurisdictions, such as Denmark, which do not seek to discriminate against different forms of gambling and recognize that all are capable of being properly regulated,” stated Clive Hawkswood, RGA’s Chief Executive.

Sorel Mizzi, a well known poker professional, seems to have got his name tangled up in yet another alleged poker cheating scandal. The source of this alleged plot is an IM chat between Sorel Mizzi and Steve “thorladen” Weinstein posted on the TwoPlusTwo forum, where Mizzi (if the chat is indeed his) appears to be urging Weinstein to use a sort of business software tool to cheat at multi-table tournaments.

The TwoPlusTwo forum details this chat and gives several posts on the issue as well. The idea of the supposed Mizzi scam is to use software to link computers via remote access and create multiple accounts. In the chat, Mizzi appears to suggest the use of a tool which he describes as “revolutionizes teaching/ghosting in poker (and) can also be used for multi-accounting,” to break the terms and conditions on online gaming sites. Mizzi also allegedly suggests involving other poker players like Chris Dombrowski and Aditya Agarwal in the scam.

According to the chat, Mizzi then goes on to explain how to use the tool. “Now there’s more than 1 way we can profit from this program…the most obvious is just watching and taking over for your stakes when they’re deep in a tournament. The beauty of it is ur not logging in from another IP, all you’re doing is controlling their mouse and keyboard and they can take it over again right away with the click of a mouse.”

Weinstein who seems to be uninformed about this makes this response: “while im certainly interested in whatever u thinking, if u want me in, but obviously I have to know who knows cuz I cant get busted… I have a lot of money online.”

The thread has spiked rumors about Sorel Mizzi and a cheating scandal, which led Mizzi to come right out and defend himself by posting a long reply in the same thread.

Mizzi also known as “Imper1um” claims that the chat is a fabrication of old conversations he has had. “The conversation in question contains bits and pieces of information from several conversations I’ve had with Thorladen and others over the course of about a year.” He also claimed that he had once been blackmailed by an extortionist who threatened to release the chat, which he did not take seriously.

After Daniel Negreanu called Annie Duke a “F**king C**t” in an interview, there has been a lot of backlash for Negreanu and support for Ms. Duke. The incident has been discussed by several poker news websites, podcasts and poker shows like This Week in Poker, all of whom agree that Negreanu had indeed overstepped the line when he used the most derogatory term and sexual reference to refer Annie Duke, a poker professional.

PokerStars however, does not seem to be taking a stand against Negreanu’s usage of the C word and made this statement: “Although Daniel Negreanu is a Team PokerStarsPro, he is an entity to himself and as such will always be encouraged to express his views and speak his mind as he would otherwise do so, PokerStars Pro or not.”

Duke took offense at PokerStars’ statement and their failing to condemn his use of the C word to refer to her and wrote them an open letter. “..This response condones its star player calling a female poker player a “f**king c**t” in public, she said.

In her letter, Duke questioned if PokerStars would have the same attitude and fail to denounce Negreanu’s behavior if Negreanu had made a derogatory racial remark against African Americans or an insulting anti-gay statement in an interview.

“This is not about his (Negreanu’s) views. It is about a particular word he chose to express those views. The word “c**t” is not an opinion, it is an abusive epithet, and PokerStars is completely ignoring the use of that term in their response,” Duke said.

PokerStars have only just created The Women’s Poker League and if the site fails to take a stand against the use of such language by one their prime endorsers, it may juts be possible that the poker community could end up thinking that the site shares Negreanu’s views on insulting women with the C word in public interviews. “PokerStars had an opportunity here to take a stand and express regret that Daniel would say such an offensive thing and failed to do so,” said Duke.

The only good thing that has come out from it is the resulting spike of publicity for both Duke and Negreanu, giving them good hits on all their sites and blogs.

In a recent interview Bwin’s CEO, Norbert Teufelberger expressed his personal opinions and stated that both PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker were “operating illegally” in the US. He also said that Bwin’s pulling out of the US in the year 2006 could turn out to be the “biggest mistake” both he and his co-CEO Manfred Bodner have made, if the US permitted PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker to continue business in the country.

“We pulled out, they didn’t. But we’ll see who was right in the end. We still believe we were correct and it’s pretty clear cut,” Teufelberger stated.

After the US e-gaming laws changed in 2006, companies like Bwin pulled out of the US market in order to avoid lawsuits, while PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker held on to their positions and continued operations. Today, both PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker have become the top two gaming companies in the world, which according to Bwin CEO, Norbert Teufelberger, is in no way a coincidence.

“There are only two companies in the world who are stronger in poker than us, and they are only stronger because they still operate in the US. It’s not because they have premier marketing skills or premier technology, what they have is hundreds of millions of dollars from what we see as an illegal market,” Norbert Teufelberger commented.

Indeed, while many speculate on the legal standing of these two poker companies PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker, it must be said that any decision to provide them with US gaming licenses will have to be a carefully considered decision. Should the companies be found to have been operating illegally, it would not do to reward them with US permits to provide gaming services to American players.

Teufelberger believes that the US government will freeze out the two sites, which continued operations in the US despite gaming regulations and the UIGEA. “We would expect that once the US regulates these two companies will not have access to the market, and once that happens we’ll then see who the leader will be. They say they’re not operating illegally but I think they are. Let’s see who is right,” he added.

Daniel Negreanu shocked the poker community with his comments about Annie Duke, when he called her a “F***ing C***” in a public interview. Although Duke has been known to have occasionally rubbed people the wrong way on account of her strong personality and has been the subject of criticism by many, Negreanu’s choice of words has left poker fans all across the world quite disappointed in him. Some have even called the player a misogynist.

Ms. Duke, a poker champion in her own right, has starred on the show Celebrity Apprentice and is known for her charity work in Darfour. Negreanu made these remarks in response to a question related to the Ladies WSOP, which recently permitted men to attend Apparently, Negreanu was incensed at the use of tampon shaped clips as card holders and Shaun Deeb who wore a dress to the event. Duke was supposed to have commended the players on getting into the spirit of things ands said, ‘Good for you, men, standing up for sexual equality.’ Negreanu called her words “baloney,” and told his interviewer that duke had later posted a statement on her blog where she claimed that the Ladies WSOP should have been abolished. Negreanu did not like this any more than he approved of her website message and said, “What irked me is that this woman has the audacity on her website to call herself ‘the best female poker player in the world’. So on one side of the coin she’s fighting for, ‘Oh, we’re all equal, there shouldn’t be any gender thing,’ but when appropriate she decides to call herself the best female poker player in the world.

So I’m like ‘how offensive are you, you f***ing c***? You want to say you’re speaking for women, yet you claim superiority over all of them.”

Negreanu is known to be a bit of “big mouth” and has fallen under public criticism for some other comments related to racism that he had made concerning the BET channel. What this mouth off will cost him is yet to be seen.

Kevin Stani, a Norwegian poker player appears to have decimated his opponents at the European Poker Tour (EPT) held in Tallinn, Estonia knocking out more than four of the final table players including Arnaud Mattern, the noted French poker player.

Fans of Arnaud Mattern were excited to see that the Frenchman had a good chip lead in the early part of the day and estimated that he would the EPT that day, especially since he already has got one EPT win to his name. However, Mattern’s luck ran out as he played the turn and the river which saw him drop from his first place lead to third place, while Konstantin Bilyauer, a Russian poker player took second.

Should he have won the EPT 2010 held in Tallinn, Arnaud Mattern would have made poker history as the first player to have won two EPT titles. Instead, it was Kevin Stani who took home the honors adding €400,000 to his poker bankroll.

When the day began, Arnaud Mattern was in the lead and he was closely followed by Konstantin Bilyauer. Stani progressed steadily surely and eventually ousted both of them from their comfort zones before he took the first. Stani increased his bankroll while removing players like Dmitry Vitkind and Steven van Zadelhoff from the game. Zadelhoff was pushed into sixth place when he left the game and was quickly followed by Dmitry Vitkind, whose earning qualified him for fourth place.

Konstantin Bilyauer took in €250,000 and came in second while Arnaud Mattern fell in to third place with €160,000 in winnings.

Other players who placed in the money included Dmitry Vitkind who took in €120,000, Mikko Jaatinen who ended up earning €80,000 and Steven van Zadelhoff who only won €63,000. Other noted players were Nicolo Calia and Bassam Elnajjar both of whom took in less than €50,000, with Calia earning €47,000 and Elnajjar getting €47,000.

The next EPT will be held at Vilamoura, Portugal.