Poker Blog and Poker Gossip

If you’ve ever thought that you needed performance enhancers to keep you on your game when you’re playing online poker, then maybe instead of drugs, you need better glasses. Much of the fatigue in online poker play is due to staring at a digital screen for hours at a time. A relatively new company called Gunnar Optiks might have just the performance enhancer you need to stay focused and awake without impairing your judgement or creating health risks. Their unique glasses are designed to filter out certain types of light, and to help prevent eye strain for people who spend hours in front of the screen.

According to Gunnar Optiks co-founder, Jennifer Michelsen explains that “Any digital device that is viewed in the near distance for long amounts of time will create digital eye fatigue. The smaller the screen, typically the closer the user puts it to the eye, and the more the eye will strain to see it over extended periods. “

Gunnar’s technology, known as i-AMP helps increase contrast much like shooter glasses. Comparing the Gunnar glasses to shooter glasses, Michelsen says “The difference is that Gunnar glasses are very specifically tuned to the type of light found in artificially lit environments and computer screens.”

According to Michelsen, most of Gunnar’s wearers will experience an immediate improvement in optical resolution, contrast, and detail. She says that over time, instead of fading, the effects actually increase, and that Gunnar advises customers to try the glasses out for at least a week before they try to gauge the results. Prices aren’t terrible either; you can pick up a pair online for around $100, as long as you don’t need a prescription. With a prescription, the price gets closer to $250, depending upon your frames.

If your eyes burn at the end of a long tournament, these glasses are definitely worth looking into.

On April 7, 2010 France passed an historic bill legalizing and
regulating online gambling, and that included poker.  At the time of the
bill passing people were very excited, as the legalization and taxation
of online poker would put online casino’s into a position of “legal,”
and on the same level as brick and mortar casinos in France.  French
residents were optimistic that the new law would diversify a largely
state run monopoly and give the French consumer more choice in where
they spend their money, while not worrying that what they were doing was
“illegal.”

Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to be how it all
turned out.  As of May 13th 2010 the new law has seen it’s first two
casualties.  As of May 13, both Betfair and Sportingbet (owners of
Paradise Poker) have pulled out of the French market sighting an
insurmountable tax burden and stiff state-run competition. Tim Phillips
(European Public Affairs Director @ Betfair) was quoted as saying  “We
are looking very hard at the French market and how we might operate
within the new licensed regime. Though it’s not impossible for a
newcomer to create a commercially viable business, most projections show
it will be very difficult to do so, given the proposed restrictions
imposed on licence holders.  French legislation will certainly benefit
the incumbent players and the ultimate loser will be the French
consumer. The new law does not adequately open the former monopoly’s
market to true competition from other operators. We hope that the
review, scheduled 18 months from now, will amend the law to address
these flaws.”

Currently in France the application process is
beginning without the full law being decided upon yet, but this much is
known: The industry will be brought in line with live casinos and horse
racing. Taxes will be levied on any licensed regulator so that two
percent of each poker bet and 7.5 percent of each sports or horse racing
bet will go directly to the French government. However, a portion of
those monies will be dedicated to gambling addiction programs.  No word
yet on the cost of the license, but typically these licenses cost a lot
of money up front, and then yearly to maintain. The bill also includes
provisions to address the issue of underage gambling and rooting out
criminal activities.

So, it seems to me that the holy grail of
American Online poker players may be a false hope. After France
legalized the practice, a whole slew of new problems arose.  Maybe
keeping it as a “don’t ask, don’t tell” operation is preferable to
shining a light on an imperfect industry.

I wrote recently about how with the introduction of the Ipad poker
clients for Iphones/Ipads is something that is inevitable.  Weather it’s
a major online poker room (like full tilt, Party or Pokerstars) or a
3rd party who develops the app and put it on there via jailbreak or
whatever still remains to be seen. 

It seems i misspoke.  I ignored the fact that the Iphone isn’t the only smart-phone out there. 
There are many different developers, with different major brands (LG,
Droid, Samsung Blackberry) and most of them each have their own app
store.  So, in ignoring that fact and focusing on the Iphones closed off
software store, i missed a whole market.  A market Casino-Online.com is
looking to corner, and i actually can’t believe it’s taken this long.

Casino-Online.com is not new in the mobile app business, and has been providing gambling
centric content for the market since the company’s early days. 
Currently their main focus is providing content instead of game play,
but that is changing rapidly.  Currently in the UK there are a lot of
online casino games already ready for smartphone use (note, “smartphone”
is not iphone..), and in the US Bodog poker is listed as a “mobile
casino” that is ready, but when i followed the link from Casino-Online
it just took me to the Bodog sign up page.  It could be because i’m in
Canada though.  Here is the Link (it also lists the links from the UK if you’re interested) (also, we are not affiliated wtih Casino-Online.com)

Casino-Online.com’s chief editor Jennifer Lefrack said ” Casino-online.com continues to innovate by not only following the market trends, but actually creating them. Our customers
are tech savvy and because they have 24/7 access on their smartphone, we
need to make sure we provide them instant, easily accessible
information.” 

So it seems that while Iphone may be lagging (purposefully?)
in the online casino bid, the major players are making moves to fix
that.  I know that if the Android app store is offering Full Tilt poker,
or a viable way to connect to Full Tilt, my next Phone will be an
Android capable phone.  Watch out Iphone, or get with the program!

Just because it’s the biggest online poker room in the world,
doesn’t mean expansion has to include more players or absorbing a
smaller online provider.  It looks like Pokerstars is set to broaden
the frontier of what an online poker room is all about.  Pokerstars has
recently acquired three of the most well respected poker blogs in the
industry, betting that branding and affiliating those poker rooms with
Pokerstars and providing players with a “one stop shop” to play and
read all about poker, 24 hours a day will pay off big time.  And
they’re probably right!  If you think for one second that Full Tilt
isn’t eyeing up the remaining major poker blogs, well, you haven’t been
watching the these two follow each others major moves over the years.

The three blogs purchased by Pokerstars are Pokerpages.com, PlaywinningPoker.com and Poker-Babes.com.  All three
have their own strengths, and specific information niches, and all
three have been providing solid poker related news since early 2000, if
not before.

PokerPages.com’s speciality lies with it’s
worldwide live tournament results archive.  Need to know who won a
tourney in 2002 for a prop bet?  Bet you’re going to Pokerpages.com.  It also houses an article database, and has over the years had articles written by T.J. Cloutier, Lou Krieger, Tommy Angelo, Mike Caro, and Andy Glazer.

PlaywinningPoker.com
is mostly about strategy.  The sites former owner (Steve Badger) says
“It’s about strategy, and none of that resume stuff guarantees anything
anyway! Keep in mind this site’s principal lesson: if you want to be a
winning player, you need to think and decide for yourself. Creative,
logical, sensible, situational thinking is key to winning. Even more,
it’s the key to winning big.”

Poker-Babes.com has evolved over
the years, but was originally started by a Bicycle Casino cocktail
waitress Shirley Rosario.  Her mission was to get the word out about
talented female poker players that had been overlooked.  While this
aspect of the site is still active, it’s main bankableresource is
personal profiles that Rosario has collected on poker players over the
years.  If you’re ever heading to a major live tournament and need to
have some idea of the opponents that you’re about to face, you’d do
well to head over to Poker-babes.com and have a read.

But the
question now is: what will be Full Tilts response?  Will they dismiss
it out of hand and concentrate on delivering superior game play instead
of attempting toacquire and manage an online blog community, or will
after seeing the value and the loyalty created by having a “community,”
put a bid in for 2+2?

I have been thinking about this for a little while now, but with the pending release of the Ipad, and the fact that Ipad and Iphone are virtually the same operating system, i’m wondering if we will soon see the major online poker companies release an app for the Ipad.

I’m Not Crazy

I realise that this has been talked about by many a fanboy – “wouldn’t it be SICK If i could play online poker while i’m on my commute, or waiting in line at the bank!” but the reason i’m bringing this up now is specifically because of the release of the IPad, and the updated Ipod OS 4 release coming this summer.  Why?  Because the Ipad isn’t a phone.  It is a tablet PC, that is meant to be portable, and have 3g capabilities (not the first version, but the IPad v2 release will), but at it’s core it’s a personal computer.  If i’m sitting in my chair, watching the wife watch a movie, and i’ve chosen my Ipad
instead of my laptop, i want to be able to play online poker with it. 
There is a market here, and I’m shocked to see that Full Tilt,
Pokerstars all haven’t yet pushed an app out….even to the Jailbroken community!

Why Ipad poker = Iphone poker

I say again, the Ipad and Iphone are both operating with the same operating system.  If the poker companies make an app for the IPad, you will likely be able to download it to your iphone
without too much hacking / messing with things most people are
comfortable messing with.  It could potentially open up a whole new
revenue / customer base for all of the major online poker / casino
groups and realistically it’s something most people i’ve spoken with are foaming at the mouth for.  So..where is it??

It’s
shocking that it’s taken this long, with the only online poker apps in
the app store being “Free” or poker tracking type software, but
hopefully an oasis ofonline poker while waiting for your wife to try that third outfit on in the changing room isn’t far away.  My fingers are crossed!

There are many nice thing about charity events.  Chief among them is the fact that you get to participate in a game that you love, and give back to a very good cause; lately there are no shortage of good causes to give to!  Also, there are the prizes.  Not typically a monetary prize, but with a well sponsored event, the swag you can potentially walk away with is usually worth it, if you’re in the giving mood!

With that in mind, Full Tilt has partnered with Pokergives.org for a $5 +$5 charity event taking place 2pm (ET) April 4th 2010 (Full Tilt Tournament ID: 137275439 Password “PokerNations”).  Pokergives.org is a non-profit organization that states on it’s website “No Board Members or Founding Members will receive a salary in the expectation that a minimum of 95% of all funds raised will reach the charities. All efforts will be made to keep the administrative costs of maintaining the site to 5% or less.”  The charities that Pokergives.org supports are: The Special Olympics, Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund, Paralyzed Veterans of America, and the Step by Step Foundation.

The Prizes
I talked up the prizes at the beginning of this article, and they are absolutely worth while; particularly when you factor in the fact that it’s a charity event.  The prizes range from poker sunglasses from Blue Shark Optics, a home game set from DB Dealer, a one-year subscription to Bluff Magazine, six months of poker coaching from Deuces Cracked, poker books, card protectors, a $200 gift certificate to Andrew Shirley and Company, and private coaching sessions with Johnson, Delk, PokerXFactor’s Chris “Fox” Wallace, and Michael “tuna_fish_tank” Stroh.  Entrants can also receive a one-month CardRunners Gold Subscription, Texas Hold’em strategy cards, a one-year membership to the Down to the Felt Club, a one-year subscription to Australia Poker Weekly, and a PMS PokerWear prize pack.

To be eligable for the prizes you need to go to the PokerNations Forums and post your Full Tilt user name in the associated thread.  After posting your info (note: you do not need to provide anything other than your user name!!), and most likely registering at the forum, you will receive a one month membership to the Down to the Felt Club (retail: $25).