Poker Author's Challenge Tournament: Binion's, January 21

Just a little shameless self-promotion here folks. I want to invite each and every reader to take part in the Poker Author's Challenge in mid January in Las Vegas.

This will be your chance to play with your favorite poker authors, get autographed copies of your favorite poker books, meet and greet the authors on hand, and have a wonderful time in the process.

I'm going to be there, and I hope you will too. We expect this event to be at least as enjoyable as the Poker Author's Challenge held in March 2006 at the Taj Mahal in Atlantic City.

Won't you join us?

Will Party Poker Return to the US Market?

The season between Christmas and New Years is traditionally a slow one where news is concerned, except for Party Gaming. They’re the ones making all the news this week, and they’re even the source of a major rumor.

Party Acquires Empire’s Assets
PartyGaming is set to acquire Empire’s assets in a deal to be announced shortly. The acquisition values Empire's gaming assets at between thirty- and forty-million also provides an out for Noam Lanir, Empire’s founder and CEO.

Lanir has been looking to get out of the online gaming business for some time now, and this deal provides him the means to do so.

Party’s Revenues on the Upswing
PartyGaming appears to be recovering from the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act’s (UIGEA) impact, as Party sources say they are beginning “…to see improvements in a number of its key performance indicators.”
Their daily poker revenue is averaging $721,000, up from a low of $637,000 immediately after enactment of UIGEA, which led to a radical restructuring of the company and 945 jobs lost in the process.

Party’s marketing direction changed dramatically since enactment of UIGEA, with comprising 80 percent of total new sign ups and 67 percent of gross daily revenue coming from Europe. Prior to UIGEA, Party’s revenue stream and player base was heavily American.

Is Party Planning a Return to the American Market?
That’s the rumor of the day. “Unconfirmed reports" in the media have PartyGaming returning to the American market they exited after the October 13 passage of UIGEA. PartyGaming and other publicly traded gaming stocks suffered huge price drops immediately after the law’s passage and hurriedly left the US market, which was their main source of business. Many private companies have continued to offer online poker and casino gambling to the US market and have seen their business grow sharply in the period following UIGEA’s passage.

Will Party conclude that they left the US market too soon? Will they seek to return to the United States and try to recapture their once formidable player base? After all, the majority of new acquisitions since October 13 by privately held US facing online poker operators are probably former Party customers. If they do return to the US market, just how many players will drop their new associations and come back to Party? Some will. But others won’t.

I won’t even venture a guess. Actually, I don’t know whether Party plans another about face and a run at the US market. It’s just a rumor at this point, and no one is confirming anthing. Only time will tell.

Update on the Jamie Gold, Crispin Leyser $6 million dispute

The last few weeks have not been particularly kind to 2006 World Series of Poker champ Jamie Gold. He lost his father to ALS (Lou Gehrig's disease) recently, and in a case related to his 2006 WSOP victory, U.S. District Court Judge Roger Hunt turned down his motion to remove the injunction that’s freezing half of his $12 million win.

The injunction is part of a $6 million lawsuit filed by Crispin Leyser (pictured along with Jamie is better days), who alleges that Gold – who was sponsored by Bodog – agreed to split any WSOP winnings with him. To earn this split, Leyser would be required to find celebrities to would wear Bodog logo gear while they played in the tournament. Leyser succeeded in this, arranging for “Scooby-Doo” star Mathew Lillard and comedian Dax Shepard to wear Bodog hats and shirts.

Gold claimed half of his $12 million first prize at the conclusion of the tournament, but the disputed $6 million remains with the WSOP’s host site, the Rio Hotel and Casino, pending the outcome of this dispute or a release of the injunction.

Leyser’s most compelling evidence is a voice mail of Gold promising to pay Leyser half on anything he wins. When Gold refused to pay his share, Leyser went to court and secured an injunction to freeze $6 million of the total $12 first place prize.

In his defense, Gold claims he only intended to give some — but not half — of his winnings to Leyser. Leyser subsequently filed an affidavit stating that his arrangement with Gold was a binding business deal, not a gift.

Judge Roger Hunt refused to lift the injunction, saying, "His [Gold's] actions, in the court's view, do not give the plaintiff [Leyser] much assurance that the money would, in fact, be available in the event of a judgment in his favor."

He then added that, "The likelihood of success weighs on the side of the plaintiff [Leyser]," a strong sign that Leyser is likely to win his claim for the disputed $6 million.
While Leyser's lawyers hailed the judge's decision and got in one last dig at Gold when David Chesnoff commented, "We're pleased with this result because it prevents the money from being squandered by someone who admits he didn't keep his promise."

Patrick Byrne, who represents Jamie Gold, claims to be, "Disappointed, yes, but not surprised."

One point of agreement was to have the judge move the disputed $6 million into an interest-bearing account for the duration of the case. Even at a paltry four percent annually, that’s not chump change; it’s more than a quarter million a year.

Happy holidays

Merry
Christmas
Everyone.....

Why it's important for the WSOP accept third-party registrations in 2007

Let me begin this post by stating that I like Gary Thompson and applaud the World Series of Poker for managing to run events that have grown much larger than any of us would ever have imagined only a few years ago, and even though they may have stumbled along the way, at the end of the day Harrah’s deserves more kudos than complaints.

What Gary Thompson said in a recent interview
Nevertheless, when you’re wrong, you’re wrong. In an interview conducted with PokecetFives.com, WSOP Communications Director Gary Thompson said:

"As in 2005 and 2006, Harrah’s will not be accepting third-party registrations from online poker sites (.com’s) that do business with U.S. residents. PokerStars.com and PartyPoker.com could not register players directly last year because they did business with American customers. Ladbrokes could because it wasn’t doing business with U.S. residents.”

Why his statement is not true
This is just not the case. I personally witnessed one online site that did plenty of business with U.S. customers register 75 players for an event. Just to make sure I hadn't seen an isolated incident, I confirmed my findings with one of the higher-ups in Harrah’s who assured me that third party registrations were commonplace last year and the year before, and that the majority of entrants into the WSOP main event were handled as third-party registrations.

Why does it matter?
Why is this important? The predicted size of the playing field goes a long way toward setting exhibit space prices at the exposition and lifestyle show that sets up shop alongside the WSOP main event. Another reason it’s important is that until and unless Harrah’s decides on whether they will accept third-party registrations for 2007, the size of the field for the main event will be as up-in-the-air as their own predictions — and they are saying the field will range anywhere between 2,000 and 12,000 players, which isn’t really a prediction at all.

Why third-party registrations are critical to the success of thw WSOP's main event
What I do know is that unless online sites can register players via the third-party route as they did last year and the year before, or can register them through some sort of subterfuge that will operate in lieu of a third-party registration, there’s little reason for them to run WSOP satellites. It’s on thing, after all, to provide a prepaid registration to an online satellite winner along with, say, airfare, a hotel room for a few days, plus while having to hope he books his flight to Las Vegas, checks into a hotel, and spends $10,000 of his winnings to enter the WSOP’s main event.

I wouldn’t think that more than one-third of players would actually enter the WSOP if they were given cash instead of a prepaid entry. Most would spend their money in the real world, rather than in a poker tournament. Moreover, with the kibosh being put on logo wear and other means of publicizing online sites, what is an online site’s motivation to serve as a feeder system for the WSOP, especially if they are precluded from taking a booth at the lifestyle show and using it as a means to recruit new online players and meet and greet any and all customers that might be attending the WSOP in person?

Only two more poker-playing days until Christmas; no more fibs, please
Right now there are only two poker playing days until Christmas and Santa is diligently watching everyone. So unless you want a lump of coal in your stocking, it doesn’t pay to tell fibs this time of year.

Russia enacts stiff anti-gambling laws

In a move designed to restrict, regulate, and control gambling, the Russian Duma passed legislation outlawing online gaming, and limiting land based casino gambling to four designated areas.

The bill is expected to gain approved in the upper house of Russia’s parliament and then be signed into law by president Putin. The bill passed in the Duma by a wide margin, receiving 428 of the 450 votes cast in the lower house.

The four designated gambling zones will be located at purpose-built resorts aimed at the tourist trade. According to the Russian news agency Tass, one of these resorts will be close to the Chinese border and positioned to attract Chinese tourists.

The Russian gambling policies are among the most restrictive in the world, with Russian authorities arguing that these regulations are required to counter a rapidly growing, illegal industry.

The new laws are slated to take effect in 2009.

These laws will seemingly drive Russian gambling underground, in much the same way as the Unlawful Internet Gaming Enforcement Act (UIGEA) seems to be doing in the United States. One big difference is that UIGEA did not criminalize online gaming, while the Russian law appears to make online gaming illegal, as well as any land-based gambling activities outside of the four designated areas.

Harrah's -- and the World Series of Poker -- to be sold

Harrah’s Entertainment, Inc, the world’s largest casino company, entered into a buyout agreement with private equity groups Apollo Management and Texas Pacific.

An official announcement on the deal, rumored to be $16.7 billion, is very close to completion and could be announced as early as today.

Published reports state that spokespersons for Harrah’s, Apollo, and Texas Pacific declined to comment.

This deal values Harrah’s at $90 per share, which was higher than the $87 per share offered by Penn Nation Gaming, a racetrack and casino operator interested in acquiring Harrah’s.

Once the ink is dry and the deal closes, questions about the World Series of Poker will be subject to debate and rumor. If the new owners believe Harrah’s is worth more parted out than in one piece, they could very well entertain bids for the WSOP from bidders around the world.

One outcome of this scenario might be moving the WSOP to Macao or some other emerging gaming location, if not permanently, than for the next few years, in order to spur gaming interest there.

The future of the WSOP is all speculation at this point, but there is no shortage of interesting scenarios that one might speculate about in the course of the next few months.

Spain allows online wagering

The land rush toward legalized online gaming continues, with Spain declaring that they will allow online gaming.

Italy’s revenues from legal wagering are approximately 30 billion Euros, and Spain anticipates a similar cash flow.
Licenses will include regulations to prevent the participation of problem gamblers and underage punters.

Most of the major European-facing online-poker concerns are expected to apply for Spanish licensing, as Spain joins the majority of nations following the UK model of licensing, regulating, and taxing online gaming, rather than trying to prohibit it as the US has done.

Poker Players Alliance to develop strong local presence in 2007

At the recent blogger’s get together in Las Vegas, Randy Lau of the Poker Players Alliance, told me they are making a concerted effort to develop a strong local presence, and they are searching for state, regional, and local representatives to raise awareness and recruit members.

"We felt it was important that we have a strong local, regional and state organization that can press the agenda at home when their (Congressional representatives) are back in their local jurisdictions," said Michael Bolcerek, the president of the PPA. "They can work with local media that might be more interested in speaking with a local member of the Poker Players Alliances than with myself."

The Alliance will count on their regional representatives to help build membership. The PPA has grown to 135,000 in the past year. Bolcerek hopes continued growth and a strong local flavor to the organization will give the PPA some clout with incoming Congressional leaders.

"It gives us the opportunity to look at specific districts and members of Congress and to build our membership specifically around those targeted districts," Bolcerek said. "If someone's on the fence in regards to a poker exemption, our membership can then ask that member of Congress more actively to support our agenda."

The PPA is hopeful that legislators that are more willing to listen. Rep. Jim Leach (R-Iowa), a 15-term member of the House of Representatives who championed the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act, lost his reelection bid by less than 6,000 votes. Many industry observers, including the PPA, gambling law expert I. Nelson Rose, and this reporter, attribute Leach’s defeat to his position e on Internet gambling.

PPA members interested in becoming local, regional or state representatives can learn more by visiting the Poker Players Alliance at http://www.pokerplayerrsalliance.org.

South Africa prepares to legalize and regulate online gaming

Count the Republic of South Africa among the nations planning to legalize and regulate online gambling, rather than prohibit it.

A draft bill approved by the South African Cabinet will legalize online gambling if it is enacted into law. Provincial governments are concerned about losing a tax revenue source since online gambling is available via online casinos, online poker rooms, and bookmakers.

According to South African trade and industry deputy director-general Astrid Ludin, the key challenge is to effectively regulate all internet gambling and also how to put in place mechanisms to prevent money-laundering.

The Trade and Industry ministry evaluated other national approaches toward regulating online gambling, including the UK and the US, eventually deciding that regulation was a better option than prohibition.

Party Poker's Revenue Is Now On the Rise

PartyGaming’s revenues have stabilized following the passage of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act. According to Party sources, gross daily poker revenues now average $721,000, following a low of $637,000 immediately after UIGEA was enacted. Once America’s largest online poker room, Europe now comprises 80 percent of new sign ups and 6 percent of gross daily revenue

How do you say, "What's your screen name, dude" in Chinese?

The Internet Society of China (ISC) confirmed that China plans to adopt a "real-name” system for blogs, and has forwarded a study report to the Ministry of Information for comment.

Requiring bloggers to use their real names, they believe, benefits the healthy development of Internet blogs, because “Some have used blogs to disrupt social order and harmed the interests of the majority.”

China Internet Network Information Centre (CINIC), reports there are more than 17.5 million bloggers in the country, with an aggregate audience of 75 million.

While many expressed concern that using real names is contrary to the open spirit of the Internet, China insiders think freedom of speech should always be responsible and that the system could still allow a choice of online names, as long as there is “…respect for privacy and an understanding that leaking personal information should be punished severely.”

A bloggers' convention in China last May resulted in a declaration of responsibilities and obligations for bloggers as well as a codes of ethics and principles. Since then, many bloggers on www.sina.com.cn now use their real names.

It’s a different world in China. Once online poker becomes a reality there, I wonder if players will be encouraged to use their real names as their online screen handles, or whether they will be completely anonymous, as players are all across the rest of the world?

Season 3 of High Stakes Poker begins January 15

The Game Show Network announced that "High Stakes Poker" will air on January 15 with new players at the table, such as Phil Ivey and 2006 World Series of Poker Main Event winner Jamie Gold.

A total of 14 new players have been added to those who played during the show’s first two seasons. The players enter these cash games with their own money, buying in from a minimum of $100,000 to $1 million.

Commentators Gabe Kaplan (pictured left) and AJ Benze will provide game analysis, with Kaplan taking his turn at the table for some games this season.

The third season will emanate from the South Point Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. It will show at 9 p.m. each Monday night.

"Poker" become the most searched-for term on Lycos

“Poker” is the most often searched term on Lycos, beating out “MySpace” for first place.

Lycos, in a news release, said that Clay Aiken was the Web’s most-searched man and Pamela Anderson was the most-searched woman. While I don’t doubt that, I wonder whether Pam’s high search quotient will drop, now that she’s no longer involved in the poker business, and anyone seeking her out on Lycos would have to be interested in her for other reasons.

The Lycos Top-10 Search Terms for 2006 were: Poker; MySpace; RuneScape; Pamela Anderson; Paris Hilton; Pokemon; WWE; golf; spyware and Britney Spears.

The Top-10 speaks volumes about our culture, taste, and collective interest, though I wonder if the same people searching “poker” and “golf” were also desperately seeking “MySpace,” “Pamela,” “Paris Hilton,” and “Britney?”
And for what it’s worth, search activity for President George W. Bush dropped 17 percent from last year, while 40 percent more web searches were directed to World Cup soccer than the war in Iraq.

The Ballad of Iggy the Blogfather

Someone wrote and sang a terrific song about the Blogfather, Iggy, giving up his Guinness and Poker blog. Actually he didn't give the blog up, he just moved over to Poker Works. You can still read iggy at http://pokerworks.com/, and you can listen to the Ballad of Iggy at http://youtube.com/watch?v=XY9a_GW9MVo.

Go do both. You'll enjoy it. I guarantee it.

Bodog kills their US advertising to focus on Europe and Asia

Bodogpoker.com announced cancellation of all of its U.S. television, radio, magazine and newspaper advertising a few days ago, though they will continue to serve U.S. players.

Instead, they plan to focus on the European and Asian markets. Bodog.com founder Calvin Ayre said that "the recent legislation passed by the US Congress was the reason behind the decision", and that it created "current uncertainties in the U.S. market."

Ayre added, "We couldn't be better positioned to build upon our current success and growth and to continue our aggressive push toward international expansion into markets such as Europe and Asia."

The message here is that another site is positioning itself to attack the burgeoning Asian market that will be unveiled with the coming of numerous land-based casinos in Macao. Savvy observers have even predicted that Macao’s future may well be a gambling destination larger than Las Vegas.

When you think about the future of Macao, you have to realize that it is positioned on China’s doorstep, a nation with 1.3 billion people with a love of gaming built deeply into the very fabric of their culture. The Chinese middle class is growing, and that emerging middle class has sufficient disposable income to support a Macao bigger than most of us can imagine.

Bloggers Invade Las Vegas

Iggy Gives Me the Hammer
I’m wearing a small gold pin in the shape of a hammer on my jacket, signifying that I’m officially part of the poker bloggers group that’s here in Las Vegas for the winter World Poker Bloggers Tournament, which is more a get-together of poker bloggers who eagerly read each other’s stuff and love poker and frivolity -- in which order, I’m not sure -- than it is a conference or anything else with overtones that serious.

Regardless of the reason, there are 90 or so folks her for this event that culminates in a tournament today at Caesar’s Palace, if it hadn’t already culminated in a terrific lunch Friday at the Wynn, and some private poker games at the MGM, where our tables were adjacent to the bar, so players could partake in drinking and playing with equal gusto.

Iggy, the “Blogfather of Poker” famous for his uberposts on his site Guinness and Poker, gave my pin to me. Iggy is the O’Hare Airport of poker blogs; all poker blog traffic seems to run through him and he is constantly redirecting his readers to other blogs and he is always a wonderful read.

Lunching With the Literati
My radio broadcast partner, Amy Calistri, was there as was Tim Lavalli, our guest this past Thursday on Keep Flopping Aces, which airs weekly on www.holdemradio.com at 9:00 PM EST. I would up sitting next to Tim, Amy, Richard “The Quiet Lion” Brodie, Michael Craig who wrote a marvelous book about the ultra high stakes games between Texas gazillionaire Andy Beal and a consortium of top Las Vegas pros that included Jennifer Harman, Todd Brunson, Ted Forrest and others that were euphemistically referred to as the “Corporation,” Dan Michalski from Pokerati, and Randy Lau from the Poker Player’s Alliance.

Hundreds of Ersatz Elvises On the Loose
The Las Vegas marathon is Sunday, but when I got up Saturday morning and went across the street to Starbucks, I must have passed 30 people or more all dressed up in Santa Claus suits and participating in some sort of charity run or walk that was associated with the marathon. I never thought I’d see Santa Claus outnumber ersatz Elvises (is the plural Elvi?) in Las Vegas, but the folks in the Santa suits outnumbered the Elvis Impersonators five-fold.

Between the marathoners, the ersatz Santas, and all the cowboys in town for the Rodeo and partying loudly in every casino I went into, Las Vegas was so crowded that our small-by-comparison group of bloggers might have escaped attention altogether unless you happened by the right bar at the right time and wondered why they were running out of Guinness.

Caught in a Time Warp and Reduced to Dial-up Access
I’m staying downtown in Binions, rather than across the street at the Golden Nugget where I usually stay, and had forgotten that Binions does not have high speed internet access, so I’m not even going to bother with the dial up access available here, and I’ll wait to post all this stuff until I get home. Ever since they wired my neighborhood with fiber optic cable and I switched from cable modem to a fiber optic connection, I’ve become incredibly spoiled about online connectivity, which is incredibly funny when I realize how happy I was way back when I was able to upgrade to what was then a blazingly fast 56k dial-up modem, and it wasn’t all that long ago.

Early Elimination From the Tournament
aturday was the big day — the poker tournament — and I had some gifts to give. I brought a copy of Poker For Dummies to be awarded to the first player eliminated from the event. I almost won it myself, which would have been really embarrassing. I think I was the second player eliminated. I also brought Secrets the Pros Won’t Tell You About Winning Hold’em Poker, and my newest book, The Rules of Poker: Essentials For Every Game, that is just about to hit the bookstore shelves. Those two books were a gift to the player who knocked me out of the tournament.

I lost a number of chips when my pocket queens fell to pocket kings, lost some more chips when my pocket kings fell to a set. I was finally eliminated when I flopped a flush draw with Ac-10c and never was able to spike either an ace or a club.

A Long Lunch With Nolan and Rich; $2-$5 No-Limit Hold'em at Caesar's
I really wanted to keep playing that tournament, but I couldn’t. So I did the next best thing. I went to lunch with Nolan Dalla. Lunch with Nolan usually gets pretty philosophical, and this was no exception. Rich Korbin was in town and he joined us as we were about midway through the meal, which put three long-winded guys at the same table for quite some time.

Finally we were talked-out and went off to play $2-$ no-limit in the poker room at Caesar’s palace. If you’ve not been to this poker room, it is very quiet, set off away from the rest of the casino and reached by a passage leading behind the sportsbook. There’s loads of room between tables, very comfortable seating, and it’s an incredibly relaxing room.

Nolan and I each won about $600 when the game broke up. Rich was at another table, so I don’t know how he did, but he stayed and continued to play as they combined the remnants of our broken table and filled the empty seats at his table.

I had taken a cab up to Caesar’s earlier in the day instead of driving, and Nolan was kind enough to drop me off at Binions, which by then was a cowboy-crazed madhouse, full of rodeo fans in full alcoholic frenzy, whooping it up on the last night of their stay in town.

I was too tired for any more fun so I crawled off to sleep, awakened at 6:00 in the morning and headed off to Palm Desert. Instead of taking the Interstate that’s always crowded with Sunday going-home traffic, I took the cut off to Cima and went through Amboy — the nearly untraveled, back way through the desert.

Captured
Somewhere between Amboy and 29 Palms, on a two-lane road that cuts through the midst of a very unpopulated stretch of desert and has almost no traffic anytime, I never saw the CHP officer on the side of the road until his flashing lights caught my attention. I was ticketed for doing 80 in a 55 mph zone, which will commit me to a future Saturday in traffic school to atone for my sins. Just one last bad-beat, I suppose.

I guess I’m fortunate he clocked me doing 80; I usually run it up a lot faster than that on a nice, dry, deserted desert road in the middle of nowhere and a couple of years ago I was cited for doing 100 on the same road.

I arrived home tired and run down. I turned on the TV, fell asleep in front of a football game and awakened in time to see the San Diego Chargers look like the best team in the league and LaDanian Tomlinson look like the best back since Walter Payton, if not the best all-purpose back ever, as he set the single season mark for touchdowns with three regular season games still to go.

I'm Going Back For More
The bloggers get-together was about as much fun as you can have doing things that are legal, and I’m eager for the next one, whenever it is. I have my little hammer pin fixed to my Poker Players Alliance hat, so it’s obvious to anyone in the know, that I’m no longer a newbie and I belong. And I’m glad I do.

Gunning for a good time: blogging and poker in Las Vegas

I'm heading up to las Vegas tomorrow for what I hope turns out to be a dandy event. It's a gathering of poker bloggers for a weekend of fun, frivolity, partying, and a poker tournament. And yes, a chance to meet in person many of the bloggers I read regularly.

So far, 89 poker wordsmiths have promised to be in attendance, from well-known authors such as Michael Craig and blogging legends like Iggy and Paul "Dr. Pauly" McGuire, to those known only to their core group of readers.

I'm the newbie. At least I'm one of them. My radio broadcast partner Amy Calistri, whose "Aimlessly Chasing Amy" blog is always worth reading, has been hanging out with the bloggers for a couple of years now. She convinced me to go, and just to give you readers a bit more information about this event, we'll chat about it during our radio show tonight.

In case you've never listened, our show is called Keep Flopping Aces, and you can listen online at www.holdemradio.com Thursday evening at 9:00 EST. Previous shows are available for listening in the station's archives as well as in a podcast through i-Tunes.

I'm thinking this get-together will be a lot like BARGE (the annual summer gathering of poker newsgroup fanatics and techies), where about 120 folks cavort madly at a series of tournaments and parties.

BARGE has a large techie quotient, but writers are interspersed within the group too. BARGE and the bloggers have a lot of similarity in style, fun-factor, love of poker, and both really enjoy hanging around with other very bright, very talented people.

The bloggers could be a subset of BARGE, and I'd love to see more bloggers attend BARGE each year. Those BARGERS with a literary bent should really enjoy this get-together too.

More words to come from me about this event, and more words to come, I suppose, from a whole lot of other poker bloggers over the next few days.

Chips, chips, chips

Bad News: WSOP chips for sale on e-Bay
A friend of mine notified me this morning that World Series of Poker chips were being sold on e-Bay. A $25,000 tournament chips had already been purchased for $305 and a $10,000 chip was still for sale with a reserve price of $300.

How did these chips make it from the tournament room to e-Bay? Someone obviously nicked them. That much is obvious.

This is another example of human error coming into play where control of tournament chips is concerned. Smart chip technology is already available, and it can easily support inventory control and monitor chips in play.

Smart chips may well have prevented the introduction of an additional $2 million in chips during the main event of the 2006 WSOP, and would be a major deterrent to the pilfering of tournament chips, regardless of whether they are being stolen to introduce in a tournament at a later date, or simply to sell as a souvenir to collectors.

Poker’s premier event, the World Series of Poker, needs to take whatever steps are necessary to maintain its integrity, and buying smart chips to use in their events ought to be a priority.


Good News: Customize your own poker chips online
Speaking of chips, TheChipLab.com is an online company that sells customized poker chips to the home market, giving the poker enthusiast an option of owning chips produced by two of the largest casino manufacturers in the US.

Their web site allows customers to use software to custom design their own casino-quality poker chips, which sell for $280 for a set of 300 chips, and $469 for 500.

It’s all the brainchild of 22 year old Chase Schwatka, who enlisted Portland Trailblazer basketball player Dan Dickau, to help him tap into the growing number of poker players looking for unique chip sets to support home games.

The entire venture began as a school project. Schwatka met Eric Pozzo, chief operating officer and finance officer of CSI Digital in Sherwood, Ore at the University of Portland, during Pozzo’s tenure as the college's entrepreneur in residence. Schwatka took TheChipLab concept from an academic exercise into the real world, and Pozzo jumped in as a major investor.

Buyers can go online and choose one of 17 chip templates and customize it by adding photos, artwork, designs and wording.

Sounds like a terrific product. Good luck to Chase Schwatka, Dan Dickau, and Eric Pozzo in their venture.

Sands to open online gaming in UK while dreaming of Macao

The Las Vegas Sands, one of the world’s largest gaming companies, announced that it’s teaming up with Cantor Gaming, to build an online platform offering company brands such as The Venetian, and The Sands in the UK and Europe when they launch their first online gaming site next year.

This comes three months after the US passed a law making it illegal for credit card and other financial payment processing companies to accept online transfers and four months after Sands chief Sheldon Adelson, warned Stanley Ho and other gaming operators in Macao that competition in this fast growing market was about to intensify.

"If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen," said Mr Adelson.

It doesn’t take much to connect these dots. While Adelson’s properties will gain some experience in the European online market, it’s merely a warm-up for the real action: a move to seize as much of the Asian market as they can by establishing a presence in Macao as early as they can. Gaming in Asia is forecast to explode in coming years, and Macao appears to be its epicenter — the Las Vegas of Asia, or maybe bigger.

Poker Author Challenges set for Binions and Taj Mahal

I'm happy to announce that both Binions in Las Vegas and the Taj Mahal in Atlantic City are excited about hosting Poker Author Challenges early in 2007.

The dates selected are:

Sunday, January 21 at Binions, Las Vegas

and

Sunday, March 4th at Trump Taj Mahal, Atlantic City

Last year's Poker Author Tournament last year at the Taj Mahal in Atlantic City was a big success, and we think things will be even better in 2007.

Each event will feature a very affordable $120 buy-in, book bounties on the poker authors, a two hour time frame for an "author meet and greet book-signing event" (10 a.m. to noon), and an early start to the tournament (12:00 noon).

Super agent Sheree Bykofsky is still working out the details and seeking additional sponsors and added prizes, and many of the participating authors will be providing books and promotional items.

Hold'em Radio and the Gambler's Bookshop are both on board for the Binion's event. Hold'em Radio, www.holdemradio.com, will do a live remote broadcast of the event and will interview a number of participating authors on site. Everything Hold'em Radio records will be available in the station archives and on i-Tunes as a podcast. Gambler's Bookshop will be on hand to handle book sales.

Borders Books will take care of book sales and giveaways at the Taj event, as they did last year. There's a good possibility that Hold'em radio will also be present at the Taj event if we can work out some details. Sheree Bykofsky and I also intend to launch our newest book, The Rules of Poker: Essentials For Every Game at the event.

As these events draw closer, you can look for more information right here on my blog.

For more information on this event, please contact Sheree Bykofsky, at shereepoker@aol.com

Pamela Anderson's bad week

Pam Anderson had a busy time of it over the last few weeks. Not only did she drop out of the online poker business, she filed for divorce from hubby Kid Rock.

They’d been married three months, which was about the same length of time Pam was in the poker biz. I guess if you had a last longer bet on her marriage versus her poker career, it would be a push.

Titan poker available in seven languages, but not in the United States

As online gaming turns toward Europe and Asia, Titan Poker announced the launch of its poker software in Polish and Turkish — in addition to English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish — and that Titan plans to introduce more languages in the coming weeks.

Titan's customers will be able to choose language options during the download process, and receive e-mail responses and online chat support across the site’s seven languages.

Job losses in the poker biz

Layoffs in the poker industry
Writing for the online version of Poker Player Newspaper, Pauly McGuire states that Card Player Magazine and the World Poker Tour recently fired a number of employees, in a “a trend that's been too common in the poker industry over the last few weeks.”

McGuire goes on to say that this is a frequent occurrence lately, and that he’s lost writing outlets because clients of his no longer had the revenue to pay him. He’s not the only one. It’s affected me too, and just about everyone I know in the poker business, and this includes not only writers, but players with sponsorship deals, affiliates, and anything else that was driven by advertising revenue from US-facing online sites.

UIGEA: job killer at home, stock killer abroad
The Unlawful Internet Gaming Enforcement Act (UIGEA) has turned out to be a job killer in the USA, and its effect in the UK was just as bad. It wiped out sixty percent of the value of publicly traded online stocks such as Party Poker and in so doing, it put a big dent in the wallets of many investors.

Jobs did not disappear there, however, and a quick perusal of the listings by search firms in e-Gaming Review magazine shows a lot of online gaming jobs in the UK and Europe. I’m even expecting that job market to grow as online gaming gains more of a foothold in China and Macau.

A few bright spots
The only bright spot on this side of the Atlantic seems to be Poker Player Newspaper, where McGuire reports that publishers Stan Sludikoff has added several writers in the last few weeks and expanded the size of the paper.

Of course, UIGEA created some unintended job losses too. Representative Jim Leach (R-IA) is currently a lame duck, having been turned out of office in a close election, with the decisive votes thought to be cast by poker players in his district who were upset about his stance against online gaming.

Senator Bill Frist, who as Senate majority leader rammed the Unlawful Internet Gaming Enforcement Act through the Senate by attaching it to a piece of must-pass legislation, the Safe Ports Act, in the dead of night with no recorded vote or debate on the issue and did so to pander to the religious right in an attempt to garner the Republican nomination for the presidency, is now out of business too.

Just this week he said that he will not seek the nomination, though I think this is more a result of a number of insider-trading investigations that would render him very vulnerable if he did make a run for the presidency.

A change in the air....

All good things eventually come to an end, and my relationship with Royal Vegas Poker will conclude at the end of December. I've enjoyed my time with them, especially the time I spent serving as a volunteer host for the Colelge Poker Championship.

But with Royal Vegas Poker having to refocus their business in light of UIGEA, my relationhip with them will conclude. I enjoyed it, and was happy for them to maintain my blog and website for me, while I did the easy work; I provided content.

But this blog will not cease. Rest assured that it will still be here far into the forseeable future and I'll still provide the same kind of commentary I always have, along with the sometimes irreverent photographs I have a fondness for.

In fact, readers shouldn't recognize any change at all. The blog will still be here and so will I. Proof positive, in the poker world as in life itself, the more that things turn upside down, the more they stay the same.

Is customer service asleep on the job?

An independent survey conducted in the UK by customer service auditing firm Talisma concluded that many popular online gaming sites provide poor customer service.

Here’s how the results were obtained. Following the passage of the Unlawful Internet Gaming Enforcement Act (UIGEA) in the United States, a Talisma researcher posing as a customer asked each site if online betting in the UK was legal.

Fully 40 percent of emails sent to the sites were ignored. Phone calls didn’t fare much better. Sixteen percent of calls placed by customer service auditors posing as customers were unanswered. During online chat sessions with customer service representatives, 30 percent of requests for advice made were not addressed and no follow-up response was provided.

Talisma also found that only 4 percent of the surveyed sites offered self-support documentation that was sufficient for problem solving.

If you’ve ever requested help at an online site, this survey may confirm your experience — that online poker rooms do a bad job of providing service, and probably do an inadequate of training their staff to deal with even commonly occurring customer service issues.

There’s a message in this bottle for online poker rooms. Training customer service employees is not a pill you take once, improvements can always be made, and better service should be an ongoing objective.

It’s also an open and easy opportunity for any online site to gain a competitive edge. Train staff before putting them on the phones. Continue to train them on a regular basis to make certain they are up-to-speed on all the issues they’re likely to face. Make sure that commonly encountered issues are discussed with customer service staff in training sessions so that learned lessons are shared.

Regularly audit performance of customer service staff to identify issues that need to be addressed as part of an ongoing training program. A routine audit program will also assist in identifying top performers as well as those who are deficient even after repeated training.