Ivey – You da f’cking best

July 19, 2009

Perhaps the best thing that could happen to poker, Ivey in the November 9. A shot to legitimize the game…it’s more than just luck. He’s a lot mysterious, and certainly regarded as the best to play the game. A fearless, rich, degen…who only wants one thing: to win.  For the guy that crushes the highest stakes games, and will play anyone, at any game, at any time…I’d say him winning this tournament would certainly help make poker perceived as more of a skill game.

I can’t wait to see how high he starts playing at the craps table. He might just break Vegas.  The headlines will read: Ivey wins $1B playing craps at the Wynn – steve wynn transfers ownership….or something like that.  

It was funny to hear when Ivey was asked by reporters: How will you deal with the oncoming media storm?  Ivey: I’m going to change my cell number and leave the country.  (Pause, followed by awkward reporter laughter)  Ivey: I’m serious.

Where’s Ivey?

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PROP at Google I/O

June 6, 2009

Thanks Rob for all the great pics…


WSOP Promotion! FREE SHIRT!

June 3, 2009

Buy any PROP Hat, Hoodie, or Tee and receive a FREE Dots T-shirt!

Hurry, offer end July 15th, 2009!


Price is Right Mountain Climber

June 3, 2009

Whenever I see this game on the Price is Right I get excited.  While perhaps not as popular as the infamous Plinko, this game is great. 

For those who haven’t seen it – a contestant must guess the price of three products – for every dollar they are off, the mountain climber climbs.  Get all three within $50 (I think??) and you win the big prize.  The anticipation on the last product price climb is ever so strong.

I think it is a lot like the poker world, you start at the bottom, climb up the ladder, and fall off a cliff at the end!


PROP Player – Hassan Babajane

June 3, 2009

Don’t worry, he’s not a terrorist…but he’s a few spots out of the money in the first WSOP $1500 event.  Day 2 starts today with about 330 people left, down from 2700ish and he is sitting around 20k chips which is 1/2 of the average…we definitely wish him luck!


Stop Motion Videography – Cool Stuff

May 22, 2009

http://www.sorry-im-late.com/


Huck Seed Emotionless After Winning $500k

May 20, 2009

Another example of the sickness we have for playing poker:

Huck Seed wins $500,000 in the NBC Heads Up Championship and says during his winner’s interview, when asked how he feels: “I’m glad you asked that question, because I have had trouble expressing my emotions in the past…when I won the WSOP I didn’t feel anything.”  He doesn’t elaborate (perhaps due to a shitty NBC edit) but either way…it’s just another day at the office.

Neat.

photo credit: Russ Okon – russokon.com


Search in the Now

May 17, 2009

I was just reading a little about Twitter via Techcrunch and got to thinking how this can effect the poker world.  I must admit I’ve done little outside of set up a profile and send a few texts to my twitter page, but it is intriguing nonetheless.

You can see it’s impact in a site like Pokerroad – where a large portion of the homepage is dedicated to this live stream of internet consciousness.

At this point I’m not totally convinced of the usefulness of this tool outside of celebrity stalking, but it does have the opportunity to direct traffic via the web.  And with the popularity of such outlets like US weekly and TMZ it should be no surprise that Twitter is being taken over by celebrity chatter.  I did read a cool post on Kanye West’s blog about how he doesn’t have a twitter, doesn’t want one, and thinks its a giant waste of time because he only blogs about 5% of what he’s up to, and the rest of the time is spent being creative.  I like his stance on this…but I digress.

The interesting thing about this trend is that the internet is evolving from a passive stream of consciousness (static pages, blogs, etc.) to a more real-time, ‘live’ mass of thought (twitter, digg, forums, desktop tickers, etc).  From a marketing perspective, these tools are  increasing the efficiency of ‘word of mouth’.  One could argue it’s the holy grail of ROI, and at the heart of any successful brand/product/idea or viral marketing concept.

Twitter allows groups of similiar thinking individuals to gather information simultaneously and ‘swarm’ about the web together.  Think about it like a group of bees, going to where the honey is, and leaving just as quick when the honey is gone.

We are clearly all a bunch of ridalin deprived ADD kids, and don’t want to invest time in searching, when we can be told where the latest and greatest is, happening now.  Real time = Now = Less Time spent finding what’s hot…

A site like Full Tilt could leverage this medium to ‘promote’ big games that are happening, as they are happening.  There are plenty of rail birds that log on to watch Durrrr and Ivey or Sigmund or whoever play nosebleed stakes – if they could communicate with that audience via a live stream of happenings then the swarm would know when to log on.

Although, what do I know, I just have a tiny lifestyle brand…but what I do know is that tomorrow will not look like today.


2009 World Series of Poker Schedule

May 13, 2009

The complete schedule can be found here

but I thought I’d highlight some interesting stuff:

First big buy-in – $40k No Limit event #2 on 5/28 – this is a good way for the ‘real players’ to start off the WSOP, and to generate some excitement around the circus as most likely it will be a star studded final table.

Economic Stimulus Event – $1k No Limit  Event #4 on 5/30- No Rebuy – Event #3 – cheapest way into the WSOP this year…

First 6 Handed Event – $1500 No Limit, Event #9 on 6/3 – these are fun, action packed, crap shooty but fun.

Cheaper HORSE Event – $3000 HORSE, Event #21 on 6/9 – HORSE is fun, lots of people don’t know how to play all the games so, but this is the slightly higher of the cheaper buyins so perhaps this field is a little smarter…

Heads Up Championship – $10,000 HU, Event #29 on 6/13  – nothing more needs to be said…

Shootout Event – $5,000 NL – 1000 people Max, Event #41 on 6/21 – win 2 sng’s make a wsop final table…

50k HORSE Championship – Event #49, 6/29 – $50k – big names, fun thing to watch

Main Event – $10k Obviously, Event #57 – circus circus on 6/3……


Poker Controller

May 13, 2009

A new way to play?

I have gotten used to throwing wireless mouse about the room like a football, but I suppose this could work just as well.

Apparently it works with poker stars, full tilt, and other major poker rooms.  While I have not tried it, the controls kind of look backwards to me with the ‘scroll wheel’ being on the left side – for a no limit player you would be using that all the time, and I think I’d rather use my right hand for that….

Either way, I like seeing innovations attempting to make online poker more fun, comfortable, easy to play, so good job.


Kid Cudi – I poke her face

April 29, 2009

finally a respectable version of this song…


Justin Shronk 1981-2009

April 21, 2009

One of the Pokerroad OG crew members passed away this weekend.  A funny and intelligent dude who supported the poker community in many capacities…RIP

http://www.pokerroad.com/justin_shronk_memorial/


Find new music for your ipod – We are Hunted

April 21, 2009

I stumbled across a new ‘billboard’ type chart, that’s digital, updated daily, and reflects instant trend like atttention deficit driven minds of the intrawebs:

it’s called We are Hunted.  It’s cool. It’ll help you find new music for long hours behind the computer or at the tables.

Enjoy.


Durrrr Challenge Update – 1/4 finished

April 16, 2009

Approximately 25% of the way through the first Durrrr Challenge vs. Patrik Antonius, Tom Dwan finds himself trailing by a neglible margin.  Through 12,114 hands he’s down $87k. 

What does all this tell us?  It appears they are coin flipping for a million bucks.  Durrrr and Antonius are clearly ‘about’ the same skill level, the swings are huge, and at the end of 50k hands, a -$1.00 will result in Durrrr losing an additional $1.5M.  Sick bastards.

Results currently being tracked by Highstakesdb:

durrrr-challenge


Barney Frank – A Hero to Online Gamblers?

April 15, 2009

Technically, it is not legal to conduct online casino gambling activities in the United States, and for the last several years most politicians have supported the ban on Internet gambling. But there has been one supporter of gamers’ rights to bet.

He is an advocate for online casino operators that would like to do business in the US. His name is Barney Frank, check out this clip of him on youtube. One of the first members of Congress to freely admit that he is gay, Frank is an outright crusader for tolerance and individual rights. He has, over the past years, supported the cause of legalizing Internet gambling.

Here is a brief run down of Congressman Frank’s view on gambling, especially his views of Internet-based gambling:

Although Congressman Barney Frank says that he doesn’t gamble, he has been crusading for the right to gamble online, and that has made him somewhat of a celebrity among online gamers, especially poker players. Poker is one of the largest and most developed online gaming markets in the world, and the members of the online poker community have turned to Barney Frank as one of their advocates. For some, he is a hero, a champion of the cause. Time will tell if this hero will prevail in the fight to allow Americans to gamble online.

Internet Gambling Regulation and Enforcement Act

Barney Frank has never been a fan of restricting online casinos. He voted against the Internet Gambling Prohibition and Enforcement Act. That was in 2006, and he stood in the minority. In the years that followed, he actually tried to pass the Internet Gambling Regulation and Enforcement Act, a law that would have undone the Internet Gambling Prohibition and Enforcement Act. This set of legal provisions would have restored the rights of Americans to gamble their money while playing online casino games like poker or roulette. When that didn’t work, he turned to other means of reinstating the online gambling privileges of the US public.

Payment Systems Protection Act 2008

In another attempt to re-legalize online gambling in the United States, Congressman Barney Frank supported the Payment Systems Protection Act of 2008. This bill went after the ability of the government to enforce the ban on Internet gambling. It proposed a moratorium on prosecutions related to the law that make online wagering a crime. So while it wouldn’t have gotten rid of the law all together, it would have made it impossible to punish people who did gamble in cyberspace.