Open Letter to the Community and Beyond on Integrity

[RikaKazak]

Very nice post Ansky...A+

I agree with what you're saying and wish people actually did something about it too. I know a couple tournament directors (and I'm sure others know WAY MORE/close bonds with them than me) but what we can do is get "cheaters" like JJ barred. I know if JJ ever went to Oregon or Eastern Washington I could get him barred (trespassed) in a minute, I highly recomend those close with the decision makers at the Bellagio/Wynn/MGM etc. etc. do the same. Hell, if JJ keeps showing up for things like the 5 diamond, but magically gets asked to leave, he might just stop showing up all together.

[lacky]

Originally Posted by da_fume

How about this: I have played on baseball teams, so I'm a baseball player. Yes, no?

I played little league, but no, I don't consider myself a baseball player. I would say I am a person that has played baseball though.

[NoahSD]

Originally Posted by CroMagnon

I would also wonder about different levels of cheating. Stars recently came out and said that using Sharkscope violates the TOS. Should that constitute a life time ban?

This is a good point. I think the sites have two really important responsibilities.

1) Have a fair TOS that is roughly in line with the morality of the average knowledgeable poker player.
2) Enforce their TOS.

It's obvious why enforcement is important.

Keeping a fair TOS is important because having rules that many people in the poker world disagree with--like no datamining and no using sharkscope--leads to widespread violation of the TOS, which leads people to not take the real important parts of the TOS seriously.

[gman06]

Ansky, a beautifully written and critically important essay. But being the pessimist that I am, I don't see much changing for the better anytime soon. I do agree with El D that outing current cheaters would be a good start, in addition to getting voices in the community such as Barry G and DN to speak up on the importance of integrity.

[adsman]

Originally Posted by lacky

whether pokerstars allows Justin to play again doesn't really matter to me. I'm just saying I consider JJ a cheater, as the sum of all his behavoirs up to now define him that way. I consider ZJ someone who once was a cheater but has changed. I really don't feel lumping them together without any distiction (as you did several times) is fair, and it belittles the significance of their actions between the incident and now.

The whole concept of forgiveness is to encourage people who have wandered off the path to go back in the right direction. If we ignore all the future actions that removes the incentive.

You think the incentive should be redeeming people. Some of us think that the incentive should be on eliminating cheating.

[GaryTheGoat]

apefish and MissT74,

I think that you two agree.

Forgive and forget?

JJ and Justin cheated.

I may be able to forgive Justin.

I can't forgive JJ (at this time).

I can never forget that both are cheats and require extra scrutiny
whenever either is at my table.

I would, in fact, refuse to "knowingly" play with JJ at this time. I might play with Justin. I know that I assume the risk of being cheated whenever I sit with either of them.

I would probably commit a violent crime on either of them if I caught them cheating me. I would feel mostest stupidest if said crime was used on JJ. ie It would be harder time for doin' the crime on JJ rather than Justin.

I may forgive, but can never forget that both have the propensity/tendency to cheat.

gTg

[T-God]

Originally Posted by adsman

You think the incentive should be redeeming people. Some of us think that the incentive should be on eliminating cheating.

woops

[Arnold_O]

Originally Posted by Kevmath

I think last year was the first time there were multiple chip sets for the WSOP Main event and prelim events because of the $2m that was incorrectly added to the Main Event.

now this type of cheating, imo, is the serious kind.

--but some average joe poker player who happens to be very wealthy and is looking for more action so he plays the big weekly Stars tourney under 2 accounts -- well, it's not good but it's tame compared to these clowns like Men the Master who move chips from one table to the next and from one person to the next.

these guys, and the colluders, are the real cheaters.

can't help but to think the persecution of jj is rooted in jealousy of his wealth

[sawseech]

i think it's a mistake to ask him for something which he may not be capable of giving and to create a prosecutorial environment in a case where he has no regard for the origins, especially given the limited enforcability of whatever actions may result from your post.

i would prefer that the sites collectively bar him, but there's always ghosting and 1 player/hand is unenforcable online.

i feel that i've already spent more time thinking about this than it's worth. i hope i'm wrong.

[jwc529]

Originally Posted by T-God

Imo the only way to do this is to take away their ability to cheat through the software. If there's a hole, someone will try to take advantage of it. Everyone can get all pissed and yell about morality all they want but that won't help the situation. Things like ZJ opening up multiple instances of PS or JJ taking over for his horses midway through a tourney from a diff. IP address should be pretty easy to fix.
Things like sweating and instructing a horse while he plays and feeds you hole cards over or the phone is where things get hard, if not impossible. Anyone have ideas about this?
(PS you ever picture an ACTUAL horse playing poker? CRAZY LOL!)

many people play at hotels while on the road or use public access points which would have multiple unrelated computers/people reporting the same external IP. also if said cheater commandeered other computers and was able to spoof their IPs with multiple computers, (not that its easy), they would be undetectable outside of collusion patterns for cash. of course there is always the problem of a group of cheaters acting in accordance with one another, which may be what happened here and the people he backed.

[tobikosan]

Nice Post.

The only thing necessary for evil men to triumph is for good men to sit idly by and do nothing (or something like that) So true.

So how does change come about? Do WE get riled up and get THEM to do something?

As Gandhi said " Be the change you want to see in the world."

As Martin Luther King said and it was included in the film "Driving Miss Daisy", and I paraphrase again " When history looks back at this period it will not be surprised by the actions of evil for there is always evil in the world. No it will be amazed at the apathy and inaction of so called good men"

I appreciate Greg Raymer's actions. If he can do it without much or any malice or self-righteousness even better. To also have compassion and perhaps forgiveness is even more evolved.

I don't happen to be Jewish but there is a very interesting slant on forgiveness in their religion that helped me immensely with people stuck in the space that JJ seems to be: It has always been very hard for me to forgive someone who has wronged me when I'm pretty sure that given the chance they would turn right around and do the same thing again.

But I heard a rabbi explain that forgiving someone is not agreeing that they have changed and will not do the same thing again but rather acknowledging that they are a fellow flawed human being and that you wish them well despite that and basically renounce the connection to hating them and free yourself from holding the negative emotions like self-righteousness and others connected to their unethical acts.

I want to be clear that I don't necessarily agree with the post that implied Greg Raymer's stance was wrong in that it was "righteous." Being righteous, by definition, is a positve thing. You can be righteous without being self-righteous.

If I was at the table of a known cheat and vibrating on a high level that day i might say something like, "JJ I think the table needs to be informed of your questionable poker past, would you like to inform them or should I?"

If I was vibrating on another one, as I was recently at a golf tournament, where a self-proclaimed 16 handicapper was one of the best ball strikers I have ever seen, I might say something like " This peice of shet, lying scumbag is a stone cold-cheating liar and I am willing to discuss it out in the parking lot if you have any objections."

Oh well. I'm a work in progress.

[captZEEbo]

Originally Posted by MLG

Ansky,
Obviously a great letter. And your points are 100% correct. So, let me be the first in this thread to name a name I know. When Gavin refers to how "we" used to ghost accounts all the time I can be fairly confident he is referring to Erik Lindgren. While E-DOG and I were at the same table deep in one of the Borgata main events in 2006 he discussed the same thing, including him saying that he would frequently take over for one of his horses if he was knocked out of a tournament and they were still in with chips.

Mike Goodman

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought this was discussed before and people generally agreed that while scummy, it's 100% unenforceable, so it's legal in the realm of online poker.

[CroMagnon]

Originally Posted by captZEEbo

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought this was discussed before and people generally agreed that while scummy, it's 100% unenforceable, so it's legal in the realm of online poker.

Recently one of the eidtors of Bluff magazine allowed another player to take over a tournament, can't remember either of their names, but when it came to light he/they were disqualified and had to return the prize money.

Cro

EDIT Thanks ruinu4good.

[ruinu4good]

Originally Posted by CroMagnon

Recently one of the eidtors of Cardplayer magazine allowed another player to take over a tournament, can't remember either of their names, but when it came to light he/they were disqualified and had to return the prize money.

Cro

You mean bluff?

[seek42]

I have read through most of this thread and I am surprised that not much has been said about high stake online players changing screen names to get action/ be more effective. It seems to me that you gain a much bigger edge than multi accounting tournaments doing this yet is it seen as acceptable even though its completly unfair on all the players who are not changing screen names/using friends screen names to play (read this thread after reading the recent cts thread where he comment in the chat box on someone going under a different s/n).

So in my mind this is as bad as ghosting/multi account as it is against all sites t + c's and gives you a big edge yet it is well known that lots of players do this (PA for one), I remeber Brian Townsend did it for a bit....how do people stand on this?