Unsarcastinated your sarcasm.

This

While I as a cash game player ofc thinks it´s the other way around. Let´s compare Chris Moneymaker´s skills vs luck that got him 5M or something vs a nosebleed cash game player that has earned that after 1M hands MAYBE. At the same time I can understand their thoughts somewhat.

HU4ROLLZ, Judge?

Got nothing to do with the government (although they are idiots too). It is a court decision.

Also I don't understand the reasoning behind the decision. whether poker is a game of luck or skill is a matter of evidence. It should be statistically possible to show that players whom are big winners over large samples can't be that solely because of luck.

The fact that it is bossible to play as if it were a lottery doesn't mean that it is one. and the fact that players who do, consitantly loose and players who have a solid strategy can be big winners over large samples should be evidence that it isn't a lottery

As a swedish citizen I'm both happy and unhappy with the results. Happy because it means continued tax free income (according to law), but unhappy or worried because, if they come to these sorts of obviously retarded decisions about poker, how many other retarded decisions do they make?

Please inculde link next time OP, even though it's swedish: http://www.aftonbladet.se/sportblade...cle12839659.ab

This is not some jurisdiction against poker in general and I highly doubt it will have any immediate effects on the tax-discussion etc.

In short the Police stopped an illegal poker tournament w 670 people in it and the guys who arranged it managed to convince the jury that the outcome of the main tounament and it's side tournaments are more down to skill than luck, and thus avoided any charges for hosting an illegal gambling event. There were cashgames being played at the event and these were ruled as being games of chance, I would guess the few cash games just weren't as big of a deal as the tournaments in this particular case and thus didn't get as much attention in the skill vs luck debate.

I have no doubt it would be a pretty easy job to convince the grand jury that their thinking is kind of backwards in how they relate tournaments to cashgames should the tiopic heat up a bit and fire up a demand for a new regulation with regards to taxes.

i hardly know where to start, but if making themselves educated enough on a subject to have the slightest clue about that which they are making a ruling on is beyond them then they should gtfo

motherofgod.jpg

thx for the link

thanks for link, although i cant read swedish lol
furthermore, i just cant get over the absurdity of a courts decision to say poker is a game of luck. like, you think there would be one person in the entire damn country which could explain to them the rules of poker and show how it is a game of skill with an element of luck. how can the courts be so hasty in making such a decision when they have no idea what theyre addressing? im just really shocked and confused when things like this happen. sigh

edit: but whats most amazing, is how they came to the conclusion that tournaments are more skill that luck and cashgames being the other way around. this has got to be the most baffling decision a court has made towards poker and im very curious to see how they reached that conclusion

Chance and skill to Texas Hold'em: Swedish court

Published: 6 Apr 11 09:52 CET | Double click on a word to get a translation
Online: http://www.thelocal.se/33040/20110406/
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The Supreme Court in Sweden ruled Wednesday that it is both chance and skill that decide the outcome in the poker game Texas Hold’em.

* Top Swedish judges attend 'poker school' (23 Feb 11)
* Texas Hold'em case heads for supreme court (22 Feb 11)
* Taxman eyes Swedish online poker star (13 Jan 11)

What is key is what form of the game that is being played and how long it is played for, according to the Supreme Court.

“We have found that the main tournament and its side tournaments were not random chance games, but that skill does come in to it,” judge Göran Lamberth told news agency TT.

However, the court has found that the freer form of Texas Hold’em cash games are in breach of Swedish gambling laws. In the cash game players can play when they like, bet when they like, and leave the table at any time.

"We find this form to be a game of pure random chance," Lamberth told TT.

In 2007 four men were convicted of violating Sweden's gambling laws for organising a multi-million kronor tournament in Grebbestad, which had hundreds of participants and lasted several days.

Two men were acquitted when the case was appealed in 2008, while the remaining two had their sentences reduced in part because the appeals court accepted arguments that the tournament involved a game of skill rather than chance.

In order to be convicted of serious illegal gambling crimes in Sweden, it is necessary for the game being played to depend to a substantial degree on chance rather than a player’s skill.

Expert witnesses testified in February that skill is critical for succeeding in the game. An experienced poker player gave the judge a tutorial in how the game is played and argued that it takes a lifetime to become a skilled player.

A maths expert from Chalmers University claimed that the element of chance is limited to the first dealt card.

Despite this however the court found that the outcome of the game is too reliant on random chance to be viewed as a purely skill-based game.

If the court had shared the views of the expert witnesses it would have opened up for Swedish betting companies to hold poker tournaments.

The Supreme Court here in Northern Ireland ruled poker was a game of skill and had an element of luck last week.

Hahaha, it would be so much fun if the tournaments got taxed and the cash games didn't. Irony at it's best.

I'm swedish though, so I hope their isn't gonna be any taxes at all for the comming ten years or so.

Allthough it's a little worrying that they came to that decision, even after some "education". It isn't that hard to come to the "right" conclusion other than this. So many dumb people. It's a EV+-0 step for the poker in Sweden - still lot's of fish to catch.

ignorance has no bounds.