rigged imo

why hasn't the PPA advertised on TV with the WSOP? They should work on getting in touch with the poker sites and making some type of fuss about all the bull**** that is happening.

Leapfrog is right that the actual list of 200 was drawn AT RANDOM from a much larger list. The conclusion that the people who drew up this list have very little clue as to what is really going on is also true, however, despite leapfrog's link. The reason for that conclusion has already been identified above. The list includes sites that already DO NOT allow Minnesota or US players. This is shown by the inclusion of WilliamHillPoker on the actual list. I haven't seen them listed on any of the "US Friendly" poker site lists, have you?

Also, the choice of using the Wire Act's "common carrier" provision is highly indicative of a lack of research and understanding. There are far better statutes to cite than this particular one. However, you will have to waterboard me to get me to say which ones would have worked better and/or why.

So yeah, the reason FTP is on the list and PokerStars is not was random selection. But the overall list and action still shows, IMHO, a lack of legal sophistication regarding the legal issues this action presents.

Cliff notes: they didn't really think all this through and that's probably good for us.

Skallagrim

First time I can truly say LOL in a long time .

Skallagrim

While I am certainly doing whatever I can, recent information that I have seen (like your post) have me hopeful. Any idea how hopeful I can be?

Note: To be clear, I still intend to do whatever I can, regardless of how good our chances are here.

glad i just moved from MN

The study that you reference here concerns online sports gambling. I was speaking specifically about online poker, and I think there are major differences between the two.

I was only speaking from my own experience, and explaining the rationalle behind my views.


I think this is a reasonable argument. However, it is my opinion that the number of people who are harmed by online gambling does not constitute as small a minority as others like to argue.

Where do you think all the money comes from? I bet there are a lot of winning or at least break-even players in here speaking about the merits of online poker, but I wonder about the people who collectively loose millions of dollars every year.

Online gambling has damaged a lot of lives, and if some 20-something not being able to play poker for spending money is the price we have to pay to ensure that an addicted gambler isn't blowing his/her own hard-earned money then in my opinion so be it. There are evidently others who feel the same way, or we wouldn't see legislation like this.


I also disagree with people dropping out of school etc. and becoming online professional poker players. Society suffers as a whole when smart, ambitious young people are diverted into an occupation that essentially adds zero value to society. (I am not judging anybody or saying that anyone is wrong or is making a bad decision or anything like that. It's just my opinion.)

You gotta remember, this is Michele "bat****" Bachman's state. Once you've seen here speak nothing happening in Minnesota should surprise you.

PBJaxx, I will say that I am confident (but that does NOT mean CERTAIN) that this particular action by Minnesota will be blocked by the Courts. I can say that as a lawyer very familiar with the issues presented.

At the same time, I have to say most of my confidence comes from the way in which the current laws are written, not an abiding confidence that the Courts will recognize extensive personal rights in this situation. What that means is that any Court victory can be easily undone by a legislative vote to change the law. EVEN IF A COURT VICTORY HERE IS EASY AND SWIFT, THE POLITICAL FIGHT IS MORE IMPORTANT.

Don't ever stop making your voice heard, please. It is, ultimately, the single most important factor in gaining/assuring our right to play.

Skallagrim

Commercials are expensive. PPA would probably spend more on commercials than they'd gain in new members.

The announcement was just made yesterday. I imagine the sites are well aware of the threat and are making plans on how to address it.

Thanks

If you indeed had these issues, I'd encourage you to avoid poker forums.

You're unlikely to convince anyone here that online poker should be banned, as you're basically posting FoF talking points (perhaps you came up with them independently, but they are substantially identical to the FoF ones).

The bottom line for me is that I don't wish for the federal government to protect me from myself. Addicted poker players can easily place themselves on self-exclusion lists, and they can also avail themselves of counseling. All federal legislation for online poker has included such provisions.

I thought the irony was pretty delightful myself.

You know, your first post was not that bad, raising legitimate concerns in a reasonable way. But this post crosses the line over to BS.

First you distance your self from studies saying you are only talking from personal experience. Then you immediately make a claim ("it is my opinion that the number of people who are harmed by online gambling does not constitute as small a minority as others like to argue") that is quite properly the subject of study. Your personal experience with 5 or 6 friends (if even that many) is hardly a reliable statistical sample, is it?

Second, when did you become an expert on what society should value? Explain to me, if you can, why it is socially valuable to let people compete to become NFL players? Or Golf Pros. Or virtually any other profession that does not produce food or shelter. This is as smug as it gets.

Finally, gambling addiction is a real problem. I have personally represented textbook cases of gambling addicts. Gambling addicts are never game specific. They crave the action, whatever the game is. Poker, as a game where skill is at least significant if not dominant factor (I believe its dominant) is LESS attractive to most problem gamblers. This is the same reason most problem gamblers never take up Chess for money.

Poker, online or off, is not the issue when we speak of gambling addiction.

Still, gambling addicts will occasionally seek their "fix" through poker. So of course poker sites, as well as any other gaming site, should have policies to identify and try to minimize that harm. You will only get that, if you get that at all, from legal, regulated poker: a legal business has an incentive to comply with regulations, an illegal business has none.

Skallagrim

You have a "view." That's great and all, but thankfully there are people out there that actually study this stuff and come up with factual conclusions! Harvard studies ftw!

I'd like to thank everyone who has providing updates and explanations in this thread. It's been very helpful after this hit out of nowhere.

wasn't aware of that. thanks.

Kind of been skimming thread but my mom calls me today and basically tells me to pull my funds off the internet asap.

I told her I'm sure they cannot lock my money away but will just prevent me from playing.

Any idea when this goes into effect? Also when are we going to riot?

No. The implication is that some of the best online limit players are from Minnesota (such as Schneids among others). He was kind of making a joke although there's a ring of truth that if everybody from Minnesota really were completely prevented from being able to play at all then the online high stakes limit games probably would actually be better.

Yup, since Zen apparantly values "personal experience" my personal experience with a gambling addict was him saying "poker? Not enough action, it moves to slow. Id just end up going all in all the time. Im sticking to craps"

aaron, your money is as safe as it ever was; the worst this action can do to you is make it take a bit longer for you to get it as it may make your ability to communicate with the site more difficult.

As to your second concern, its too early to say with any confidence. I can assure you, however, that if and when anybody's play gets blocked, the lawsuits will be filed almost immediately thereafter.

At the risk of being accused of a biased opinion, I will nonetheless say that now is a perfect time for every poker playing resident of Minnesota to make sure they are members of the PPA (free or premium is up to you). The PPA WILL fight this: legally if it goes into effect and politically to prevent it (hopefully) from ever going into effect.

Skallagrim

http://pokerplayersalliance.org/pres...er-ppa-042909/

Found this statement on the PPA website. I like the harsh and somewhat sarcastic tone of how ridiculous it is and believe it can garner support with many people including non-poker players. My Mom is a Republican and quite conservative and even if her son wasn't a poker player this is the kind of attitude she would have over such governmental interference.

I would really like them to send this news and their response to all of their constituents because certainly it's only a very small minority of them who are going to go to their site and find this. I hope they are able to get to work to get this statement out there in various media all over. But if we haven't seen or heard it yet in any media (and all I've heard about are Minnesotans on here who have called the talk-shows) then I'm not sure it's going to happen. Even if they get to all these different outlets sometime soon that would be better than nothing. But is the PPA's message getting out in any media at all other than their own website?

This looks like a decent news release to me and I hope they are able to follow that up with phone calls to various media organizations offering sound-bites of their response or in-person interviews about it, etc.

I simply feel that using a study about online sports gambling to draw conclusions about the merits and dangers of all forms of online gambling is unreasonable. People are placing their sportsbets online similar to how they would have called those bets into their bookie. I think that the differences between online poker and live poker are larger than the difference between online sportsbets and live sportsbets.

Using this study in the manner that it being used is making the inherent assumption that sportsbetting and poker is equivalent.

A credible study that specifically addressed online poker would be more convincing.

I think the problem here is that people assume that if someone loses $1000 gambling, it means that they gained $1000 worth of utility. In the case of gambling, I think this isn't always true.

When someone decides to gamble with $1000, they aren't necessarily writing off the full value as 'entertainment' because they know that there is some chance of a win. However, if they estimate this chance too high (a likely problem with many gamblers for various reasons), then they are overpaying for the entertainment value that they are actually getting.

It is also important to consider the time spent gambling. For many people, they end up spending more time gambling than they initially planned, and given that time is valuable to them, they have again 'overpaid' for the entertainment that they received.

Where I'm going with this is that when people spend their money on a football game, or decide to spend an evening watching the game on tv, odds are pretty good that they are making a rational, utility maximizing decision.

However, with gambling, the outcomes are uncertain, which increases the likelihood that the decision is not one that maximizes utility for the amount of money and time spent.

I am not saying that gambling does not provide some utility, but that it creates a situation where many people will make a mistake in allocating their resources, so simply making the argument that people always spend their resources the correct (utility maximizing) way is not true in the case of gambling.

So when an online poker player wins $100,000 in a year, one cannot assume that the player created $100,000 worth of entertainment value, while for the NFL player this assumption is much more valid.


I don't mean to hijack this thread; I am presenting my perspective which is also likely the perspective of some of the supporters of this legislation.

or ... RAGGING ACES - ER - RUNNING ACES!

Again, why does the state allow the lottery then? I was at the Coinstar machine last week and a lady walked by me, bought two scratch tickets, scratched them, then turned to me and loudly complained that "all she did was break even, no income from the scratch tickets like there should be". That's clearly an f'd up utility function/overpay no? So why does the state encourage this form of gambling? They'll let her throw her whole paycheck into that vending machine without batting an eye.

So I assume you either want all gambling banned or your main argument is that people are using their time incorrectly since poker takes a long time to play?? The second argument would be very odd indeed. Are we going to have the Government optimize leisure time utility functions now?

Final point...this isnt legislation, its a civil action by a member of the executive branch. Banning online poker explicitly or passing legislation to block content on ISP's would at least allow for an open debate. That's not what's happening here, the state is deciding they would like a certain outcome but don't want to have to go through the whole legislative process to do so, instead they'll just try and mangle existing law to produce their desired outcome. That is much worse than passing legislation.