Poker is all about seeing into the future.

it is inconceivable to me that anyone can make the argument that poker isn't a skill game. being against poker for moral reasons (you think gambling is a drain on society etc. or w/e) i can sort of understand, but still obv disagree with.

but for the NYT to give credence to this FoF guy's "opinion" that poker is all luck is totally irresponsible journalism. there is no room for opinion in the matter, and any logical person who actually looked at the empirical evidence would be forced to come to that conclusion.

overall i thought it was a somewhat positive article, but it's a shame the NYT actually printed that guy's bullsh*t.

What was actually said was not as bad as you imply. You left out the rest of the paragraph.

Actually, the original version was much longer and more detailed, but it had to be cut for space reasons. Regarding Absolute Poker - I was told they're about to roll out a program "shortly" to reimburse US players. The exec. emphasized this several times.

The original intent was to talk about Black Friday, its effect on players, and the push for legislation. But the story was delayed due to breaking news in the broader market (ie. the meltdown in the stock market). During the delay, a flood of news came out of Full Tilt, making it necessary to revamp the story to address this news.

I wanted to thank all of the members here who told me their stories and helped me in my research.

Did this AP exec sound like he was rehashing legal advice/aka crap or did it sound like he was legit? I mean when we customers mail them they say the same, but it is just a copy paste text written by their legal department. What was your feeling about this guy's honesty?

JKM-NYT-

I'm assuming you wrote the article in question. It would be interesting if you could address this post by Lee, who, if you didn't know, is an active and respected member of the poker community on both the player and business side:

it really cannot be disputed that poker is a game of skill considering the empirical evidence available. I realize that it is essential for you as a journalist to be objective, which includes presenting both sides of the argument. However, what this FoF spokesman is saying about the skill involved in poker is patently false. To include it in your piece, and therefor validate it, is doing a great disservice to your readership.

Any reputable journalist will look at all sides of an issue - the good, the bad and the ugly - and listen to all sides in the debate - before writing an article. I realize many of you are passionate about your cause and dislike FOF. But suggesting we ignore or leave out Mr. Hills' views in the article isn't realistic when writing an objective story. Likewise, it would be wrong to list his arguments and not yours.

Keep in mind, the 2006 UIGEA legislation was tacked onto a larger "must-pass" bill on port security without review or discussion. So, many politicians don't even know the arguments for or against the issue of legalizing online poker. This article lays out the arguments from both sides, letting both express their views on the issues. And after taking all sides into consideration, this article concludes momentum is building on the side of legalizing/regulating online poker.

Please don't take my post the wrong way, because I think it was an otherwise fair and balance report.

My point of contention is that what this man from FoF is claiming about poker being 100% luck is just plain wrong. And, like I said before, there is really no room for opinion on that matter: if one always makes the best decision over a large enough sample, they will win. This is a fact. I completely understand and applaud your need to include all views, but I don't think you should include views that are just plain false.

"The best argument that poker is a game of skill-vs-luck is that a skillful player (eg. Phil Ivey) who plays poker against a less skillful player (eg. any player on 2+2) he will win ~100% of the time if >10,000 hands of poker are played. Every time!"

This would be a good argument, except for the fact its very false. You seem to lack a lot of knowledge in a) how long the long run in poker is and b) how good some of the posters on twoplustwo are.

http://www.economist.com/blogs/gamet...nd-skill-poker

The economist picked up on Mr Hillis' skill vs chance arguments.

The best analogy here would be comparing the evolution vs intelligent design debate; sure there is a large contingent of the population that "don't believe we come from no monkeys!!" but the science is clear and unequivocally points to evolution being true. Clearly you don't publish every viewpoint in every article because some are just flat out factually wrong, and that is pretty much the case here.

Also his position is basically the equivalent of saying "NFL football is a game of chance, because neither team knows what the other play caller is going to call!" It's a completely ridiculous statement.

[ ] Kasparov

[x] Copperfield

[ ] copperfield

[x] madoff

ldo

So beautiful. Bookmarked obv.

TY

Janet, I respect that fact that you took the time to look at both sides of the argument. The problem, you will obviously face on this forum, is the completely false and biased information that FoF(Chad Hillis) has put into mainstream media that is taken as fact. I know many, myself included, would like to see a completely unbiased and researched article. What I mean specifically is something like FoF says poker is a game of chance, then you get a non poker affiliated source(Steven Levitt comes to mind) to confirm/deny and vice versa.

For instance you say in your article:
Mr Hillis Says in Don’t Cry When Your Illegal Activity Is Shut Down
As far as the skill vs chance argument, you simply copied FoF's argument(which is a misquote from a poker book):
From that same article you could have quoted:
You could have also mentioned The Poker Joker “Skill” and Hillis' scientific approach to this issue:

The only thing you really need to know about our situation is this. One side is pushing an agenda and one side is trying to reverse an agenda. In my opinion, it is very obvious which is which. To the general public, however, it is not. We are, for the most part, seen as degenerates by the mainstream media for no reason other than propaganda by "experts" like Mr Hillis. So you can see when you copy and paste an incomplete and misleading mathematical argument to the general public, which most don't understand basic algebra(and almost every pro poker player does), why we may get upset.

I'll be absolutely shocked if AP/UB reimburse US players ever, let alone "shortly" (which probably means at least 3 months in AP-land).

Edit: In regards to the skill vs. luck debate, I find it extremely disappointing that you didn't cite any of the recent studies that have proven statistically that poker is indeed a game of skill.

...or maybe you lack a lot of knowledge in just how good Phil Ivey is. I would put up my entire 20K BR given the opportunity to bet on the outcome of Phil Ivey vs. any 2+2er over 10,000 hands of poker regardless of how good they are. ~100% doesn't mean 100% btw

Regardless, I was clearly making a case for the skill-vs-luck debate. Rather than just stating "the fact its very false", and how much knowledge I lack, you should try backing up your claims with some substance or at least some explanation...or are you just trolling?

Lastly, it wasn't my intent to get 2+2er's backs up by using us an example. Replace eg. "any player on 2+2er" with eg. "some other group of good poker players". And replace 10,000 hands with 10,000,000 hands if that helps.

4k rb over 450k hands?

Your job as a journalist isn't to blindly present all (asymmetrical) sides of a story (which seems pretty obvious to me but maybe I am overestimating). Your job is to find out who is full of **** and who isn't, and report accordingly. You are correct that we are a poker community and have a strong pro-poker position, but many of us are trained mathematicians and scientists. When we claim poker is a game of skill as a matter of mathematical law, we are not simply stating an opinion. This is an indisputable fact, and the specious, unlettered ramblings of Chad Hills are not tenable alternatives worth presenting. The case for poker as a skill game is even stronger than cases for evolution vs. intelligent design since we are working with a closed system of mathematical axioms. There is no debate on this issue among people who are not terribly ignorant of the topic. If Chad Hills didn't believe in Riemann integrals or particle physics models, I presume you wouldn't consider his opinion on those topics for a news article?

Give it up already! If you win the skill vs luck debate, and it becomes a game of skill, then the Hillis's of this world will criticize you for using your skill to take advantage of the less skilled innocents that find their way into the online poker world.

It's a no win argument. Hillis has a way to turn it against you any way you look at it. The best you can do is marginalize him and his kind, by ignoring them and concentrate on the revenue side.

If we win the skill vs chance debate, then poker is legal in 38(?) states.

a list of those "38" ?

34 States sorry, from virgingaming.com:

We are screwed in Louisiana ward. You should know that.