The argument is that ALL of the reasons this might happen in the future hold right now, and have held for years.

There are millions of people in poor countries with internet access (ever been to SE Asia?) who could make vastly more money playing poker than doing pretty much anything else in their countries.

The world is not an economics textbook. Cultural issues, inertia, lack of interest, money management, etc.

Yes although the Starbucks comment was a rhetorical flourish.

I think you're looking at this argument backwards as far as China and a few other countries are concerned. You respond as if China had been accused of having a low IQ, but on the contrary, the Chinese are a very intelligent people and that is why they're scary.

I agree with everything else about your post, pretty much. A poker boom among poorer populations or ones with a different approach to poker based on culture could put an end to online poker as we know it. Completely disregarding this threat would be silly. I remember having a discussion about Koreans and having someone disagree with my point of view (that they are a threat) by calling Koreans donkeys. Well, when there are like 15 of them on pokerstars, all super-grinders, it's easy to say that but imagine having 5000 korean supergrinders. Even if many of them aren't good, the games would die because they would totally swamp the actual losing players who deposit money, and send a lot of that money to pokerstars' profits via 24 table rake generation.

These doomsday predictions are so bad.

Poor countries provide softer rather than tougher player pools. Look at Russia, Latin America, Greece, what random poor country you can think of that fields online players.

Generally speaking the poorer the country the more the distribution of wealth is skewed toward a small % of extremely rich donks. The peons in these societies are too busy looking for potable water or whatever to procure a broadband connection and deposit their life savings on PokerStars. That leaves the idle rich who have nothing better to do than fire off their probably ill-gotten wealth online.

The toughest player pools come from countries with large middle classes. Can you think of a single good poker player who comes from a genuinely poor background (I don't mean relatively speaking within the US, although there are very few even there).

Virtually all of the good players come from middle class backgrounds. Sweden, Finland, US, Canada... these are middle-class countries. Almost all of the winning players they field are from middle class backgrounds.

Now you might respond to my argument by saying well fine, once the Chinese grow their middle class we'll all be screwed.

My response would be no more screwed than you are playing against American players. There are good ones and bad ones and if you play well enough and game select you'll do alright.

no money in china, everyone's sorid.

seriously though, gold farming in world of warcraft is kind of a big deal and people are making a living grinding monsters, why isn't this happening in poker ? (Yet ?)

Grinding is a positive sum game. Poker is not.

Are you/he in India?

if nanonoko can 24 table 3/6, 5/10 and 10/20 and still crush the games in June 2010, i am pretty sure that SSNL and MSNL are still beatable.

stars and then steal a women and make her breastfeed my baby - brap brap

Yes, he is in India ... I moved to the UK now .. so can play legally

OP you assume 'perfect information' and that assumption is WRONG

/thread

I don't know about IQ's but if you see somebody at your table and it says France by their name, what is the first thing you think? My suckometer pegs the needle

This should be the initial reply in every one of these threads.

People in any given country are not all smart or all dumb.

Surely being "well educated" or scoring highly in IQ tests means very little when it comes to poker.

Patrik, Ziggy, and Ivey have a high school diploma at best, whereas Durrrr was an English student at some Boston community college IIRC. According to luckyjimm Isildur1 was a terrible student in high school. Galfond seems smart but I doubt he would have gone onto publishing peer reviewed papers in his chosen field. FullFlush probably didn't even go to school.

Do these guys and most of the other nosebleeders read scientific papers on nano-physics in their spare time?

I think not.

Having a extremely high IQ and a decent education might help but you'll need so many other skills to do well in pokerz.

Just my thoughs.

Very good example that IQ and poker skill aren't that much related - Italy 6th. Now who wouldn't want to play with italiano?

This.

I was thinking along the exact same lines. Also forgot to factor in starting costs. If your annual income is $1000 just exactly where are you going to come up with a roll from, play using what computer and stable internet connection and even though you may have a high IQ it doesn't automatically mean you will be good at poker.

I am sure we could compile a long list of top players who all have a tiny IQ

More than you think.

If they did all of a sudden make online poker legal in India and China...does that mean they would come in and ruin the poker community? Give me a break. Lol. I wish they would do that...5 billion more fish IMO.

You can be an extremly smart person in every sense of the word and still never make it as a professional. Poker is a game skill, emotions, and incomplete information. Its not a math problem.

Please make online poker legal in China and India...ONE TIME!

So USA citizen are on the same level as Mongolians, that explains alot.

i dont think u can just say ''x country has iq of 100 but lose more than x country with 94 iq, iq and poker skill aren't related''

i think u have to take some other factors into consideration like-
-the country's GDP
-the countrys average loss per hand
-if there are any top winning nosebleed players in the country
-whether or not that country have any kind of poker training available in their language
-whether gambling is legal in the country
-when did the poker boom reach a country
-the country's player pool

etc etc etc.

Could a poker 'sweatshop' be +EV in let's say China for ex?

It would function like a call center/day trade operation. Company fronts the capital, provides training vids in Chinese, bonuses for good performance etc...

I know these exist already but to what extent should we feel threatened by this idea? Obviously they would bottom-feed but it could still have a negative effect on the poker economy as that money would be taken out rather than put in play at higher stakes.

When a new market is discovered it takes TIME for participants to enter. Even if the barriers to entry are quite low it still takes a little while to permeate the ether, so to speak.

That it hasnt happened already just means that it hasnt happened YET.

"My response would be no more screwed than you are playing against American players. There are good ones and bad ones and if you play well enough and game select you'll do alright."

By this argument you would expect the standard of play online to NEVER change, but it has. The old days of Partypoker guaranteed earn are gone. Edges have been competed down. More participants may mean more donks for a short amount of time, but as the donks leave, all you are left with is competent grinders.

Poker is like a giant Ponzi scheme, it is only the steady flow of new donks that keeps the industry alive. Otherwise we are all just exchanging the same money and gradually losing it to rake.

The outsourcing panic of recent years should have at least alerted you guys to a single truth; there are people in this world who will do your job cheaper than you are willing to do it. Expanding poker into the areas that these people live in will compete down earn rates to THEIR marginal income, not yours.

This isnt textbook economics, with the implication being that it doesnt actually relate to the "real" world. First of all, if you dont think "text book" economics relates to the real world, then you dont actually understand what you imagine you have read in an economics textbook. Secondly, and more importantly, this is a purely logical chain of ideas. I have found that most people who disagree with this sort of rational thinking do so because of emotional reasons; they dont WANT to think about any bad outcomes. So they live in denial.

ppl in china or india with phd are very few. if you have a phd in china you are top .001% of the population. Phds are becoming more common as education is provided for everyone. But current Phds in their 40s means that they are the top of the top of the top.

Needless to say having Phd in china or india means you've made it. You will get hired where ever you apply.

Not only that, most phds in china or india move to USA. In USA they pay Phds about 100k a year. In india or china they would prob get paid equivalent of 20k usd a year.

The people that play poker online are going to be the younger generations that are the children of wealthy people in china or india. The adults will have no interests and the children have no income. Therefore the only people that are playing online poker from china or india are young guys 18-30.

if Gold-Farmers start grinding Poker - hopefully we can buy their money for cheap.