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Recent legal moves in the United States have aimed at making it more difficult for players to play online poker, but in one state the reverse may be about to happen. New Jersey Democratic state Senator Ray Lesniak is sponsoring a bill that would allow poker, along with some casino games like baccarat, to be played online legally. If passed, it could lead to the state earning more than $50 million per year in tax revenues, more than double what is currently earned by its struggling Atlantic City casinos.

Supporters point out that more than half a million New Jersey residents are already gambling online, and that the revenues from regulating and taxing this activity could subsidize the ailing horse racing industry, help the bricks-and-mortar casinos and leave money left over to help state finances. William Pascrell III, a lobbyist for the bill, believes 4,000 to 5,000 jobs could be directly created by the move, stating, “New Jersey could become a global Mecca for Internet gaming.” He points out that Costa Rica, which pioneered hosting gambling sites, had created tens of thousands of new jobs by doing so. If the bill were passed, Pascrell believes the regulatory and fiscal framework could be in place within six to nine months.

Opposition to the move has always been strong among casino owners, but with Atlantic City showing declines in casino revenue month-on-month for more than two years, attitudes may be changing. Casino operators may prefer to work alongside a regulated online industry, since it appears that they cannot stop the rise of online play. Supporters of the bill hope they will support this bill in New Jersey as there seems little prospect at the moment of changes in federal law.

Concerns have been raised by a number of the state’s lawmakers, and the passage of the bill is by no means a certainty. Interestingly, however, many of those with reservations about online gambling have failed to come out in total opposition to the bill, raising hopes among poker players that a concerted lobbying effort may result in at least one state of USA where playing online poker is fully legal.

If you've watched the World Series of Poker on television, you can't help but notice the prominent advertising for Jack Link's Beef Jerky. It's been the subject of jokes and probably helped contribute to no small amount of heart disease, but the money they're throwing at the biggest name in poker isn't going anywhere anytime soon as the processed meat distributor has extended their contract with the WSOP through 2011 and 2012. The press release for this has one of the most dubious comparisons we've come across:

"Poker is entertaining, unpretentious, unpredictable, and full of fun and camaraderie among friends," Jeff LeFever, Director of Marketing for Jack Link’s Beef Jerky, stated during the announcement. "The same attributes can be used to describe the Jack Link’s brand."

At least they didn't try to describe poker as "salty."

All joking aside, the branding placement has been exceptional. Besides running ads and getting their name on the televised edition of the World Series Of Poker, they've run promotions like their "Stacked Jacks Go Wild," in which players win big prizes for holding quad jacks during the main event. The televised broadcasts have included a special segment called "Jack Link's Beed Jerky Wild Card Hand," where ESPN commentator Norman Chad tries to figure out a player's hole cards by observing their actions.

Its some good stuff.not a store in town that doesnt sell it here in the town i live in here in texas.every truck has a batch on the dash as well.lmao.

This past Sunday, November 7 saw another big-money installment in Bodog's ongoing weekly $100,000 guaranteed tournaments. These massive events take place each and every Sunday at 4pm EST and feature some of the best online poker action going. Longhorn_99 took first place and walked away from their computer with an additional $25,000 in their bankroll. They were followed by BretMan127 ($15,000) and VOITTAJATYYPPI, who rounded out the top three while earning $9,500. Here's the rest of the final table results: grepaige ($7,000); Hdoggy ($5,500); NoGravitas ($4,500); patrick0933 ($3,500); tremendoano ($2,200); chiquita ($1,700);

In addition to our show-stopping Sunday events, Bodog hosts its regular weekly tournaments to players, and here's the winners of last week's events!

* November 1 $10k Guaranteed Double-Stack WillyNilly
* >November 2 $10k Guaranteed Double-Stack Kublai
* >November 3 $10k Guaranteed Double-Stack mjtw0072x
* >November 4 $10k Guaranteed Double-Stack timph
* >November 7 $10k Guaranteed Double-Stack walkslake
* >November 7 $10k Guaranteed Turbo Double-Stack cruiserjade

Bodog's guaranteed tournaments mean that there's always a big cash pool. Play poker online at Bodog Poker and get your share!

Boucherville, Quebec's Jonathan Duhamel is the winner of the 2010 World Series of Poker Main Event Championship, surprising very few people that saw him step up to the heads-up portion of the event with a chip stack that was more than more than six times greater than his opponent, John Racener. Duhamel collects a stunning $8,944,310 for his victory along with a piece of jewelry that is as desired as it is over-the-top: a diamond-encrusted gold bracelet. Racener's second place finish netted him $5,545,955 in prize money, a nice consolation prize for the pro from Port Richey, Florida.

Duhamel's victory, while seemingly assured, was not an easy one. This year's field for the World Series of Poker Main Event features 7,319 entrants in the second-largest Main Event in history. He arrived at the final table with the chip lead, holding about one-third of the total chips in play. Stage one of the finale saw Duhamel losing some of his momentum, even losing the chip lead to Michael "The Grinder" Mizrachi at one point. However, he was able to recover quite nicely and get back the velocity he needed to take the lead again with his elimination of the surprisingly-formidable Joseph Cheong helping no small amount.

The final heads-up stage of play took place inside of the Penn and Teller theater at the Rio in Las Vegas with an audience of nearly 2,000 people observing, not to mention a worldwide audience viewing the event over the internet. The final table airs tonight on ESPN, for those of you who want to get a better picture of the event.

As the first-ever Canadian champion, Duhamel joined an elite club, becoming only the sixth non-American to win the WSOP Main Event. He joins Mansour Matloubi (1991, UK), Noel Furlong (1999, Ireland), Carlos Mortensen (2001, Spain), Joe Hachem (2005, Australia) and Peter Eastgate (2008, Denmark).

Congratulations to Duhamel on a victory well earned!

As a fellow Canadian and from someone who lived in Montreal almost my whole life, I cannot tell you how happy I am for him. What an amazing story. I cannot even begin to imagine what winning the WSOP must be like. Congrats😡!

While the World Series of Poker's final table was grinding away in Las Vegas, Vanessa Selbst rocked Cannes with a first place at the Partouche Poker Tour event held there. The normally quiet event exploded this past weekend due to the number of pros and amateurs that turned out, bloating the prize pool far beyond its normally modest confines. This brings Selbst up to the third-highest total among female live tournament money winners, behind only Kathy Liebert and Annie Duke.

The event, however, was marred by a scandal involving German poker player Ali Tekintamgac, who was disqualified before the final table kicked off. The player, who's been accused of wrongdoing in past poker tournaments including the WPT Spanish Championship and EPT Tallinn, became a target of suspicion from his competitors over the course of play. It appeared that several observers who were acting as "journalists" fed Tekintamagac information about his opposition's hole cards and he was removed from the tournament with no prize money awarded.

Despite the hullabaloo over the German player's ejection, Selbst remained calm, cementing her place in modern poker history as someone to watch.

The euphoria that accompanied the progress of HR 2267 through the channels of Congress was dampened significantly, following the results of the US mid term elections earlier this month. There was a marked swing to the Republicans, who managed to gain 60 seats and control over the House of Representatives.

One of the most disappointing results of the elections was the fact that Barney Frank will need to step down from his position as Chairman of the Financial Services Committee, from where he had been able to advance his Internet Gambling Regulation, Consumer Protection and Enforcement Act this past year. While Frank was re-elected to his constituency, he will need to pass his chairmanship to the Republicans. Even worse is the fact that the chair will probably go to its online poker’s arch enemy, Spencer Bachus of Alabama.

Frank and co-sponsors of his bill aren’t giving up just yet, however. There is still the lame duck period before the new house actually re-shapes, where there is small chance that the bill can pass.

“We’ve said that our best opportunity to get something done in 2010 was during the lame duck session,” said John Pappas, executive director of the Poker Players Alliance. “We’re still moving in that direction.”

Pappas said that post-election results may mean that the PPA may be forced to change tactics. One of the ideas is to start lobbying the Senate to bring about change in the current online gambling environment. “A lot of our time and resources and lobbying power as dedicated to the House,” he said. “That was because Barney Frank was chairman of the committee and introduced the bill.”

“It may make more sense to focus on the Senate, which is Democrat controlled. Let the Senate become the leader now rather than the House.”


:dirol

A man who was fatally shot during a poker game was killed by another player who fired in self-defense said investigators from Anderson County, South Carolina's sheriff's department yesterday.

Anderson County Sheriff's Office spokesman Chad McBride that 911 received a call reporting the shooting came at around 7 a.m. Tuesday and when deputies arrived at a vacant building in the Commerce Industrial Center near the Highway 28 Bypass, they found two gunshot victims. The county coroner declared that 34-year-old Jermaine LeCorey Scott died from multiple gunshot wounds at about 10 a.m.

Investigators state that Scott and five other men were playing poker before the shooting. At some point, Scott pulled out a handgun and pointed it at the other players an attempt to get back money he had lost and to rob the other players.

Another man, whose name has not been released, was shot in the hand.

No one can promise that you’ll win the game with these tips but they will keep you in the game longer. How? Did you know that many poker players study poker by playing online. They first play using their computers to build up skills before they even think of becoming professional poker players.


Many people were blown away when 23 year-old, Jonathan Duhamel became the World Champion of Poker this week. He dropped out of university about 2 years ago to play poker for a living. How does one even think that that is a good thing? How can you do that?


The answer is study – study hard. Poker is a cerebral game. Many professional players read books and articles online. It takes years to build up the needed skills of analysis, strategy, mathematics and problem solving. Then you play online.

According to Chris Tessaro, who has written articles on poker playing, many poker players play 15-20 poker games online at one time. Some savvy younger players can even play 30 and 40 at a time. Tessaro says that it usually take hundreds of thousands of hands before anyone would attempt to play poker professionally i.e. at the World Series level.

Years ago, before the Internet, a young player would have to play for 15 years or more to get that kind of experience. Now with online poker, some 18-20 year-old players get that skill in a few years. That makes for a very good player at a very young age.

Tessaro noted that if you want to play professionally, at the World Series level, you need some money for example about $10,000 to start. This amount will buy you in to the main event at the World Games. If you have no skill you can lose that money quickly. A professional poker player with the highest skill level can make a decent living. What’s decent? “A decent living would be considered a million dollars a year.” He also noted that you can lose, a lot.

November 14 saw another big-money installment in Bodog's ongoing weekly $100,000 guaranteed tournaments. These massive events take place each and every Sunday at 4pm EST and feature some of the best online poker action going. The3Li0ns37 took first place and walked away from their computer with an additional $25,000 in their bankroll. They were followed by TexAce40 ($15,000) and Dyzalot, who rounded out the top three while earning $9,500. Here's the rest of the final table results: DrewDowns24 ($7,000); mattlee3 ($5,500); BOLORD ($4,500); cdeeps318 ($3,500); 2thejackpot ($2,200); HEREchipychipy ($1,700);

In addition to our show-stopping Sunday events, Bodog hosts its regular weekly tournaments to players, and here's the winners of last week's events!

* November 8 $10k Guaranteed Double-Stack timbo2tough
* >November 9 $10k Guaranteed Double-Stack brose15union
* >November 10 $10k Guaranteed Double-Stack Ron_1759
* >November 11 $10k Guaranteed Double-Stack Smitty
* >November 14 $10k Guaranteed Double-Stack amaru34
* >November 14 $10k Guaranteed Turbo Double-Stack B_Pars

New Jersey moved a step closer to becoming the first U.S state to legalise online gaming after the state’s Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee approved a bill which proposes to authorise intra-state and international online gaming at Atlantic City casinos to New Jersey residents as well as international customers.

The Committee approved the bill by a vote of 10 to 1 yesterday, with two abstentions, with the bill now heading to the full Senate for consideration.

:dance:

A High Court judgement clarifying the definition of gambling has been welcomed by the Department of Internal Affairs.

Justice Ron Young today overturned a District Court decision in June that tournament poker was not gambling as defined in the Gambling Act 2003. The Department appealed on the point of law after the lower court concluded that advertising for the Asian Pacific Poker Tour (APPT) on TV Works Ltd’s TV3 and C4 was not publicising or promoting gambling. TV Works maintained that participants were playing for a prize and not gambling.

Justice Young said the tournament entrance fee was “indirectly staked on the outcome of the poker game trying to win money in a game depending partially on chance, the definition of gambling” in section 4 of the Gambling Act 2003.

“Although some contestants qualify to play by skill rather than the payment of an entry fee, those who do pay are gambling,” Justice Young said. “Thus what is advertised is still gambling even if not all contests are gambling.”

Justice Young referred the matter back to the District Court, adding that the legislation was far from clear.
Section 16 of the Act makes it illegal to advertise overseas gambling and the Department said tv advertising breached the law through promotion of the APPT in advertisements for pokerstars.net

The Department’s Director of Gambling Compliance, Mike Hill, welcomed the High Court’s decision as very important for the regulation of gambling in New Zealand

“It provides useful guidance for the Department in carrying out its responsibilities particularly when the earlier decision was highlighted by Internet gambling sites as indicating that New Zealand had figured out what constituted legal or illegal gambling,” Mike Hill said. “If the earlier decision had remained unchallenged, there would have been a loophole in regulating poker in New Zealand.”

During the 2010 NFL season, Bodog Poker and Bodog Sportsbook are giving online poker players and bettors alike a chance to enjoy two of America's biggest passions at the same time in our spectacular Monday Night Football tournaments. The Bodog poker room is hosting a pair of tournaments on Mondays at 8:00PM. Each tournament represents a team that's playing that night and if the team whose tournament you're playing covers their spread, you get a $10 Free Football Bet at our online sportsbook!

Monday's events featured the Washington Redskins and Philadelphia Eagles hitting the gridiron and what a game it was, with the Eagles completely blowing away the spread in a decisive victory that featured the highest-ever score in a Monday night Football game, 59-28. The 28-0 score at the end of the first quarter was the largest lead a visiting ever had over a home team in the history of the NFL and the Eagles saw the most yardage they'd ever gained in a tournament, 592.

Bodog playerNewYorkJoe won the Eagles tournament, and took away $303 for their $10 buy in. In addition to those who beat the bubble getting their share of a prize pool of a tidy $1010 prize pool, everyone who played in that tournament got a free $10 football bet at Bodog Sportsbook. Meanwhile, TroutBum764 took the top spot in the Redskins tourney, earning $144.

Peter Eastgate, the 2008 World Series of Poker champion, has placed his gold and diamond champions bracelet for sale on eBay.

Eastgate, who earned $9.15 million in topping a field 6,843 players, said in the listing all proceeds from the sale would be donated to the U.S. Fund for UNICEF, a children’s charity.

Earlier this year, Eastgate, 24, who is from Denmark, told The Associated Press he had retired from poker.

Buyers have until Nov. 25 to claim the bracelet. As of Tuesday afternoon, three bids have taken the bracelet up to $16,300 — $300 more than original listing price.

In an interview with a Danish publication, Eastgate said he had great pride in his title but the bracelet was never worn. If the sale of the bracelet helps others, he “would be delighted.”

The World Series of Poker bracelet is made from 168 grams of 18-karat white gold and has a total of 291 diamonds, making up 2.81 carats encrusted into it.

“We think Peter’s situation is unique and support his effort to raise money for worthy causes,” World Series of Poker spokesman Seth Palansky said. “As a young man, we hope he won’t regret this decision one day, but it’s his right and we wish him nothing but the best.”

Eastgate broke 11-time gold bracelet winner Phil Hellmuth's record as the youngest World Series of Poker champion ever.

"I was bored of the game, lacking motivation, did not need the money any more so saw no point in continuing," Eastgate told The Associated Press. "In case I return, it will be because I need an income again or because I am bored doing nothing."

It's hard to believe he won't be playing again in a few years. Maybe he'll get a 'real' job and realize poker wasn't a bad way to make a living.

As of this writing, six bids have taken the much-covered piece of jewelry to $16,600, which was first placed on the site for $16,000. If you're into it, you have until November 25th to get in on the bidding.ore than original listing price.

The Grosvenor UK Poker Tour is drawing to a close for another year, but as always its set to end on a high as the Grand Final starts in London today. The Vic is once again the venue for the grand final which is a 9 day festival culminating in a £2500 main event. Last year football legend Tony Cascarino became part of the exclusive group of players with two GUKPT main event titles when he took down the GUKPT Grand Final for £168,800.

It usually brings out a lot more big names as well as all the regulars who are still in contention for the GUKPT Player of the Year, currently topped by last weekend’s Blackpool champion David Johnson. There is also going to be, for the 2nd year running, the £2200 World Heads Up Poker Championships taking place alongside it, which start tomorrow.

You can catch up with the GUKPT live updates over at the GUKPT Blog and the World Heads Up Championships are set to be streamed live at World Heads-Up Poker Championship

A law in Washington state that bans Internet gambling has come under fire in recent years. The state Supreme Court upheld the law against a legal challenge earlier this year, and now the state is starting to see the detrimental affects the law is having.

PokerStars pulled out of the state shortly after the Supreme Court ruling, and now Full Tilt Poker, another of the largest online poker sites in the world, has followed suit. That has left professional online gamblers scurrying for a way to keep their job.

"Most lawmakers in the US do not understand that millions of Americans have turned to the occupation of playing professional poker after the economic recession," said Gaming Analyst Brad Dawkins. "This ruling by the Washington Supreme Court has put hundreds of people back into the unemployment lines, and more will soon follow as online poker sites continue to block players in Washington."

When asked about the potential harm that the law is doing to some Washington residents, Margarita Prentice told ESPN.com's Gary Wise, "...Let them go pump gas." That brought an expected response from Representative Barney Frank, who is championing the cause of regulating online gambling in the US.

"Wow," Frank told Wise. "The intolerance of that is just appalling, but that's the attitude that goes with the sense you have the right to dictate other people's lives to them." Frank has been pushing changes to the US Internet gambling laws for years, although he has been so far unsuccessful in his efforts.

Several players who made their living playing online poker from their homes in Washington claimed they are seeking residency in other states. One, who wished to remain anonymous, told CGW, "I can't live in and support a state that does not allow me to make money working a job to feed my family. I feel like I've been laid off by the government."

The Returned and Services League of Australia is a lot like the VFW in the United States, offering a place for those who have served their country through military service to gather as well as offering support and advocacy for ex-soldiers and sailors and their families. One of their locations in Adelaide suburb St. Marys, however, is offering poker-playing vets more than the usual services with the debut of a regular burlesque poker night, an over-the-top tribute to the era of speakeasies and underground nightclubs with singing and variety acts, showgirl dealers wearing feather boas and, of course, poker.

Hosted by poker tournament company Playz, the event has grown rapidly in the five weeks since it started off with two tables and sixteen players and now featuring five tables and over 30 men and women. wanting to make time with the cards and the lovely ladies.

"We’ve been getting great feedback and they really love it," Hayley Bruce, director of Playz, told the Mt Druitt/St Marys Standard in an interview. "It’s aimed at both men and ladies. It’s fun, sassy and a lot of fun."

The aim for Bruce and Playz is to put the venue back on the map for Friday night entertainment in the city. Burlesque poker will be held every Friday from 8pm until midnight and a $22 buy-in puts you in there inning for a cash prize.