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4:10 pm
March 2, 2010
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Keith
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Post edited 4:15 pm – March 2, 2010 by Keith
Online poker is rapidly becoming one of the most popular gambling games at gambling websites on the internet. The main reason for this popularity is the belief that it is a game of skill in which money could be won. This belief is a fallacy. Skillful play will never help gamblers to win money at online poker because winning money at online poker is impossible.
Online poker is a game of skill only to the extent that skillful play will allow gamblers to lose their money slower. Money can temporarily be won in the short-run. In the long-run though, the gambling "house" which operates the gambling website, will permanently win all the money from all of the players. With a fast played game such as poker, the short-run quickly becomes the long-run when playing enough hands. Each hand played whether winning or losing any particular hand, slowly disintegrates the bankroll of every gambler. There is not anything that gamblers can do to save their bankrolls except to never play online poker.
Here is an example of how the gambling house will always win all the money from all of the players. Five players sit-in on an online poker game each with a $20 bankroll for a total at the website table of $100. Let's say the average pot is $10 and the rake is 5% or 50 cents per hand. Let's say 200 hands are played which does not take that long. After 200 hands, that 50 cents rake per hand totals $100 which is the entire amount that all of the players started with at the website table. Of course not all of the players go broke at the exact same time and fresh money can come into the game. But sooner or later each gambler will eventually lose their $20 bankroll every time without exception. Every amount brought in will eventually be lost through continued play. Those are the facts in a nutshell. Any honest mathematician, statistician, or numbers expert who understands the game of poker, would not dispute the example in this paragraph.
You have a choice to follow the guidance of this post or play online poker. Playing online poker will cost you money and quite possibly a lot of money. You may get addicted to it even if you believe otherwise. It very well can happen. Unfortunately, getting addicted to online poker has happened to many people. But even if you never technically get addicted to online poker, isn't it foolish to play a game in which losing your money is a certainty? Losing money is not only true for online poker, but for all other gambling games on the internet. There are not, and never will be, any exceptions. You are absolutely, positively guaranteed to lose your money. Those are the facts. Do not allow gambling promoters or anyone else to convince you otherwise.
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6:34 pm
March 2, 2010
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Sunny Mehta
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Post edited 8:04 pm – March 2, 2010 by Sunny Mehta
Post edited 8:05 pm – March 2, 2010 by Sunny Mehta
Post edited 8:06 pm – March 2, 2010 by Sunny Mehta
Keith,
Rather than delete your post, I'm going to respond to it methodically because your misinformation is the basis of interesting learning fodder for the readers here.
The main premise of your post is that losing money playing online poker is certain because of the rake. I'd like to point out that if this were true, it'd be true of playing in ANY poker establishment, not just online ones (i.e. live poker rooms charge a rake too).
You are absolutely right that the house always gets their rake, regardless of whether the players win or lose. So, the crux is that in order for a particular player to have long-term positive expectation, his winnings from beating the other players would have to sum up to more than the amount of rake he paid. Your position is that this is impossible because poker is not a game of skill. Unfortunately, that position does not hold up under mathematical scrutiny.
Imagine there were no skill in poker. That would mean every player's long term expectation would be [$0 minus rake]. Any observed deviation from that expectation would be due solely to random chance variation. And since there is luck in the universe, indeed some players would have won money after n number of hands, and some would have lost more than just the rake, but all of it would be due to pure chance, because there's no skill in poker. So if we wrote down every player's total winnings and losses after n number of hands, and we charted it on a big chart and connected the dots, that's what we call a distribution. And what would that distribution look like? We know exactly what it would look like – it would look like a big bell curve with a standard deviation equal to that of a pure chance distribution.(People have known about these distributions for ages. You can look up the binomial distribution for starters. I.e. if you flipped a coin a whole bunch of times and recorded the results, what would the distribution look like.)
Here's the problem with your theory. In today's day and age, we have the technology to actually look at everyone's results. Every online hand history gets recorded, and one can datamine the results of the entire population. And when we chart the distribution of observed results over n number of hands, it doesn't look your chance distribution. In other words, segments of the population have results that cannot be mathematically explained by random chance variation. Therefore, the only plausible explanations are that online casinos have the technology and incentive to purposefully rig the cards to make many certain players win and many certain players lose, or… poker is a game of skill.
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6:49 pm
March 2, 2010
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JJS
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Post edited 7:32 pm – March 2, 2010 by JJS
For a long time I have had my suspicions regarding your identity, but now I know who you are. You used to be the author of a now defunct web site “nomoregambling.com”. I know that because the post you made above is a verbatim reproduction of one of the posts made on that site by its author when the site was still operating.
You said, “Skillful play will never help gamblers to win money at online poker because winning money at online poker is impossible.”
All you just said is “winning money at poker is impossible because winning money at poker is impossible”. That’s known as a “tautology”. A tautology doesn’t prove anything, it just re-states the same thing twice.
Regarding your “example” with the 5 players buying in for $20 each, you pointed out the error yourself. All the players will not go broke at the same time. If one player is more skillful than the rest, that player would, on average, leave with more than $20, say $25 or $30, when all the rest are broke. Then this more skillful player will go to another table and repeat.
Now I’m not going to get into a discussion with you here. I know my argument above will not convince you, nor will any argument that I or anyone else can make. I remember how hardheaded you were when you used to run the forum at nomoregambling.com. Even when winning poker players posted at your site, you simply said they were either lying or just short-term winners.
It’s easy to maintain your beliefs when you choose to think that all evidence that contradicts your beliefs must be fabricated. The moon-hoax believers, the holocaust deniers and the flat earth believers all do the same thing that you do. And it’s just as impossible to argue with them as it is to argue with you.
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8:42 am
March 3, 2010
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reboot
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Here's the other problem with your position. I daresay the majority of us play poker as a hobby, not to make a living. Personally speaking, I've been playing online poker for almost 2 years now and I'm ahead… only very slightly, but ahead nonetheless. I've had a lot of hobbies in my life, but this is the only one that has never (so far) cost me anything.
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9:43 am
March 3, 2010
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Keith
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Sunny Mehta said:
In other words, segments of the population have results that cannot be mathematically explained by random chance variation.
Sounds great. Fact is, that's not true. Some players will, no doubt, have an exceptionally positive run of luck. Over a large enough sample, however, these runs will even out and these players will give it back. The money keeps changing hands until the casino has collected it all via the rake.
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10:46 am
March 3, 2010
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mullethaiku
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Here is the backstory on guys like "Keith" if I had to guess…
He lost a crapload of money gambling in the past (or someone close to him did), he has now "recovered", and has a personal vendetta against "The House" (Poker's version of "The Man"!) He now takes his hate out on ANYONE associated with gambling. (casual players, successful poker pros, authors, etc)
Ironically, his vendetta is probably also tied to him selling some kind of product or service to help gambling addiction. Which is all well and good, except I bet he's trying to make a little money off of these "gambling addict"s himself. Hmmm….making money of gambling addicts?….sounds familiar….oh yeah… "The House" you hate so much! 
Seriously "Keith" you are barking up the wrong tree here. If you want to help hardcore gambling addicts and degenerates, go to the horse track, dog track, sports betting rooms, slot machines, blackjack tables, craps tables, and roulette wheels. This is where "The House" is truly buttraping people.
Coming to this forum to stop gambling addiction, is like going to your local mechanic to stop the US Auto Industry collapse 
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3:55 pm
March 3, 2010
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AASooted
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Keith said:
Sounds great. Fact is, that's not true. Some players will, no doubt, have an exceptionally positive run of luck. Over a large enough sample, however, these runs will even out and these players will give it back. The money keeps changing hands until the casino has collected it all via the rake.
"Fact". Nice word. Shame it's based on your little thought experiment instead of the real world.
If we were talking about games played purely against the house, I'd agree with you completely. If we were constrained to play in a closed system until we ran out of money like your example, you'd have a point. The problem is we aren't. Whether you truly don't understand or are pretending not to understand to further your agenda, poker players have different skill levels. If I choose a table where my skill level is better than the other players at the table such that I win more than the rake takes from me, I'll win money if I play long enough to reduce the role variance plays in the results. If I sit at a table where all the other players are better than me, I'll eventually go broke.
Like the old joke says — I don't have to outrun the bear, I just have to outrun the slowest member of my party. I try to choose tables with some VERY slow members.
One thing I'll add is that I've cashed out a few thousand more I've deposited over the past 5 years, and if I start losing I'll stop playing. So it clearly isn't inevitable that I'll lose money.
You will continue, however, to insist that there is no skill involved in poker. You're not going to change your position. We're not going to change ours. Kind of makes this argument pointless, doesn't it?
So you just keep on refusing to understand that poker is not the same as roulette. I'll keep on playing poker as long as I can make a small side income from it. If you want to talk about games played purely against the house (and poker isn't), I'm sure we can find some agreement.
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4:27 pm
March 3, 2010
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mullethaiku
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Keith!!!!!! I have a terrific idea to drive your point home. Since in your opinion online poker requires NO skill. How about you play say 25 heads up poker matches against one of the authors to prove your point? Or better yet you can play me online if you like!!! By your rationale, we should probably end up splitting the games 13-12 or11-14 regardless of skill level. (there is no skill right?). Or if think we need a larger sample size, we can play 100+ heads up matches. I'll even let you pick the stakes we play at, or if you like, we can play with "fake money" online since gambling is against your religion. This will really prove your theory to all the doubters!
Lets put your theory to the test…and I'll even spot you some games if you want. However, I'll only do it under one condition, you can't go online or research any books on poker strategy. You see my dear Keithy Weethy, there are literally hundreds upon hundreds of poker books and internet forums dedicated to poker strategy, but oh yeah, according to you, there is ZERO skill involved, and NOTHING to learn.
PS- I wonder how Phil Ivey and Patrick Antonius became multi-millionaires? Hmm…maybe they won the lottery? invested in the stock market?……wait….oh yeah…they're professional poker players…strange…shouldn't they be broke by now?
Let me know when you are ready to start. But please go easy on me, as you well know, I am a very sick addict.
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5:58 pm
March 3, 2010
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JJS
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Keith said:
Sounds great. Fact is, that's not true. Some players will, no doubt, have an exceptionally positive run of luck. Over a large enough sample, however, these runs will even out and these players will give it back. The money keeps changing hands until the casino has collected it all via the rake.
The only thing this post proves is that you didn't understand anything Sunny said. Seriously, you are really just showing how ignorant you are, and making yourself look like a fool.
Please take your crusade somewhere else where you might do some good. As already said eariler, you need to go after the slot machine/roulette/craps etc. addicts. Those are the degenerate gamblers who lose their money in the long run. Books like the one written by the authors here need far too much time and thought, and gambling addicts don't have the time or inclination for that.
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8:38 am
March 4, 2010
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AASooted
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I'm starting to feel kind of bad for this guy. For whatever reason, he clearly feels like he needs to save people from themselves, and that's always an uphill battle.
The truth is that the vast majority of poker players don't have the ability and discipline to be winning players. Unfortunately, that's not a convincing argument to make to a gambler. Human nature being what it is, everyone thinks they're among the top x% that can learn to make money at the game. That leaves him with the lie (or misconception, if you want to be charitable) that NO ONE can win in the long run. Losing players would be better off if he could convince them it was true, but that doesn't make it so.
He'd be better off focusing his efforts on a place with a lower concentration of winning players, but I'm sure he'll be back in another few weeks with another of his cut-n-paste diatribes posted from a random guest account. It would be a lot more productive if he could understand the nature of the game, but I fear it's too emotional an issue for him to see the difference between poker and roulette.
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1:44 pm
March 9, 2010
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RML604
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You can take your (awful) argument and apply it to society and taxes too. To be consistent with your argument, you would also have to take the position that eventually, any taxed society will run out of money (ie the govt will have all of it), because the money just keeps getting taxed and taxed, which it does. When I make money, the govt takes a %. When I then spend the money that the govt hasn't taken yet, they make me pay more, so that they can have some of the money they didn't tax the first time around. And then after I have spent that money, somebody else will be taking that money in as income, where it will be taxed again. And so on and so forth, until eventually every dollar has been taxed and nobody but the govt is left with any money.
Obviously this doesn't happen, but why not? Because the govt is constantly distributing money back, by hiring people and by giving money out for whatever reasons. Same thing happens in a casino. The casino takes in money, but then it pays people salaries, and those people may play poker with that money. Or they may go spend it on groceries, which then turns into income for a grocery bagger, who takes it to a casino to spend money. You are ignoring that money is constantly flowing throughout society. The casino isn't a black hole where money goes to be lit on fire, it's a place where money flows in and eventually back out, just like the govt.
If your argument is that poker can't be profitable because of rake, then you also have to conclude that working can't be profitable because of taxes.
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11:17 pm
March 12, 2010
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skittles
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Post edited 11:19 pm – March 12, 2010 by skittles
Just think about it guys. Why should anyone really have an edge at poker? You get the same cards over the long run that every other player gets. Everyone is trying to do the same thing you are (i.e. get maximum value from good hands and bluff with garbage hands). I play poker, but just for fun (no money). I have heard some very informed people say that only 5% of poker players are significant winners.
In gambling terms, the odds are 19:1 AGAINST you being a significant winner. Contrast these odds with those offered by, say, intelligently investing in dramatically undervalued stocks. If you are patient and disciplined enough, your chances of being a significant winner are far superior to those offered by playing poker.
I suspect that making money from poker requires one to exploit tiny edges many times over. To me, this seems similar to day trading in the stock market. The stats are similar for daytraders in that only roughly 5% are significant winners.
Here's a question for the players that think they will be significant winners:
How often do you chase and catch that miracle draw when you're a 19:1 underdog?
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12:23 pm
March 28, 2010
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Jacob
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Post edited 12:31 pm – March 28, 2010 by Jacob
Sunny Mehta said:
segments of the population have results that cannot be mathematically explained by random chance variation. Therefore, the only plausible explanations are that online casinos have the technology and incentive to purposefully rig the cards to make many certain players win and many certain players lose, or… poker is a game of skill.
You have heard of the scandal at Absolute Poker, right? At a minimum, online casinos certainly have the technology to view all of the player's hole cards. As for incentive, how's money? You don't think the online casinos can manipulate various accounts (your so-called "segments of the population") solely for the purpose of making money? Of course if the casinos are smarter than Absolute, they won't allow these accounts to make an obscene winrate that draws attention. They will achieve a winrate that is just profitable enough to fool people into thinking it's skilled, but fair, play.
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7:48 am
March 29, 2010
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Sunny Mehta
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Jacob said:
You have heard of the scandal at Absolute Poker, right? At a minimum, online casinos certainly have the technology to view all of the player's hole cards. As for incentive, how's money? You don't think the online casinos can manipulate various accounts (your so-called "segments of the population") solely for the purpose of making money? Of course if the casinos are smarter than Absolute, they won't allow these accounts to make an obscene winrate that draws attention. They will achieve a winrate that is just profitable enough to fool people into thinking it's skilled, but fair, play.
I can't comment too much on what technologies different casinos have, and what risk and reward scenarios follow implementation of various techniques, because honestly I don't know. I only know that I personally have witnessed myself and quite a few others win money at online poker through fair means that would also pass the mathematical sniff test of being "beyond the capacity of luck alone." Further, I am generally not a conspiracy theorist, and imo empirical evidence and logic stand above most else.
Having said that, I absolutely think that being cognizantly skeptical of online casinos is a responsible attitude to take.
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8:51 am
March 29, 2010
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Jacob
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Sunny Mehta said:
I only know that I personally have witnessed myself and quite a few others win money at online poker through fair means
Like I said, casinos can manipulate accounts.
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12:35 pm
March 30, 2010
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Bob
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Jacob said:
Sunny Mehta said:
I only know that I personally have witnessed myself and quite a few others win money at online poker through fair means
Like I said, casinos can manipulate accounts.
You are utterly hopeless. You can't be reasoned with because you refuse to use logic in any of your arguments. You ignore evidence and fall back on ridiculous claims like "the site is rigging the cards to players. just like at ub." ub didn't rig cards for random players, there was one player who had a super user account that he used to make money. that's not even close to the same thing as full tilt rigging the deck so that random players make money, considering many of the substantial winners at full tilt are not affiliated with full tilt in any way.
In any event, here's the bottom line. Nobody is forcing you to play poker. Nobody is forcing you to buy this book or to visit this site or to even accept that poker is a game of skill (which is clearly is). So if you don't like online poker, don't play it. If you don't like live poker, don't play it. It really is that simple. There are those of us that enjoy online poker and even make money from it. If you don't like us, nobody is forcing you to talk to us or hang out with us or even think about us. Just ignore us, and we'll happily ignore you.
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9:36 am
March 31, 2010
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Jacob
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Bob said:
You ignore evidence and fall back on ridiculous claims like "the site is rigging the cards to players.
You need to take a good look at the evidence. Take a look through history at all the lying, cheating, and unscrupulous means with which casinos have used to stay profitable. Casinos and poker sites thrive when they lure people into believing that one can achieve an edge. For you to deny that online poker sites manipulate cards/accounts is just plain naive.
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6:23 pm
March 31, 2010
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Bob
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Fine, poker has no skill involved. To prove it you should play some of the best players in the world and show them that you're just as "good" as them since there is no such thing as being good at poker.
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9:38 pm
April 6, 2010
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jeffnc
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It's interesting to me that some people are repeating that Keith said there is no skill in the game. He clearly stated there is. Why is this point being debated? It makes your counterarguments seem poorly thought out, as if you didn't bother reading his post, but rather just had a kneejerk reaction.
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