the poker poets

Email sent to Full Tilt Poker Employees by Laurent Tapie

admin — Sun, 06 May 2012 20:36:18 +0000

Email sent to Full Tilt Poker Employees by Laurent Tapie
It seems Pokerstars has made a deal with DOJ for Full Tilt Poker and its player base. Which leaves the question: Why would they do that is they already had most of those players and didnt have exclusive rights to the software. It appear to me that (this is just a hypothesis based on industry knowledge and government), Full Tilt Poker must have made deal to avoid USA, let Pokerstars buy the poker software and license to the states, and partner with Tapie to create new site and license in Europe. Pokerstars becomes huge, makes money of state skins and shares that with Wynn, retains their Euro player base, and most importantly avoids anti trust laws in USA and Germany. Bitar and Ferguson stay out of jail, collaborate on new room with Tapie, keep some of their money, and wont have to pay back the poker player base.. This is purely a hypothesis at this point. Will report as more info comes in. Dear All, Considering the work we have been doing together to relaunch FTP over the last 7 months, I feel it is my duty to inform you on the current situation, and my plan, before I release a press statement in the coming hours. The deal with DOJ is off, and the negotiations are terminated. Ultimately, DOJ refused to accept GBTs proposal for repayment of the ROW players a proposal that we thought had been accepted and, on 14 April 2012, informed my lawyer that they could only agree on an agreement where GBT would repay 100% of the 184M$ value of ROW players balance in a maximum of 90 days. That clearly made the deal unworkable. And I believe no one would accept such terms. I continue to believe that our plan for repayment was fair. We would have made all ROW players balances available for play on the relaunched site immediately. Furthermore, we would have repaid (allowed withdrawal of funds for) 94.9% of ROW players day 1, 4.9% of ROW players in 18 months and only 0.2% of these players in more than 18 months, with a maximum of 5 years for the very large balances. In addition, we agreed to a DOJ proposal to allow ROW players to submit petitions to the DOJ for compensation as well, and agreed both to reimburse DOJ for those players and to compensate those players for any amounts DOJ did not reimburse. According to (finance employees name redacted by diamondflushpoker) last report, PK has enough funds to pay the april salaries but not May. Therefore, as an alternative to the purchase, I offered Ray Bitar to license the assets on a temporary basis, in order to relaunch the site, preserve the value of the assets and participate in an eventual auction as a bidder in the future. Ray required DOJs aproval to do this. My own understanding of the situation was different : I thought that since the companies were clearly in insolvency, as a legal representative Ray should have immediately accepted this licensing offer which was the only concrete offer to preserve the jobs, the cash, and the value of the assets of the companies. Futhermore the DOJ is not the owner of the assets until it decides (if it ever decides) to forfeit them. But Ray stayed on its position that DOJs aproval was necessary. So we made the offer to DOJ but despite our best efforts, and with no surprise on my side, DOJ was unmoved and, on 20 April 2012, reaffirmed that its decision was final, that no licensing agreement of any kind would be accepted by them, and that our negotiations were ended. I met Ray last friday and suggested him to place the companies into insolvency in each of the countries where they are (my understanding of the situation is that he legally should), and inform the staff that he can no longer guarantee their jobs. Considering he has always required US DOJs aproval before taking any decision for the last 7 months I have been observing him, I dont know if he has or if he will. But on my side, I am unwilling to allow 7 months of effort to go to waste, to see 200 employees lose their jobs and to witness former FTP players around the world go unpaid. For that reason, I have decided to devote a significant portion of the funds that I was planning to use for the acquisition of the FTP assets instead to launch my own company, under the auspices of Game Cubed, the company I have created in Ireland. I will do this only if I can attract ALL OF the Pocket Kings KEY STAFF to join me. With your help and know-how, we will launch a new website that will be best of breed in 6-7 months. I know that any such step requires a leap of faith, so here is my offer: as of May 1, I will hire the entire Pocket Kings key staff every single one of you at your current salaries and with your accumulated benefits intact. I also will include stock options in the new company, so that weall will share in what I believe to be the exciting upside this opportunity represents. We will write a new poker software platform based on your knowledge and relaunch using a new brand, with an offer to former FTP ROW players that will allow them to recover their lost balances if they come to our new site, just as we had planned in our agreement with DOJ. I have the money to make this happen and am working with the Alderney licensing authorities on obtaining a license and getting their help on the repayment plan. I am also negotiating with Poker Strategy to resurrect an affiliate arrangement similar to that which I was negotiating with FTP. In order to make this work, I need commitments from you all very quickly. I am sorry to put this pressure on you, but timing is critical if this is to work. I need to know whether I have sufficient critical mass to move forward no later than the end of THIS WEEK. If I do, I will schedule a meeting in Paris with the top 5-10 key peopleat the end of this week. We will take care of your travel and accomodation. I look forward to partnering with each of you to help build the best poker site in the business. Laurent Tapie Directeur Gnral BLT Dveloppement Source http://diamondflushpoker.com Play Online Poker Poker Blog Copyright 2008 – 2012 Pokerbloggs.comSubscribe to PokerBloggs.com

Player to Dealer and Management Ethics in Poker Tournaments

admin — Sat, 28 Apr 2012 04:18:29 +0000

Player to Dealer and Management Ethics in Poker Tournaments
Player to Dealer and Management Ethics in Poker Tournaments If you are required to respect the other poker players in the poker tournaments, be it a minor or major poker tournament, you are also required to respect the dealer and the management. The Poker Players and the Dealers Because the dealers treat the poker players who joined in the poker tournaments professionally, so should the poker players treat the dealers professionally. Before the start of the poker tournament, poker players agree to treat the dealers with a professional attitude as well as a respectful demeanor. If a dealer has decided against what a poker player wants, the player can ask the dealer about his decision but never with personal hostility. It cannot be helped that the dealers might commit mistakes and errors, and the players can always bring this to the attention of the dealer. But the player should never use any foul language or aggressive behavior in front of the dealer when discussing the decision. Likewise, the dealers themselves should treat the poker players equally and implement the poker tournaments rules constantly, not giving deference to a poker player over the others. The dealers must never put a stake on a poker players hands and financial outcome. This is strictly prohibited as this promotes biased and prejudiced treatment, making it an unfair fight for the other players. To avoid controversy and further squabbles, the poker players and the dealers must report any inappropriate behavior at the poker table to a supervisor. The Poker Players and the Management The poker players who have joined in the poker tournament should always respect the management and should always employ a professional manner towards the management because the management will always extend the same courtesy towards its players. There will be times when a decision the management has made might not work with what a poker player wants. The decision will be discussed by the management and the poker player, but the player should refrain from making any denigrating remarks during the poker tournament about the management until an official report has been filed to the poker tournament director or at least to his representative. A poker player can definitely question a decision the management has made, but this should be done in a very professional manner and without any personal hostility towards the management. The complaint should be submitted and should only be discussed with the appropriate supervisor or manager, but never in front of other poker players. Likewise, no foul language should be used.

Success in the $20,000 Guaranteed

admin — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 16:00:21 +0000

Success in the $20,000 Guaranteed
Posted by Steven, April 15, 2012 Player zekaspt from Portugal signed up at Titan Poker on Thursday and the next day he played the $20,000 Guaranteed, a re-buy event with a $30 + $3 buy-in that kicked off at 19:00 GMT+1. One hour later he began play in another $20,000 Guaranteed R/A; this one featured a $15 + $1.50 buy-in. In both events the Portuguese player finished in the money. The first tournament attracted 279 players and lasted just over seven hours. When heads-up play began, zekaspt was ahead of AlexeyZykov by a 2-1 margin. The Portuguese player managed to keep the lead through 8 hands until he called the A 9 all-in of his opponent holding jacks, one of which was a diamond. The flop and turn delivered four more diamonds to complete a flush, and zekaspt emerged with the first prize payout of $4,404.93. In the parallel tournament, zekaspt finished in fifth place for a payout of $1,151.82. In his final hand, zekaspt went all-in with A 9 and was called by a player holding A J. The flop was J 7 Q, and the pair of jacks was enough to knock out the Portuguese player. The $20,000 Guaranteed staged on Saturday night at 20:00 GMT+1 with a $10 + $1 buy-in attracted 734 starters. When only four players remained, all four were from Titan Poker. First to go was fgiretti from Argentina, who went all-in with his short stack and pocket cards of Q T. He was called by Russian player ihateluck who had pocket eights. A third eight appeared on the flop and the decks fourth eight appeared on the river. fgiretti was eliminated with a $1,518.90 prize. ihateluck was the next player to go. He went all-in with pocket tens and was called by German player memetic who had pocket aces. The flop delivered A T 3, and the set of aces won the hand. For his third place finish, ihateluck won $2,031.42. Heads-up play began with memetic faced up against fellow German pokertotti1972. The one-on-one battle continued for some time until a hand when memetic went all-in holding A J, only to find that his opponent held A K. An ace appeared on the flop, but the jack on the river gave memetica huge windfall in chips. Ten hands later, memetic hit a set of nines and eliminated pokertotti1972 to claim first prize of $3,726.86. For his second place finish, pokertotti1972 received $2,712.02.

Microgamingâ€™s Bad Beat Jackpot Reaches 500,000 Euro

admin — Mon, 16 Apr 2012 09:54:22 +0000

Microgamings Bad Beat Jackpot Reaches 500,000 Euro
The Microgaming online poker networks Bad Beat Jackpot has reached a value of 500,000. This is the first time that the Microgaming Poker Network (MPN) has reached an amount as high as this, and the largest online gaming software provider in the world has been very excited to share this news on its website and in a press release. A Bad Beat Jackpot is an online poker jackpot promotion that was set up to reward players who hold a specific good poker hand, and yet lose the game that they are playing. This makes the likelihood of winning the jackpot fairly unlikely, however, even though the odds are against winning the Bad Beat Jackpot, it will happen one day, and the winner will have a great prize when it does happen. The criteria to qualify as the Bad Beat Jackpot winner are as follows. The player needs to have played in a hand with four or more players, and the hand played needs to be a raked hand. The player needs to lose the hand, while holding a Four of a Kind that is made up of 8s. Both the hole cards need to have been in play, and the hand played needs to have gone to a showdown. The player also needs to be playing at a participating Bad Beat poker table. The Microgaming Poker Network Bad Beat Jackpot is now way ahead of many of the other Bad Beat Jackpot prize pools that are found on similar online poker networks. The excitement is certainly growing as the online casino software company, and those who play on the Microgaming Poker Network, wait to see who will hit this incredible Bad Beat Jackpot prize. The Microgaming Poker Network Bad Beat Jackpot will continue to grow until it is hit by a lucky Microgaming poker player. Related Posts Launch of Circle Line Poker Last Chance Saloon at Paddy Power Poker Bodog Poker to Move into Asian Market PokerStars Sunday Million 6th Anniversary Colt Poker and GGE $10K Giveaway Share on Facebook, Twitter, MySpace…

Reflections on the Full Tilt Poker Smear Campaign

admin — Sun, 08 Apr 2012 01:54:13 +0000

Reflections on the Full Tilt Poker Smear Campaign
published on 09/21/11 at 4:18 pm With all the news coming out about Full Tilt Poker and a so-called Ponzi scheme, I felt the need to say something. First, let me start by saying that Full Tilt Poker is a class organization that has treated this organization and overseas bank accounts fairly throughout the years. Howard Lederer and Jesus Ferguson are honest, trust worthy individuals. Not to mention, Rafe Furst, although he did move to Mexico, I can only say his work with charities and the Bad Beat on Cancer have garnered the utmost respect from me. Second, it is a shame to see the U.S. government stick their noses into something that was good for the poker industry, the nations economy, and an individuals self esteem. The majority of players online are terrible and just give money to the lucky few. But these players kept depositing funds into their accounts, helping my lifestyle with a variety of extravagant needs. So what a player did not know about the inner processes of Full Tilt, did not hurt them. They would never have withdrawn funds in the first place. Third, all these dopes posting about a 400 million dollar hole in Full Tilt Pokers finances, do not know one thing about international finance. 99% of their money is in overseas accounts. To get their money into U.S. accredited bank accounts takes several months, due to the Patriot Act. I believe Mr. Lederer and Mr. Ferguson are just waiting for the funds to go through the proper channels and everyone will be promptly paid. So let us stop slinging the proverbial mud at Full Tilt Poker. We need to let this show trial run its course and in the end, you shall all see that they are innocent of all charges. About PokerPlasm, Inc.PokerPlasm, Inc., is privately held so no financial statements are made public. Forward-looking statements in no way relate to, among other things, expectations of the business environment in which the Company operates, projections of future performance, potential future performance, perceived opportunities in the market, and statements regarding the Companys mission and vision. The Companys actual results, performance, and achievements differ materially from the results, performance, and achievements expressed or implied in such forward-looking statements due to a wide range of factors. Mr. Sonny Partrude is Acting CEO until the board elects one to a full-term. Related posts: PokerPlasm Executives Discuss Options for Increasing Profits Cracking the Full Tilt Poker Code Full Tilt Magazine Press Release Are Online Players Cheating at Full Tilt Poker? Full Tilt Poker Pro, Cuzzinlaw, Spends Quality Time With Street3

Is Facebook buying Full Tilt Poker?

admin — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 09:36:07 +0000

Is Facebook buying Full Tilt Poker?
Poker March 30th, 2012 A rumor is going around that Facebook is buying Full Tilt Poker. I dont know if this is true or not but I doubt it is actually Facebook. If this were at all true, it would be Peter Thiel who is one of the original founders of Paypal, original investor in Facebook, and investor in Zynga Poker. It is possible that Bernard Tapie was the broker for the deal. Peter Thiel Image Recently, Zynga poker announced that it was going to create a desktop application for Zynga Poker that would be real money. They spend tens of millions on advertising and recently bought OMGPOP.com for 180 Million dollars because of its big hit Draw Something. It would totally be plausible that they would buy Full Tilt Poker to further their real money poker interests. Im not sure if it is Zynga or Zynga with Peter Thiel behind them. He has all the ties: Paypal, Facebook, Zynga, and his hedge fund Clarium Capital Management LLC. If Zynga could dish out 180 million for an online Pictionary called OMG POP, it is completely possible that they would buy Full Tilt Poker. Play Online Poker Poker Blog Copyright 2008 – 2012 Pokerbloggs.comSubscribe to PokerBloggs.com

U.S. House to Hold Online Poker Hearing

admin — Sat, 24 Mar 2012 21:00:39 +0000

U.S. House to Hold Online Poker Hearing
Submitted on Tue, 2010-05-18 00:00 The U.S. House Ways and Means Committee will meet on May 19, 2010 at 9:30 am in the Longworth House Office Building. The focus of the hearing is to consider the fate of online poker in the U.S. in connection with “The Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act” (UIGEA) that is scheduled to go into effect on June 1, 2010. Invited Testimony The U.S. House committee press release has said that the point is to “hear witnesses, oral testimony at this hearing will be from invited witnesses only.” The release also notes, “However, any individual or organization not scheduled for an oral appearance may submit a written statement for consideration by the Committee and for inclusion in the printed record of the hearing.” What is the UIGEA? This law prohibits anyone from accepting payments from someone if they know those payments are connected to illegal Internet gambling. However numerous Representative and Senators have been involved in excluding poker, which is considered to be a game of skill, from the law. Importance of this Meeting The meeting could be the start of the a movement in the U.S. House and Senate that would legalize online poker. There are numerous bills on tap that are designed to protect online poker in the U.S.

Strategy with Kristy: Quinn Sivage Discusses Min-Raising Button

admin — Fri, 23 Mar 2012 08:18:16 +0000

Strategy with Kristy: Quinn Sivage Discusses Min-Raising Button
February 16 2012, Kristy Arnett Related Articles Strategy with Kristy: John Kim Part Two Strategy with Kristy: John Kim Part One Strategy with Kristy: Jared Tendler on the Mental Game of Poker Pt 1 Share It Tags PokerNews Strategy, PokerNews Podcast, Poker Strategy, Online Poker Print Quinn Sivage is a professional poker player who specializes in using stats to crush mid-stakes online poker cash games. Last week on the Strategy with Kristy podcast, Sivage discussed using statistics for optimal preflop strategy in six-max no-limit hold’em games. This week, he answers listener questions and also talks about why it is so profitable, in online cash games, to raise the minimum when it folds to you on the button. Here is a snippet from the interview: The fact is that the button is such a ridiculously good position. You dont need to make it any bigger than a min-raise. Heres the really cool thing. If you min-raise, it makes their [a player from the small or big blind] three-bet a little bit worse because now there is just less in the pot. There is only 1.5 big blinds to win from the pot and your two big blinds. Its only 3.5 big blinds that they are trying to win by three-betting out of position. So, it makes your raise a stronger play, it makes their counter-move weaker, and it makes your counter-counter move, the four-bet, stronger, as well. Because you kept the pot small, you can make your four-bet ridiculously small like 17 or 18 big blinds to win almost that much. That makes their next move, the five-bet shove, even more unattractive because there are only 30 to 35 big blinds in the pot, and having to risk 100 big blinds. Min-raising the button makes all of your counter actions stronger, and it makes your opponents ways to defend it, weaker. The button is just a really tough position to mess up. If you want to make it bigger, sure if there is a recreational player in the blinds and you just want to build a nice big pot. But, in general I think the min-raise is better. Then, you can start to play more buttons. There are guys who will min-raise every button if it’s folded to them. I’m not going to advocate whether or not you should be stealing 100 percent there. You just have to know what the consequences are of whatever your button-steal percentage is. Sure, it can be 100 percent, you just have to realize that, and you might have to make some adjustments. Podcast Powered By Podbean Tune in every week for new episodes of Strategy with Kristy. Feel free to send in questions, ideas or suggestions for the podcast to kristy@pokernews.com. Also remember to follow PokerNews on Twitter for up-to-the-minute news. Follow Kristy Arnett on Comments

Austrian Player Keeps on Streaming

admin — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 21:54:21 +0000

Austrian Player Keeps on Streaming
Posted by Bradley, February 23, 2012 Austrian poker player Michael Huber, who plays at Titan Poker under the nickname mainstreamer, has represented Titan Poker in events staged in Morocco, England and Prague. He has also proved skillful at some of Titan Pokers largest guaranteed prize tournaments. Last night he outlasted 603 other players to win 1st place in the Wednesday $30,000 Gtd. for a payout of $6,272.28. In December, Huber won the $25,000 Guaranteed for a prize of $10,746. Commenting on that win, Huber said, “I got lucky here and there in this tournament, but thats poker, sometimes you need some luck to win a tournament.” In last nights tournament, Huber began heads-up play against xicopept with a 2-1 advantage in chips. He managed to retain the lead through most of the 44 hands the two played until finally his pocket queens defeated his opponent, who was unable to complete a straight while holding J T. For his second place finish in the match, xicopept received $4,540.05. Huber played on Titan Pokers behalf at the DeepStack Open Marrakech in October 2010, at the Grosvenor UK Poker Tour (GUKPT) Luton in August 2011, and at the iPOPS Live Main Event in Prague in December. At the GUKPT 1,000 + 70 Main Event, Huber finished in seventh place for a prize of 7,420. Two days later he took first place in the GUKPTs 100 No Limit Hold’em – Bounty event for a prize of 1,395.

Pius Heinz wins 2011 WSOP

admin — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 04:18:15 +0000

Pius Heinz wins 2011 WSOP
The 2011 World Series of Poker Main Event title has finally been claimed. Pius Heinz, a 22-year-old professional poker player from Cologne, Germany, took the title holding Ace-King against Martin Staszko’s Ten-Seven. Neither hand improved and Heinz took home $8.7 million with ace-high. Not only was Heinz the first German to win the Main, he was the first to sit at the final table. Over 6800 players from 85 different nations started the event over 13 days, with a prize pool of $64,540,858. The top 693 cashed and the tournament broke, as usual, over a period of five months between the body of the event and the final table, the “November Nine.” Notably, third-place finisher Ben Lamb was looking to culminate a sick, sick run at the WSOP. He place in five consecutive tournaments, making the final table of four of them, and winning one of them. This unheard-of streak locked him up solidly for the WSOP Player of the Year title. For the first time, the Main Event was broadcast (almost) live. There was a delay of several minutes to limit the ability of players to exploit the private pocket card cameras. Although this could potentially allow players to learn about very recent hands during breaks, creating a unique angle on the most important final table of the year. The continuing high turnout of the WSOP is taken as proof that the allure of poker continues throughout the world despite a federal crackdown against online poker. # Player Earnings Country 1 Pius Heinz $8,715,638 Germany 2 Martin Staszko $5,433,086 Czech Republic 3 Ben Lamb $4,021,138 United States 4 Matt Giannetti $3,012,700 United States 5 Phil Collins $2,269,599 United States 6 Eoghan O’Dea $1,720,831 Ireland 7 Bob Bounahra $1,314,097 Belize 8 Anton Makiieveskyi $1,010,015 Ukraine 9 Sam Holden $782,115 United Kingdom Copyright 2012 Ace Nine, LLC Legal | Contact Us | Site Map