Great Lee Jones Article

Hectorjelly

This sums up thoughts Ive had for a long time, I think all the software that goes with Online Poker ultimately distracts from it and could speed its decline. At the moment Ill use PT, or holdem manager or whatever; but id much rather no-one used anything.


The Anonymous Userid for Online Poker PDF

By Lee Jones

Important note: I used to work for PokerStars; I don’t any more. What I’m writing here is my opinion, and not necessarily PokerStars’ opinion. Please don’t confuse the two.

An interesting thread has started up on 2+2 – the original poster suggests that online poker players be identified as simply "Player1", "Player2", or other relatively random names. His argument, of course, is that this will render useless much of the player tracking software that the serious online players use.

I’ve been in favor of something like this for a while now. In fact, about a year ago, I wrote a proposal to do just this and passed it around to a few colleagues.

My basic proposal was that a player be given the option to have a one-time disposable userid for a single session. For simplicity, let’s define a session as the time from when you log into your poker client to the time you log out. If you don’t care to be anonymous – if you want everybody to know that you’re "Sheets", "Curtains", or any other home decorating item – fine. But players who wish to be anonymous can be.

Here is my argument:

Any healthy ecosystem relies on some kind of balance between the predators and the prey. I won’t bore you with real world examples - it’s easy enough (and fascinating) to look ‘em up. Unfortunately, due to various human tendencies, there are also plenty of real world examples of what happens when that balance is messed up (the ecosystem goes all out of whack).

Online poker is, in some important senses, an ecosystem. There are sharks and fish - we even call them that. With the slight modification that a fish who is eaten (busted) may be reborn (by bringing in outside money). [1]

As we know, evolution happens. [2] However, in this case, the two groups are moving in opposite directions:

A. The sharks are evolving - tools to improve their hunting ability are coming out weekly, and the existing ones are improving. Heads-up display tools, database websites, training websites, equity calculation software, the list goes on.

B. The fish are devolving. Specifically, it continues to be confusing and/or difficult to get money onto many poker sites. That means that when a fish is eaten, it’s harder for him to be reborn. Furthermore, my sense is that the deposit issues (at least for U.S. players) are not going away any time soon, and may well get worse before they get better. This also, of course, creates a high barrier to new fish birth – another bad sign for the prey population.

I am concerned that if these two trends continue unabated, the overall health of the ecosystem could be in jeopardy. Furthermore, it’s not in a shark’s nature (either the members of the Class Chondrichthyes or the human variety) to worry about the meta-problem of ecosystem health. They simply eat whenever and however much they can.

To put this a bit more bluntly, I don’t think that most of the poker sharks give sufficient thought to the implications of ever-improving fish detection and consumption technology. Their attitude seems to be, "Hey – this is online poker, the tools are here, we use them. If the sites say it’s legal, we do it."

But it is in the sites’ best interest (and, of course, ultimately all the players’ best interests) to maintain a reasonable balance between the sharks and the fish. And I believe a session-long userid would restore that balance. You could still use PokerTracker, et al to track your opponents during a specific session, which would clearly provide some benefit. But the massive databases (both locally maintained and served over the web) would suddenly lose most of their value.

Look, the good players will still beat the bad players. It’s been like that since the beginning of the game, and even if www.sngratemaster.com suddenly becomes useless, the cream will still rise to the top.

There’s another factor that I want to mention: in a natural ecosystem, the fish are there pretty much by definition. They continue to reproduce because, well, that’s what fish do. And so (other factors aside) there’s always a population of prey for the sharks. This is not true of the poker ecosystem. The amateur players, the occasional dabblers, the nervous newbies don’t have to play. If they discover that their $25 deposit on PokerStars is lasting half the time that it used to, well, they may decide to do something else where they get better value for their entertainment dollar.

As if that weren’t enough, there are a bunch of boorish fools who routinely use the published rankings to berate other players (either at the tables or in online poker forums). So this information is being used as ammunition by clueless idiots whose egos make them put down other players, at the cost of civility, the quality of the game, etc. Yet another reason to make the information go away.

Some people will argue that my proposal is inconsistent with live poker – that you can’t be a different person every time you walk into the Bellagio or Commerce (modulo sophisticated disguises). So what? I tell anybody that will listen that online poker is not live poker – they are similar in many ways, but extremely different in others. But more to the point, they are separate ecosystems, and each must be managed differently. Unlike online poker, money can move freely in and out of the live poker economy. And unlike online poker, the technology available to the live poker sharks isn’t improving, except the fairly asymptotic improvement in the available literature.

I think that the first major poker site to institute the "one-time disposable userid" option will benefit significantly, particularly over the long-term. I also expect that within 3-5 years at most, such options will be standard within the industry and people will take them for granted.

TrueDub

I'd be very much in favour of this - I have PT & all that goes with it, but I'd sooner they weren't used across the board.

RoundTower

Hectorjelly wrote:

I think that the first major poker site to institute the "one-time disposable userid" option will benefit significantly, particularly over the long-term. I also expect that within 3-5 years at most, such options will be standard within the industry and people will take them for granted.

I like the idea but I'm not sure I agree with this paragraph. Bodog doesn't work with Poker Tracker (I think?) and hasn't become a major force.

BobSloane

Sounds good to me. I only use the gametime thing in PT anyway. Then again I only play 1 table, or when i'm feeling frisky, two - so i just watch whats going on in terms of who is agressive/passive in what spots etc. Not so long ago before I got PT my table assessment method was to join a table, sit-out while smoking a fag and watching what was happening for 10 or 15 hands and take it from there. It worked ok!

sumoward

he amateur players, the occasional dabblers, the nervous newbies don’t have to play. If they discover that their $25 deposit on PokerStars is lasting half the time that it used to, well, they may decide to do something else where they get better value for their entertainment dollar.

This is the crux of the argument.

I fit in here and If I no Longer get enjoyment out of playing Ill go do something else.

Keeping the live money in the game or not Killing the Golden Goose should be the priority for the companies involved in sites and the serious players on them.

As an aside wouldnt "Golden Goose" be a great online name.

DeadParrot

I totally agree. I'm not a fan of PT and PO (in fairness I havent extensivly used either)
I'm a single table guy (more down to the laptop than anything else) and like the idea of ME recognising the flaws and patterns of an opponent

mewso

I would have no serious objections to the idea. I would expect notes I take on a player to last through sessions though. O.k. lets cut out the accurate percentages but if I note someone is a weak tight player I should see that note the next time. I think hes overplaying the damage thats being done a bit. It's pure guesswork to say the fish are losing their $25 in half the time. As he says the good players will still win but is his point that they will win more slowly? How can we know?

strewelpeter

This suggestion has its merits. However I would be afraid that the sole reason that it would be implemented by the sites is that it would give them a get out of jail free card on the issue of monitoring and policing sophisticated collusion and bots. It would certainly make detection of them almost impossible by players.

LuckyLloyd

This post has been deleted.

MrPillowTalk

I think this would be healthy for online poker, however Id like to have my notes on a player transfer as they change id.

PT is overused anyway tbh

fuzzbox

MrPillowTalk wrote:

I think this would be healthy for online poker, however Id like to have my notes on a player transfer as they change id.

You would like to both have your cake AND eat it then !!!

MrPillowTalk

fuzzbox wrote:

You would like to both have your cake AND eat it then !!!

Indeed, I think the value of this will be the illusion of anoynimity for the casual user, allthough saying that it would be nice to turn up as a complete unknown.

Inquitus

As a self professed newb to the world of online poker, I received advice from the good people on this board about the availability of software assistance, most notably PT and GT+.

I have since dowloaded and installed them and find they give imo, and at the levels I play ($.25 / $.50), a considerable boost to my game. You can spot the fish as soon as they sitdown, spot the multitable rocks to avoid clashing with unless you have the cards, check notes etc etc. And I am only starting out in this, I presume some of the people on here have the ranges people play, betting patterns etc all keyed in. This gives them a big edge over those who have nothing installed.

Inqui

cardshark202

I would think that within 3-5 years the online poker 'ban' in the US will have been lifted and hopefully the APPT and other asian poker events will have spread the popularity of poker around some asian countries. This will hopefully help to boost the flagging ecosystem and poker will be as profitable as it was like 3 years ago!

Imposter

strewelpeter wrote:

This suggestion has its merits. However I would be afraid that the sole reason that it would be implemented by the sites is that it would give them a get out of jail free card on the issue of monitoring and policing sophisticated collusion and bots. It would certainly make detection of them almost impossible by players.

Despite what the sites keep saying they have virtually no detection systems in place to catch anybody who is even semi-intelligent from cheating. They have also generally shown an unwillingness to investigate a lot of reasonable claims that others are cheating.

Players having changing usernames would still have to have their accounts behind them so nothing would change from that side for the online companies.

This would be good as it would cut down on the multitablers who play 8+ tables or at the very least it would seriously damage their win rates. This imo has to be a good thing.

It would also basically only allow PT/PO/etc and PokerAce to be used for a single session and to evaluate your own play. Ideally the first of these wouldn't be possible either but that looks like an arms race problem that's unlikely to be rectified. Other illegal tools (from the pokersites perspective), such as dataminers, large DB's and table selection tools, that a lot of the multitablers use would also become useless which has to be a good thing.

dvdfan

Would it really make that much difference to the real fish, how long is it going to take to spot a 50/30 or 70/10 player, 20-30 hands maybe.

If you allowed notes to be kept across all sections then it wouldnt be long before someone came up with a program that merges aliases and combine the stats so i dont think that would be an option but then again you can only fit 3-4 lines of notes on ipoker anyway.

You just have to look at sites like pkr.com to see how important stats are to poker players, how many people here or on 2+2 post hands from that site even though its absolutely crawling with fish, the reason i would speculate is 1) Multitabling is awkward at best 2) Stats and notes are not available. This dosent effect the fish but it does effect your typical multitabler/stats player and I wouldnt like to be the first site to take this away from their regular players unless there was some sort of deal that they all do it because they would undoutably lose regular customers even if the fish stay.

Imposter

The players will stay if the fish are there. Look at Party as a great example of that. Absolutely awful support and terrible software and yet the fish kept coming and the good players weren't leaving for stars were they?

NickyOD

I really like the article. However one thing I've come to realise about fishy poker players is that the vast majority of them don't stop playing, and continue to play at levels and games which are way above their abilities, no matter how much they lose. I think the reason for this is because everyone who plays poker believes they have it within them to be an expert at the game in a very short space of time. Also it's really amazing the lengths that bad poker players go to get a game and the rake that they pay just to get their gamble on.

The one and only serious deterrent to the fish is abuse which Lee touched on. I personally think it's the most important thing for a professional or a winning player to realise is that you've got to keep the fish happy, be friendly, and don't be upset when they win.

This biggest worry for me about on-line databases is that players could look up their own stats and read in black and white that they are rated as useless. This may hit home the message that maybe they should do something about it, or worse still give up.

I'd rather everyone was left in the dark.

DeVore

They dont stop playing so long as they aren't made to feel like main course in a feeding frenzy.

When they see the same people following them around it goes from feeling like a fun activity to one step short of being mugged. No one wants to feel like they are a loser.

DeV.

Ste05

DeVore wrote:

When they see the same people following them around it goes from feeling like a fun activity to one step short of being mugged. No one wants to feel like they are a loser.

Speaking from experience??

mrflash

it sounds good, but is it realistic? there would be a lot of extra data managment involved and that would mean a lot more employees for the sites, which would probably mean that a bigger rake would be on the horizon, and then we all lose. but i would be all for it as i am a big fan of live poker and this would make things a lot more similar. The thing i most agree with in this article is that they are different games. as a matter of fact i would say that the only thing similar is that there are usually either nine or six players at every table.

Macspower

Might bring back some fish.... on a side note I was talking to a guy in the SE the other night... he was siting to my right and telling me that guys online are using software like pokertracker etc etc... so he doesn't play online anymore.. he used to lodge about 500 a month to PPP and now doesn't play at all as the money is gone in one session!!!!

lol you'll like this bit..... He then goes on to tell me that poker tracker predicts his cards and thats why he can't win.....

wonder if it's the advanced version.. didn't get it with mine :rolleyes:

opr

Macspower wrote:

he used to lodge about 500 a month to PPP and now doesn't play at all as the money is gone in one session!!!!

lol you'll like this bit..... He then goes on to tell me that poker tracker predicts his cards and thats why he can't win.....

While this is funny its also one of the big problems surrounding all the software. I have heard from lots of people that refuse to play online due to urban legends like this.

RoundTower wrote:

I like the idea but I'm not sure I agree with this paragraph. Bodog doesn't work with Poker Tracker (I think?) and hasn't become a major force.

I think ?? This hasn't exactly being well advertised if it is true.

If thier were a site that was well known for not allowing any software of anykind to be used and could clearly show this is be true like the player1 etc suggestion it would attract players.

Most of all i think that players need to be given the illusion that they are on a level playing field which a site like this could provide.

Opr

ocallagh

The following would be a good compromise.

Everyone is called Player1, Player2 etc.

The site itself stores a handful of basic statistics on players. VPIP/PFR and AF maybe.

IF you have played with PlayerX before, the site idenifies this and reveals the stats for any hands PlayerX has played while you were sitting at the table with him. The site will let you know how many hands these statistics are based on.

The more you play the more stats you have.

Likewise if you've never played at the same table with the guy you won't know anything about them.

Similar to B&M.

Allowing you to take notes would be a potential disaster. It would allow people to start forming groups to share stats, using a unique identifier (a number or name) stored in the notes to identify players and share the information. Likewsie, the site would have to round off any stats to the nearest whole number so you could not identify a player by their actual statistics. ie: 67.13/0.45/15.97 stats would be uniqe enough that you could identify someone, but 65/0.5/15 might not.

Ste05

TBH I can't see how this could ever happen. All the sites have to do is ban certain pieces of software, even just Heads Up displays would do it IMO.

There used to be a piece of software for Party Poker (expanded into other sites after) called Poker Prophecy or similar and Party banned it because it used a centralised database and gave you info on every player at the table, (STT's) party banned it and scanned your computer to see if you had it running. If you did, your account could be locked and funds confiscated.

Obviously there were ways around it developed by the programmer such as when you installed/updated it re-named it something random so Party couldn't find it easily, then started advising people to run it on a seperate computer, or whatever, I had it and when Party made it illegal, punishable by account closure and fund forfeiture, I stopped. Because of fear of being caught and because of all the hoops you had to jump through for something that wasn't even all that good, (I think it basically just told you the same thing Sharkscope does, but did it automatically) I'm not sure if it's still available or what it's called now, but I presume it's still around somewhere.

So I think the sites just have to ban PT or HUD's because randomly playing different names just wouldn't do it for me, personally I'd love noone to know who I was, but on the flip side I'd also like to know who else is at my table.

Also I agree with Cardshark, that in 2-3 years the US players will be back playing on Harrahs.com or similar and the US government will be getting their cut and it'll all be rosy again. [At least I fecking hope so!!]

58o

Anything that puts an end to "statistics poker" drudgery would be great. People forget that not everyone plays poker primarily to make money. Quite a lot of people play poker for the enjoyment of it, somthing they wont find at a 1/2 table full of joyless grinding statto tightwad nits.

ocallagh

what about an option of stat free tables.

LuckyLloyd

This post has been deleted.

Imposter

This should be a small change for the sites that causes no change to their security and no change to how the game plays out for players, other than your notes and the ability to know who you are playing against.

Each player would have an account name and a screen name. So for example my account name is imposter and my screenname is Seat1, Seat2 etc (or something I specify it doesn't matter). The poker site knows that I am imposter and can therefore do their usual checks for collusion (ie check who is in Seat2, how often I've played them etc..). The other players can't do this but the sites can. Then it's a matter of trusting the sites (they'd need some independent monitoring or something in reality).

Please point out any flaws in that if I am missing something!

cardshark202

Most players caught colluding have been reported by other players first.

Imposter

cardshark202 wrote:

Most players caught colluding have been reported by other players first.

Based on playing together all the time or stupid betting patterns and the like?

mrflash

well obviously if you are colluding, its clear that you will make certain strange moves, i mean you're not doing it to lose! i myself have spotted and reported this carry on, it happened on stars. player one was the big stack and kept pushing with terrible hands every time his buddy player 2 had a monster hand, it became clear after a couple of orbits of five and four handed play. so i made it clear on the chat window that i would report them. suddenly it all stopped and i ended up winning the heads up against player one, and it was so easy too, he didnt put up a fight, probably hoping that my winning would throw me off the scent. the scary thing about it was that i sharked both of them and found they were both up over 20k in sng's.

if this idea works and it would be the best thing for the online poker scene, it would not change anything in regards to site security. the security is a different thing entirely, and its clear from my own experience that they do check things out, however i doubt if they can detect it without it being reporting by other players.

jayhawk

My view is that some of the fundamental supplementary online poker tools are benefits to the beginning player, not impediments, if beginners were only to use them. One might just as well ban instructional books.

And the three primary programs are all after-the-fact, after all...

PokerTracker is a vital personal record-keeper and database, an invaluable source for self-criticism and growth, and an important indicator as to where, what and for how much one should play. This is information much more valuable to the beginner than to the shark.

Sharkscope, although admittedly less than welcome by the sites themselves, evens the field against the data-miners -- everyone’s record (although not totally accurately) is exposed to everyone else, for a small fee. Again, valuable information for the beginner. Who, at no cost, can opt out of the database at Sharkscope with one email, and still avail of the information on others.

PHG scripts some of us use to counter anti-data-mining programming are, I believe, unfair. We should, at a minimum, have to watch a table to compile statistics on tendencies. (Which is entirely different from one’s win/loss record.)

The case for PokerAce HUD is less clear. It certainly can’t click a mouse for you for all your chips. It does, without any effort, tell you, after some hand history, who is weak-tight and who is loose-aggressive. But it will just confuse you when Mr Tight morphs into Mr Maniac under ten blinds on the bubble in an SNG, or when Mr Limp/Fold shifts gears as the stacks and blinds progress in a large MTT. (I’ll admit I wouldn’t want to play a cash game without it, although I’m still a lifetime cash loser with it.)

I believe multi-tabling is a far greater abuse and presents the biggest danger of over-fishing. Were I King-of-the-Online-Poker-Universe, players would be limited to one table at a time, at any given buy-in. (One $55, one $2/$4 at the same time, for instance, OK.) Let peers play with peers, or those who fancy themselves peers, at full price. No more spacegraveys playing (12) $15 turbos at a time, all day long. (These lower limit, high volume grinders also play for less than us normals, effectively, thanks to rakeback and/or player point systems that encourage this behavior.)

I would also eliminate buddy lists; the notion of looking up your “friends,” abetted by the sites themselves, is ridiculous. (And most players maintain shark and fish lists where they play regularly, anyway, either on electronic paper, or in their heads.)

Mr Jones is correct, I believe, in that online poker is vastly different from the brick and mortar version. But I do not agree that’s a bad thing. Tools like PokerTracker make the online game what it is, and better. It is far more likely that greed (questionable confiscations, slow payments, exchange rate fiddles), fraud (bots, colluders) and mismanagement will kill the cyber-poker goose -- a goose that’s only golden for the sites themselves and no more than some 6% of those who play regularly, anyway.

As for those who argue that poker is (or should be) entertainment, I’d offer that there is plenty of lively action at the very lowest and very affordable limits, where the water is too shallow for the sharks to swim.

mrflash

I believe multi-tabling is a far greater abuse and presents the biggest danger of over-fishing.


agree with you on that one.

mrflash

Mr Jones is correct, I believe, in that online poker is vastly different from the brick and mortar version. But I do not agree that’s a bad thing.

Please expand on this statement

mrflash

As for those who argue that poker is (or should be) entertainment, I’d offer that there is plenty of lively action at the very lowest and very affordable limits, where the water is too shallow for the sharks to swim.

are you telling the high street executive who likes to unwind three nights a week with a little bit of online poker that he is not allowed play a 1/2 cash game, because he is not up to the standard or that if he does, he deserves to lose all his money. what sort of a statement is this. you must understand that most people dont want to play for pennies, they dont mind sitting down with up to 200 bucks as long as they feel they are on a level playing field.

mewso

The basic idea of changing players names per session is sound. Scramble it up with more cooky ideas of restriction and it will go to far in the other direction.
Hey why don't we get live card rooms to force players to wear different masks every time they play. If we could get 9 players to buy different dog masks....

mrflash

anyone know how to set up one of them voting things. it would be very interesting to see how many people are in agreement with lee jones and how many are not. and of course you have undecided and in agreement but not all the way.

Imposter

musician wrote:

The basic idea of changing players names per session is sound. Scramble it up with more cooky ideas of restriction and it will go to far in the other direction.
Hey why don't we get live card rooms to force players to wear different masks every time they play. If we could get 9 players to buy different dog masks....

Once datamining and multitabling exist in live poker then I would think the masks will become neccessary. Until then that's just silly

cardshark202

Imposter wrote:

Based on playing together all the time or stupid betting patterns and the like?

Yes that and the fact that the site sin't going to review every single hand played on it, unless someone has given them a reason to i.e. a player complains.

Samba

Even Eco systems can adapt....

The sharks will start to prey on the weaker sharks. There are many many players who are kept afloat by constantly stacking poor players, put them at a table full of good non nits and they will generally get run over.

There are many levels of sharks and the lower levels will become the fish.

It's a nice idea imo and it would be interesting to put into practice it would be beneficial to both fish and sharks in many respects.


This article however is mainly aimed at the American market and is largely referring to the tough tables now found on Stars and Tilt.

I have to disagree with Mr. Jones. Imo the continual development of online poker tools is not responsible for the current state of online poker in the U.S

It boils down to the U.S legislation, before the Americans were spread across a very wide array of poker sites, since the legislation has passed all the players have now been syphoned into a handful of poker rooms.



I could conclude my post with my latest conspiracy theory but i'll leave that for another day.

hotspur

Bad poker players lose because they are bad, not because people know that they are bad. All it would afford fish are a few hands of grace before any competent player would spot them for what they are anyway. I think the issues of anonimty / pokertracker and the fish - shark ecosystem are fairly unrelated.

And you know the players I get most out of having good pokertracker stats on? - the good tag multitablers. Avoid getting involved with them light and the rest is easy. Good players don't need software to beat bad players, and no software will help bad players beat good ones. Fish will be caught whether others use a fishing rod or dynamite, the technology doesn't matter. The software edge exists between decent players.

I have only recently started using a HUD and properly using PT, and I find it great. If you introduce total anonymity per session then you are deskilling the game. Why take a single session as the unit of anonymity? If you are going to deskill the game why not randomise the player's names and seats each hand too so you can never have any patterns on a player? If you play live then you play against a lot of the same people all the time, online anonymity would not replicate live play.

Deskilling the game as a way to keep the fish involved is a silly industry concept, it should have no support from good winning online cash players. Bad players who have quit have quit because they were bad, the existence of software is not responsible for their losses and is just an excuse if any of them think it is. Multiaccount anonymity FTW

valor

LuckyLloyd wrote:

I'll be very interested to hear what Phantom Lord and Valor think about this thread when they catch a look at it.

I dont really care either way, I rely on such tools because not using is dumb when they are available but if they werent I would adapt easily and well

Imposter

hotspur wrote:

And you know the players I get most out of having good pokertracker stats on? - the good tag multitablers. Avoid getting involved with them light and the rest is easy.

I agree with this other than the last bit. If I do not have the stats on this player at the start of a session and he has stats on me then I am losing money and making more mistakes than I should.

Good players don't need software to beat bad players, and no software will help bad players beat good ones. Fish will be caught whether others use a fishing rod or dynamite, the technology doesn't matter. The software edge exists between decent players.

...
If you play live then you play against a lot of the same people all the time, online anonymity would not replicate live play.

The people who continue to datamine certain sites after the sites have made it illegal are the 'good players'. Just have a read on 2+2. From reading it you would imagine that they all use every tool possible, legal and illegal, as well as playing 100 tables at a time. Are you saying this carry on should be allowed to continue or that it is like a live game?

Deskilling the game as a way to keep the fish involved is a silly industry concept, it [strike]should have[/strike]will get no support from [strike]good[/strike]cheating but winning online cash players. Bad players who have quit have quit because they were bad, the existence of software is not responsible for their losses and is just an excuse if any of them think it is. Multiaccount anonymity FTW

fyp.

Those that multitable legally are the very ones that complain about bots. What reasons do they use and why? Are these same multitablers not more like bots than poker players?

ianmc38

i havnt had access to any software this month and ive still done well (9.25bb/100). I dont think having/not having it really matters very much. People play poker because its an enjoyable past time. The same bad players always return and giving them a player 1/player 2 type name will just slow down the process of them losing their money. VPIP and other session stats will all still be readily available, so it'll be easy to spot the better/nittier players immediately. I think most players enjoy having some sense of identity at the table whether it be i****urmummy or whatever. I dont think lee Jones proposed system is going to attract more people to the game. I think a more lileyu scenario is evolution of the system as happens everyday. The younger keener players leanr about the tools as they become mroe advanced/start reading more/talk to people who play more etc. The current best players continue to eveolve with the changing climate. The degenerates who just like a gamble after work or the weekend or whatever will always come back as its simply a hobby where they sometimes win but mostly lose their money.

David Michael

Some simple minded thoughts.

When I first came across the software being used against me a certain boards person said in chat "it wasn't in his range"
I checked the flop good

I kinda thought of the use of the software as unfair and possibly not unlike cheating. After a bit of a think I decided I could use the said same software but didn't bother mainly because there is no real difference between the software and a players memory in real life.

Some how I doubt you guys bring a version of PT to the SE etc. But you still have mental notes and what not on a players style...range...history etc. Merely because you have played them.

So I am not a fan of data mining but have no issues with people gathering table history par se.

As for Mr. jones comments I think he is wrong. Poker will not suffer from technology.

The best soloution is probably for sites to introduce their on HUD devices. That would really balance the field as they have all the stats on all their players. That would be the ultimate test of whether the software should be used.


Me... I'll just play the cards and the tables I is at. Hard enough tim doing that never mind absorbing other info