idea re: dublin casions

Eyeball Tickler

Hi there,

I'm a freelance journalist thinking of doing an article on casinos in Dublin. I'm just exploring the possibility at this stage really, and posting here in the hope of getting some feedback or advice. I'm particularly interested in the idea of doing an all-hours article on casinos — I did a similar piece before for The Dubliner on 24 hour internet cafes in the city centre before. I suppose I'd just be interested in going to casinos in the middle of the night, painting a picture of what they're like.

But I don't have much idea at all what Dublin's casino "scene" is like —*are there many late/night ones in the city? Are they all fairly straightforward to get into? And is there a significant variety in the tone of these joints? While I'd like to check out some of the higher class joints, some of the seedier and dingier places might be more interesting for the purposes of an article.

So I suppose I'm just hoping for a bit of direction: maybe a suggestion of one or two casinos that would be worth visiting at night, an idea of the variety (or not) of casinos in the city, or any other useful advice. One thing I need to keep in mind is that my budget for research is pretty damn limited. I'd rather be visiting places that I can spend the night putting 2c coins into a slot machine rather than spending big money!

Thanks very much.

IPR_Iain

Eyeball Tickler wrote: »

Hi there,

I'm a freelance journalist thinking of doing an article on casinos in Dublin. I'm just exploring the possibility at this stage really, and posting here in the hope of getting some feedback or advice. I'm particularly interested in the idea of doing an all-hours article on casinos — I did a similar piece before for The Dubliner on 24 hour internet cafes in the city centre before. I suppose I'd just be interested in going to casinos in the middle of the night, painting a picture of what they're like.

But I don't have much idea at all what Dublin's casino "scene" is like —*are there many late/night ones in the city? Are they all fairly straightforward to get into? And is there a significant variety in the tone of these joints? While I'd like to check out some of the higher class joints, some of the seedier and dingier places might be more interesting for the purposes of an article.

So I suppose I'm just hoping for a bit of direction: maybe a suggestion of one or two casinos that would be worth visiting at night, an idea of the variety (or not) of casinos in the city, or any other useful advice. One thing I need to keep in mind is that my budget for research is pretty damn limited. I'd rather be visiting places that I can spend the night putting 2c coins into a slot machine rather than spending big money!

Thanks very much.

Tbh, I think your attitude is all wrong. These 'joints' as you call them are mostly professional businesses, run by honest people who offer a service to their members. You have totally the wrong attitude and I think your preconceptions will, for one, be detrimental to the poker community, or two, put them in a bad light.

To be honest I think your type of press would do the poker community more harm than good.

So feck off and do an article on something down and dirty like the health service.

TerryTibbs!

IPR_Iain wrote: »

Tbh, I think your attitude is all wrong. These 'joints' as you call them are mostly professional businesses, run by honest people who offer a service to their members. You have totally the wrong attitude and I think your preconceptions will, for one, be detrimental to the poker community, or two, put them in a bad light.

To be honest I think your type of press would do the poker community more harm than good.

So feck off and do an article on something down and dirty like the health service.

Can't do as much bad as the crap you put out there.

zuutroy

IPR_Iain wrote: »

Tbh, I think your attitude is all wrong. These 'joints' as you call them are mostly professional businesses, run by honest people who offer a service to their members. You have totally the wrong attitude and I think your preconceptions will, for one, be detrimental to the poker community, or two, put them in a bad light.

To be honest I think your type of press would do the poker community more harm than good.

So feck off and do an article on something down and dirty like the health service.

lol are you serious? Have you seen the jackpot on a weekend night? OP's instinct on what goes on is dead on. There are professionally run operations like the fitz with big games going on. Friendlier places that have a club feel like Voodoo where the stakes are generally lower and then mud flinging retards in the jackpot, with a nice cross section of society in each, from pros to recreational players to degenerates. The only thing he's off the mark about is that all of them are run to a fairly high standard and there's nothing dodgy or seedy about them really.

Dub13

OP,why don't you post up your article about the Internet cafés so we can get a feel for what you are trying to do.

Eyeball Tickler

Thanks for the replies guys. I can understand why some of you might be a bit skeptical and get the idea that I'm purely out to paint Dublin's casinos as seedy establishments for the sake of an entertaining article, but I promise that's not the case.

As a journalist I tend to be interested in writing about parts of the city that most people don't experience. You can see a list of some of my work here: http://geekypie.wordpress.com/about-3/

The internet cafe piece is up there. If I were to do this casino piece, I'd be purely interested in going along to a variety of casinos, talking to as many people as I could feasibly and describing what goes on. Maybe that would yield an interesting feature, maybe it wouldn't — but I'd only be interested in painting an accurate picture.

And I should stress that I'm not just interested in poker either, but in all types of gambling that takes place in casinos really. I guess I really just posted on the poker forum as I thought people here would be familiar with casinos, and because poker is probably the most popular casino game.

Anyway, thanks for the replies.

Lenny

barrera

I daresay the snarky response didn't do much to help the image either.

OP, to address the points raised, you will find that the busier ones are extremely reputable. One thing you will see across this board and other poker boards in Ireland is that the regular Irish poker player playing in the casinos is quite demanding in terms of the quality of product, incl structures of tournies, food, quality of dealers etc, and this reflects itself in most of the clubs.

The Fitz is the big one, and what will strike you is the wide range of people there, perhaps more than any other form of entertainment in Dublin. All ages, all races, and whilst predominantly male by no means exclusively so. You could actually do worse than catching the Fitz tonight, their end of month tournament regularly attracts 130+ players, and the place will be busy and buzzing.

The Sporting Emporium is more focused on games of chance, and certainly attempts to attract "higher end" clientele. Other clubs of varying standards to check include The Jackpot, Barrys Casino, Voodoo Club and D1 Club in town or the Westbury in Malahide.

Most of these aren't "slots" places though - I daresay if you approached some of the management in these places, most would be ok with you hanging around. Or you could just join as a member and hang around.

Hopefully you enjoy the experience, get to meet a few characters (of which there are many), and give a fair reflection on the clubs and people playing (I remember reading and enjoying the Internet cafes piece).

Eyeball Tickler

barrera, thanks for that. That's really useful. I'll definitely start to check out some of the places you mentioned out in the near future.

Are most of the places you suggested dominated by poker, or is there a wide variety of games?

Also, if I was to do this piece, would it be feasible for me to spend some time hanging around without spending a lot of money? Is there any easy way to do this?!

It's also really nice to hear that you liked the internet cafes piece, unlike with the internet you rarely get any feedback when writing for magazines, so it's always great to get some.

Dean.Tamkin

IPR_Iain wrote: »

Tbh, I think your attitude is all wrong. These 'joints' as you call them are mostly professional businesses, run by honest people who offer a service to their members. You have totally the wrong attitude and I think your preconceptions will, for one, be detrimental to the poker community, or two, put them in a bad light.

To be honest I think your type of press would do the poker community more harm than good.

So feck off and do an article on something down and dirty like the health service.

This is some load of BS , Think back to the lies that was printed on your own site . I think its people like you that condone downright theft from poker players and then try to cover it up with lies are bad for the poker community.

Maybe the op would be interested in doing an article on that instead.

Lazare

IPR_Iain wrote: »

Tbh, I think your attitude is all wrong. These 'joints' as you call them are mostly professional businesses, run by honest people who offer a service to their members. You have totally the wrong attitude and I think your preconceptions will, for one, be detrimental to the poker community, or two, put them in a bad light.

To be honest I think your type of press would do the poker community more harm than good.

So feck off and do an article on something down and dirty like the health service.

Jaysus Iain, wtf is wrong with you? Horrible nasty reply.

OP, totally ignore that reply, and fwiw when you do decide to visit one of the clubs you will certainly not be met with such a nasty welcome.

On the issue of your budget, don't worry, the casino management will not bat an eyelid at you simply hanging around not spending, you won't be alone.

Good luck, and if you do decide to do a piece, please follow the link in my sig and post it up there too.

Actually, would be worth your while posting this thread there too.

RoadSweeper

OP said casinos, not poker rooms. I know there are alot of casinos that arent poker rooms around Dublin. I know there is a stripclub/casino in Temple Bar FWIW.

I would follow the advice in Lazare's last 2 lines.

IPR_Iain

Lazare wrote: »

Jaysus Iain, wtf is wrong with you? Horrible nasty reply.

OP, totally ignore that reply, and fwiw when you do decide to visit one of the clubs you will certainly not be met with such a nasty welcome.

On the issue of your budget, don't worry, the casino management will not bat an eyelid at you simply hanging around not spending, you won't be alone.

Good luck, and if you do decide to do a piece, please follow the link in my sig and post it up there too.

Actually, would be worth your while posting this thread there too.

I think that it takes lot for general press to understand the concepts behind what we do in terms of poker. We are in sensitive times; new gaming bill coming and VAT being introduced into casinos. It is hard to understand for many people when doing peices what the scene is really like. In many cases they seem to miss the point and tend to focus on the negative sides.

In an effort to take some of my nastyness back, and assist in helping the OP. I will offer to take them out to a few clubs. PM Me if interested.

Eyeball Tickler

Hi everyone, sorry for being slow getting back to the thread, been really busy with work.

Iain, thanks for the offer. I think I'll probably take you up on it, but I might just tighten up the angle of my story a bit and find a publication first. But I'll definitely be back in touch soon.

RoadSweeper, good point re poker rooms/casinos. I'm definitely interested in both, and would ideally like to cover a broad sweep of establishments. I do wonder — and I could be wrong —*if poker as a standalone game got a bit of media coverage when it first started becoming really popular here. I could be totally wrong, it's just that whenever something new takes off the papers and mags are generally quick to do "look at this new trend" piece. This makes me think I'll need a broader angle, which is why I'm thinking more about a broader sweep of games, and about the people and places, rather than just poker as a game.

So yeah, I guess I do want to find out about non-poker casinos too. Should I be looking somewhere totally different to find out more on these?

And thanks a million for all the help guys, it's been really useful. I can totally understand any suspicion of an unknown journalist coming on here asking questions, and I really didn't expect the fairly massive level of help everyone's given, so thanks a million.