25 August, 2008
Michael Schwaiger is one happy guy.
He gets to go to South Africa to compete in the Sun City Million Dollar Poker Tournament, and he doesn’t even have to pay for it. What’s more, he’s also got his own seat in the Titan Poker $2.5 Million Guaranteed Tournament (the online poker room’s biggest ever).
The 21-year-old, Austrian online poker player achieved this great accomplishment by winning two Titan Poker satellite tournaments after having played there for only 8 months.
The $10,000 Sun City Million Dollar Tournament prize package includes buy-in to the tournament and $2,500 for flights there and back, and accommodations at the Palace of the Lost City Hotel for 7 nights.
The Titan Poker $2.5 million guaranteed tournament takes place on September 7 at 7 pm GMT + 1. And it’s still not to late to claim your seat. There are 2 ways to enter:
- Pay the $1,580 buy-in
- Qualify in a satellite tournament like Michael Schwaiger did for as low a buy-in as $2.75 + $0.20
18 August, 2008
In an obvious effort to attract new players, Cake Poker has just increased the guarantees it offers in its Guaranteed Prize Pool tournaments.
The weekly Sunday Guaranteed tournament will now be raised to $25,000.
The Gold Card Tournament is now at $100,000. It has also been rescheduled to a more convenient time slot, that being 5 pm ET.
And the big guaranteed tournament held on the last Sunday of the month now sports a $250,000 prize pool. The first of these will be held on August 31 at5 pm ET.
This is just the latest of Cake Poker’s gambles to rise above the relative anonymity of most poker rooms in an industry inundated with competition, as little-known Cake Poker is nonetheless renowned for:
- soft players
- a generous 33% rakeback deal
- big bonuses
And, quite possibly the best appeal of all, Cake Poker is a US-friendly online poker room.
11 August, 2008
They may not be snatching bodies, but they could be snatching up your chances to legitimately win some pots. They’re poker bots, and one look at the online poker news of the day will show that they’re the scourge of the game.
Programs that aid players in improving and fine-tuning their poker playing skills is one thing. But these new programs are being designed and used to actually play the game for you and beat out your human opponents with surprising consistency.
But while this certainly sounds appealing for people’s wallets, its ethics are questionable (at best) and its increasing prominence at the online poker table is widespread enough that it’s starting to turn many players off to the game. If this trend continues, it bodes poorly for the entire industry as it will surely herald the shutting down of many poker rooms stricken by the sudden and rapid decline in their player base.
If using poker bots sounds appealing to you, watch out - because they’re officially banned at pretty much all online poker rooms. The big problem these sites face, however, is in enforcing that rule, due to the near-impossibility of distinguishing a human player from a poker bot in the eminently anonymous world of online poker.
What’s to come? How are online poker rooms to battle this spreading enemy? And what do you think of the growing threat?
6 August, 2008
Today, Wednesday August 6, FullTilt Poker launches its 2008 Full Tilt Online Poker Series (FTOPS), one of the esteemed poker room’s most eagerly-anticipated annual events and a favorite with all its loyal online poker players.
This is the 9th installment of the FTOPS, and promises to dole out $15 million in cash winnings, spread out over a total of 25 nail-biting events.
Tonight’s kickoff tournament – a $200 + $16 No Limit Texas Holdem freezeout tournament – promises a cool 1 million to the winner. It begins at 9:30 pm ET and has Team FullTilt Poker pro Allen Cunningham hosting. And that’s just to get things started.
The 2008 FTOPS runs through August 17, all leading up to the $2.5 Million Guaranteed Main Event.
There are two ways to enter the FTOPS IX:
- pay the buy-in
- win a free seat in any of Full Tilt’s many FTOPS satellite tournaments scheduled up until the main event
Find out who was the FTOPS IX Main Event Winner.
28 July, 2008
Two online poker leaders owned and operated by the same parent organization, Absolute Poker and UltimateBet, have merged to form the Cereus Poker Network, making them the third-largest online poker network worldwide.
Expected to launch in August, the Cereus Network will integrate the players and gaming platforms from both online poker rooms. The tournament lineup, currently being reorganized by UltimateBet poker star Annie Duke, will be the same for both sites.
This move is in part an effort to rebuild both sites’ good names as their reputation suffered serious blows from cheating scandal allegations making headlines throughout the previous year. The integration of the two sites is also an effort to compete with the reigning King and Queen of online poker rooms – PokerStars and FullTilt Poker.
Of course, if Team UltimateBet and AbsolutePoker really want to compete with Poker Stars and Full Tilt, though, what they need to do is match those sites’ commitment to accepting U.S. players. That, along with the creation of the Cereus Poker Network, should be enough to take them over the top.
26 July, 2008
Poker Marketing Code is the number one site for making the most free money you can on PokerStars, one of the best online poker rooms on the planet. How Poker Marketing Code does it is self-evident in the website’s title – by arming new players with the best PokerStars Promotional Code you can find. But this is only the start of the benefits this site offers.
Poker Marketing Code is, if nothing else, the internet’s top PokerStars referral site. If you’ve ever even considered joining PokerStars, then this is the place to get your PokerStars referral from. That’s because you can’t find such a great PokerStars Promotional Code anywhere else.
Though we’re not going to reveal the actual PokerStars referral code you’re given at Poker Marketing Code, we’re happy to share with you the rewards that this code grants you. What you get with the PokerStars Promotional Code are:
- a 100% matching bonus on your first deposit match, up to a maximum of $50 in free money on PokerStars
- free entry into a private freeroll tournament called the “Weekend with Daniel Negreanu”, an event that promises the winner $17,000 in prizes and free money on PokerStars.
The matching bonus on new PokerStars players’ first deposits is more easily obtained than many competing poker rooms’ first deposit bonuses as Poker Marketing Code not only gives you the code you need to enter for a chance at claiming the bonus, but it instructs you in precisely how to clear that bonus, a necessary piece of information that far too many poker bonus portals neglect to mention.
Whomever wins the Weekend with Daniel Negreanu private freeroll will be sent, for free, to Las Vegas, Nevada where they’ll get to spend $2,000 in free money from PokerStars, plus the chance to hang out with the legend known as Kid Poker, receive private poker tutelage from the multi-time champion, and gain a free seat in an eighteen-player poker tournament that guarantees $270k in cash winnings.
Poker Marketing Code also makes sure that, since online poker is, after all, an international game, players everywhere can enjoy the benefits of the PokerStars referral code as the site has been conveniently translated into the native languages of over 12 countries.
Remember, PokerStars is the poker room that discovered consecutive WSOP main event champions Chris Moneymaker and Greg Raymer. And their arsenal of true-life poker celebrities keeps growing all the time. Learn from them, play against them, even win extra free money on PokerStars by knocking them out in special Bounty tournaments.
Even players from the U.S. are welcome at PokerStars, a claim that many leading poker sites simply can’t make.
The current PokerStars promotional code is good for the rest of this year, after which point Poker Marketing Code will issue a new and improved PokerStars referral code for new players to enjoy. But this Poker Marketing Code is just one of the many advantages of playing online poker at PokerStars, as the site is always chock full of new and exciting promotions with ever-larger prize pools. If you like online poker, there’s really no other place to play than PokerStars. And if you’re new to the site, then there’s no better place to receive your welcome than from Poker Marketing Code.
21 July, 2008
With all but November’s final table of the main event left to be played, the 2008 World Series of Poker is otherwise at an end. But if you weren’t there in Las Vegas to catch it all, don’t fret, because ESPN starts airing coverage of all the annual competition’s events starting tomorrow, Tuesday, July 22.
Find out which competitions your favorite poker stars Erick Lindgren, Daniel Negreanu, David Benyamine, Mike Matusow, and Scotty Nguyen took down. And see what surprises online poker qualifiers had in store for throwing all the usual suspects off tilt.
ESPN will be running footage of the various 2008 WSOP events all the way up to main event final table which will be broadcast live starting on November 9 with the suspenseful heads-up match between the two final finishers starting November 10.
See all 55 WSOP events with 17 weeks of coverage totalling 33 nail-biting hours of fabulous poker excitement. Like last year, expert commentary will be provided once again by Norman Chad and Lon McEachern.
You can also start getting ready for next years WSOP by reading some great online gambling guides.
15 July, 2008
Online poker is, by most counts, about 30% skill and 70% luck, the same as with regular, offline poker. But a new website is on the scene called Duplicate Poker which busts that ratio wide open!
To say that this is no ordinary poker room is putting it mildly. In a day and age where most poker rooms compete with one another for your gambling dollar with the same set of games, stakes, promotions, and prize pools, Duplicate Poker takes online poker to a whole new level.
The concept is simple: The cards that you are dealt in each hand are the same exact cards as those dealt to players sitting in the same seat as you at other tables. This way, you are competing not just against the players at your table but against all those sitting in your seat at other tables, as points are awarded depending on how well So at Duplicate Poker, it’s really your skill that’s being tested, a welcome relief for online poker players everywhere.
On the heels of the success of Duplicate Bridge in its successful 1995 transformation of the game into an officially Recognized Sport Organization, Duplicate Poker aims to do the same thing for Texas Holdem (and all other online poker games).
Because of its unique twist on the game, Duplicate Poker has achieved status as a legally certified “Game of Skill”. And as such Duplicate Poker is currently “the ONLY legal US poker room”. It’s also the only online poker room currently and conveniently able to accept MasterCard and Visa as deposit methods, making it easier than ever to sit in and try your luck…we mean, skill…at winning.
While Duplicate Poker does offer tables in Omaha, 7-card Stud, Draw Poker, Razz, and Lowball, it’s still Texas Holdem that most people come to play. But, of course, this is Texas Holdem like you’ve never seen it or played it before.
Sporting flashy Flash (or Flash-like) graphics and the option of a bird’s eye or 3D table view of the game, the look and feel of the game is every bit as smooth and seamless as at the traditional online poker rooms you’re used to. And Duplicate Poker is full of special promotions and other ways to win big too, including a first deposit bonus of up to $300, a regular $3 free play tournament, $2,000 Guaranteed Sundays, a promised $4,500 monthly in Leaderboard prizes, and a $120,000 Guaranteed World Team Championship.
Bored with traditional Texas Holdem at online poker rooms? Tired of landing those Bad Beats over nothing more than chance? Then have we got an online poker room for you!
Severely reducing the element of the luck of the draw from the game, Duplicate Poker takes online poker out of the realm of gambling and into a realm where it truly is the best player who wins. Join the online poker revolution! Join Duplicate Poker today.
14 July, 2008
On Sunday, August 10 at 4 pm E.T. Bodog Poker will break its own record and host its largest yet guaranteed prize pool tournament, namely: a $250,000 Guaranteed Tournament. Bodog promises to give away the full $250,000 regardless of how many players participate. The tournament’s winner is promised to receive a minimum of $55,000.
There are two ways to enter this benchmark-setting competition:
- win any of the more than 200 qualifiers running from now (as of today, July 14) until the day of the event, with buy-ins as low as $1 + $0 and ranging up to $54 + $5;
- pay the $250 + $20 buy-in
The $250,000 Guaranteed Tournament gives Bodog the opportunity to show off it’s newest poker software (which goes live as of July 17), featuring resizable tables, a full-screen mode, embedded game details and chat, and player tools on-demand.
7 July, 2008
PokerStars, producer of several of the latest World Series of Poker winners (including consecutive main event champs Chris Moneymaker and Greg Raymer), has just announced the schedule for its 7th annual World Championship of Online Poker (WCOOP).
Most exciting is the announcement of the event’s prize pool, double the size of last year’s at a whopping $30 million. Every event promises an enormous prize pool, with some events touting $2 million and more in guaranteed winnings.
The WCOOP features 33 different online poker tournaments, and more than just Texas Holdem, spanning the gamut of popular poker games, including:
- Omaha
- Stud
- Razz
- HORSE
- 2-7 Draw
The event also introduces several new events, like:
- High-Roller NL Holdem
- 8-Game Mixed tournament
- 4-Max NL Holdem
- Mixed Holdem
- PLO w/1 rebuy & 1 add-on
- High-Roller Heads-Up NL Holdem
- 6-Max Mixed Holdem
- NL 2-7 Single Draw
- 6-Max NL Holdem w/rebuys
The World Championship of Online Poker will last 16 days, running from September 5 to September 22, beginning with a $215 buy-in No Limit Holdem tourney and leading up to the $10 million Guaranteed Prize Pool No Limit Holdem Main Event.