Although it seems to be thriving in the international community if not the United States, online poker does have a relatively short history and background. You can technically trace its history back to the old “rec.gambling.poker” days of the early 1990s (it is rumored that former World Champion Chris Ferguson honed his poker games on that format) but online poker, as it is viewed today, came about with Planet Poker in late 1997. Now, not even two decades since the seminal launch of Planet Poker, many in the online poker community are discussing what will be its demise.
On the forums at Two Plus Two, a thread was started along with a poll looking for readers’ opinions on one question: What will kill online poker first? The readers were given five different options to cast their vote: Live cheating (such as multi-accounting, ghosting, collusion), Politicians, Bots (automated computer programs playing the game rather than a human), the opinion that online poker will survive through any issues and, finally, that the game of online poker is already dead. With nearly 350 votes cast at this time, it is interesting to see the thoughts of the online community on the subject.
Leading the way with a third of the vote (116 votes cast) were bots, with many giving decent opinions as to why. “Unregulated technology allowed the birth of online poker,” poster ‘ArtyMcFly’ opined, “Unregulated technology will cause the death of online poker.” Other posters pointed out the developments in the artificial intelligence field that have brought about computer programs such as Carnegie Mellon University’s “Claudico” that basically played four online poker pros to a stalemate earlier this year. As poster ‘Uh*Oh’ stated, “Bots don’t have to be anywhere near “impossible to beat” to kill poker. All they have to do is play better than the average poker player and they will utterly destroy the game.”
Perhaps signaling the pessimism of the online community, the second choice was that the game of online poker is already dead (99 votes). There were a variety of reasons brought up for this thought, most notably the inability of one of the largest and most affluent nations in the world, the U. S., not being able to fully participate in the online game. Others said that the inability to beat online rake, the number of people believing that they can make a living from playing online poker (as was done in the game’s early years) and the lack of reputable and stable rooms in the future (Amaya Gaming’s move with PokerStars into the online casino world drew particular ire) were all cited as reasons.
Politicians ranked third in the unofficial survey (65 votes) and drew about as much anger from those polled as bots did. Citing the lack of U. S. players in the worldwide online poker economy, poster ‘rocketragz’ said, “Games will be sustainable for a long time” with regulation. “Regulation with jail time for people who cheat and break the laws will be a big help in discouraging bots and cheating. It’s not all doom and gloom…however, it is rainbows and unicorns to think we’ll get federal regulation. Politicians will keep us suffocated and unprotected.” Another poster, ‘yimyammer,’ stated, “They may not have killed it but politicians have ruined it or, at the very least crippled it for my lifetime.”
The bottom two on the list were a bit of a surprise. There is a decent coalition (42 votes or 12%) that believes that online poker will survive through its current growing pains (remember, this is an industry that isn’t even old enough to drink yet). Finally – and potentially surprising – there is a small faction (26 votes or 7%) that believe that live cheating in the online game will be its eventual demise.
Something that wasn’t a choice on the survey actually makes sense in that it can be seen in the live poker world. Poster ‘djle2’ stated that “Poker’s death isn’t from a head shot…It’s each person taking his turn to stab, some with bigger knives than others.” Following up on that thought, poster ‘Sect7G’ said, “Lots of truth in this. Everyone is looking out for their immediate self-interest (writer’s note: the “lone wolf” mentality) and trying to deceive themselves that this viewpoint is OK and that someway it will all just work out in the future.” Meanwhile, another poster named ‘jawong2000’ made an astute statement in that poker is a “zero sum” game “driven by the desire to exploit weaker players in order to profit” and that online poker would be no different.
The Two Plus Two survey, while highly unofficial, does give some food for thought to the poker world, whether it is online or live. Without the feed of new players through the online poker wars, live poker will reach a point where it levels out (many of this year’s World Series of Poker events have treaded water as far as entries). If online poker would pass, live poker wouldn’t go away but it possibly wouldn’t be the lucrative endeavor that some believe it has become. Is there something that the survey missed with online poker or will one of its five choices be online poker’s eventual “swan song”?
Let’s not be hasty.
The easiest thing in the world, especially for a journalist who needs to submit commentary about something by a given deadline, is to predict the end of the world, or the flowering of a new world, based on a few very limited developments in a very limited context.
People played poker as soon as the game was invented, they’re playing it now, and they will probably keep playing until there are no more people left to play it. They will play it online as long as there is an online to play it.
US state authorities (US state law is the basis of poker regulation in the USA) are, for one reason or another, simply not alive to the possibilities here. The principal problem is that they insist on containing poker within their respective state boundaries, whereas it began, and can only prosper, as a global market. They don’t know how to relate to that, and quite bluntly aren’t very interested in finding out how.
And it doesn’t matter. New formats, new games, new lines of communication are coming along. Some form of poker, including online poker, will continue to survive and prosper no matter what Those Who Know Better may attempt.
Already Dead. One reason for it’s death was two words in your first paragraph. Chris Ferguson. He honed his skills all right–learned how to cheat the system and with him and the others that we all know about, equals very untrustworthy online poker playing. It’s too bad because of all the fun we used to have. Before ‘Black Friday’ when we in the USA still could play at Poker Stars and Full Tilt, it was pretty tough to leave your computer. Just wanted to keep on playing. But the times have changed. Thanks Chris–when you coming out of hiding you jerk?