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From Annie Duke's Blog: A nother Demonstration of Skill of Poker

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  1. westtexasman westtexasman is offline

    Lubbock, TX
    United States

    Posts: 785
    Joined: Apr 05

    Feb 28th, 2007 (2/28/2007 1:45pm)

    This is a different way than I have ever heard of proving poker being a game a skill. This to me makes for the best arguement and very black and white. This is an important topic as it will soon be decided by our courts. The UK has made such recent decisions to favor poker being a skilled game it's time the good ole US catch up.

    Check it out,It's a really good read http://www.annieduke.com/journal.php?journalID=1708

    Shawn Rice
     
  2. mrniphty mrniphty is offline

    Tallahassee, FL
    United States

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    Feb 28th, 2007 (2/28/2007 2:04pm) in reply to westtexasman

    Very good read, I enjoyed the first one as well that was written about poker: skill vs luck.

    Heres the article since it wasn't too long:

    My brother and I are continuing conversations about the amount of luck vs skill in poker. I am very proud and honored to be doing press on behalf of the PPA (www.pokerplayersalliance.org) and really get the word out there about how threatened this game is right now as well as how this new law is such an erosion of your right to privacy. And the arguments that poker is a skill game are so important to the stance since if we can prove that poker is all skill then illegalizing it would be like illegalizing baseball or chess.

    So Howard, by way of David Sklansky, gave me this argument: Let's say you have two players of equal skill who are playing a series of heads up matches. Over the course of the series they will end up just trading chips and whoever wins a given match or hand will appear to be completely driven by luck. The same would hold true for baseball. If the teams were equally matched skillwise then over a series of games they would split the results and which team one an individual game would appear to be determined by luck.

    But now let's say that we have our two equally matched poker players and I lean into one of them and whisper in their ear that I want them to lose the next match as quickly as possible. The player would be able to do it, and fast. They could easily come up with a strategy that would insure that they lost (for example they could check fold every single flop). Baseball would work the same way. Remember the Chicago Blacksox?

    The ability to purposely lose is a very definitive argument that a game is all skill. Notice that if I asked you to purposely lose at a roulette game or Baccarat game (where the house took no edge) you could not do it. This is because there are no decisions to be made in either of these games so you cannot purposely lose and so these games are 100% luck.

    What this shows, again, is that players really tend to over estimate how much luck there is in poker because they tend to be playing against very skilled players. In any skill sport, the closer the match up of skill between the opponents, the more luck there will appear to be. This is true even in a game that is all skill, like golf, baseball or, yes, poker too.
     
  3. tekiller tekiller is offline

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    Feb 28th, 2007 (2/28/2007 2:09pm) in reply to mrniphty

    the lederer family is smart
  4. tommpat2000 tommpat2000 is offline Chief Asshat

    Saint Paul, MN
    United States

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    Feb 28th, 2007 (2/28/2007 2:10pm) in reply to mrniphty

    well i guess im screwed

    *throws rabbit foot in garbage*
  5. Himclip85 Himclip85 is offline

    London
    United Kingdom

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    Feb 28th, 2007 (2/28/2007 2:11pm) in reply to westtexasman

    ?? actually they ruled in the uk that 'although there was a skill element to the game, as soon as the cards are shuffled, it becomes luck'

    Theyre coming down on all our card rooms too. espec gutshot
     
  6. Ozzie Ozzie is offline

    Joliet, IL
    United States

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    Feb 28th, 2007 (2/28/2007 2:25pm) in reply to westtexasman

    i could purposely lose at blackjack by just hitting no matter what.
    i could lose at video poker by holding on to no pairs and no draws.
    i could lose at roulette by constantly max betting 2 every time. or by betting every number equally, though thatd be slow.

    practically any game that has rules and forces you to make choices will certainly have some amount of skill involved. likewise i cant think of almost any game that doesnt also involve a good amount of luck, sports included.

    to try and convince someone who knows how to play poker that it is a game of skill is a futile enterprise. theyve apparently already decided that it involves chance and is thus a game of chance. im not sure what the reasons behind this mindset would be, but when it's so patent that there must be some skill involved and they still would refuse to see it, then theyre just deluding themselves. and delusional mindsets are difficult to change. for more examples of this, google creationism vs evolution.

    i would think, however, that rather than try and prove poker is a game of skill, prove that it is no more a game of chance than almost any other game or sport.
    i like bowling. but even if you make a good shot, you may get a bad result. and if you make a bad shot, you may get a good result. but the pins dont just fall randomly no matter what you do. the more good shots you make, the better your long term results will be.
    my brother is a pretty devout christian and didnt like that play so much poker online because he feels gambling is immoral. i swayed him with a similar analogy. while hes not thrilled about it, i can tell hes at least more comfortable with it.
  7. nxtbigthang nxtbigthang is offline

    Petaluma, CA
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    Feb 28th, 2007 (2/28/2007 2:35pm) in reply to westtexasman

    Doesnt the whole governmant thing boil down to the fact that the US cant tax the offshore poker sites? There isnt a movement against brick and mortar is there? Nope, because they get taxed on there revenue. Online sites are making a killing and the Gov is not getting their cut. In my eyes they dont give two shits about wether or not it is a skill game they want their money end of story.
  8. LeftyMark LeftyMark is offline Boss of Birds

    MA
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    Feb 28th, 2007 (2/28/2007 3:06pm) in reply to westtexasman

    Obv it's not just a game off skill. What do you say when you go all in with 88 against AK? Well it's a coinflip, 50/50, I hope I get lucky here.
  9. weimoxer weimoxer is offline

    Lewis Center, OH
    United States

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    Feb 28th, 2007 (2/28/2007 3:06pm) in reply to mrniphty

    You could loose playing black jack on purpose. You could continue to hit. Just a thought against that.

    Oops already mentioned below.
  10. eddie24b eddie24b is offline

    MD
    United States

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    Feb 28th, 2007 (2/28/2007 3:13pm) in reply to LeftyMark

    play at poker stars for any amount of time and you can throw its "all skill" right out the fucking window.
     
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