Hi,
I have been a professional poker player for the past 3.5 years and have been following poker and the community for the past 8 years. Also, I am a current ADA holder. After learning about the blockchain, I saw the benefits that could be obtained by running a poker site on one. I think a well done poker website on a blockchain could kill every other kind of poker site and would love to see this come to fruition. However, to create a huge poker site that rivals the likes of PokerStars requires a ton of money, experience and a huge team. Therefore, I am a bit lost at how to proceed. I guess hopefully this post catches the eyes of someone that is looking for an idea and has the expertise, team, and capabilities to pull it off.
Below I have listed the current problems that plague the poker industry, all which can be fixed by the blockchain. After, I list the challenges that would be faced if someone tried this endeavor.
Problems with Current Poker Industry:
​

• High Rake: The percentage of money the casino operator takes from each hand, known as rake, is ridiculous across all major poker sites. At the lowest stakes, the games are close to unbeatable because the operator is taking such a large percentage of the money off the table each hand. Additionally, tournaments charge registration fees of up to 10% per tournament!
• Trust: From companies being caught with backdoor super user accounts to companies not being able to play out player to trusting whether or not the RNG is rigged, there is an inherit lack of trust in the online poker community. Especially in the US in states where poker is not legal, there are now many off-shore poker sites that operate a ton of money, yet are not regulated at all by the government. It is only a matter of time before this all goes bad in my opinion.
• Community at odds with Operators: For the last 10 years that I have been in the poker community, there has always been a rivalry and tension between the players and the poker site operators, mainly PokerStars. Essentially, some time paces and PokerStars raises the rake. The players complain, try to boycott and take other measures, all to no avail. Especially 5 years ago, PokerStars had a strangle hold on the industry. Recently, some other big sites like GG Poker, Party Poker, and Run It Once have gained market share. Despite the increased competition, rake is high across all sites and the players feel like the companies only care about profit. With a decentralized poker site, the community can now come together and run the poker site using Voltaire (I think) to create the first ever poker site for the players, something the community is longing for badly in my opinion.

Challenges:
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• Building the site: For a site to truly steal market share and compete, the software has to be elite. Run It Once is a recently launched poker operator, and they built their software by scratch and it took multiple years, overshooting all their deadlines and they still have only realized maybe 25% of what they plan to release. I am not sure how to solve this problem.
• USA Market: Poker is not legal in the US except in a handful of states.
• Licenses and Regulation: Would need many licenses to operate and would take a lot of time and money I assume
• Bots: Players using software in real time and/or using bots that actually play for them is one of the biggest issues facing the poker industry today. If somehow Cardano could alleviate this problem in any way that would be huge. But if not, then a decent amount of money and effort would need to be allocated toward security of the site regarding bots. Who would pay for this now and moving forward? Treasury? Seems like this is the biggest expense that would be tough to manage as a decentralized community. Especially with new companies like Poker King coming out that are using their security team against bots as their competitive advantage.
• A lot of competition: It seems like in the last 5 years, many new companies have gained market share. Additionally, there are some other blockchain based poker companies already in the works for a while now (Virtue Poker https://virtue.poke).

If anyone wants to run with this idea it is all yours and would be glad to help. I have been working relentlessly at poker the last 3.5 years to become one of the best in the world. In the process, I know what the players and community desires and lacks. I would love to have a strategic role in a site like this and really just want to solve the problems that I face everyday as a professional poker player.

Some people are familiar with the Irvings who basically own the province of New Brunswick as a private coporation, but our other owners are more keen on the diversification route and own all of us rather than just part of us and they also do so in publicly traded corporations. If you have ever wondered what the Oligarch Index would look like, have no fear, I'll show you.
The one you might be most familiar with is the Weston's who own Loblaws. However the Weston's don't actually own a majority of it, rather they own 63% of a publicly traded corporation called George Weston which itself owns 47% of Loblaws. Keeping to the strategy of creating russian nesting dolls of companies to basically retain control over companies you effectively only really own a quarter of they have also split off the real estate of the grocery stores into Choice Properties REIT, which is majority owned by Loblaws. Thus the Weston family controls this REIT despite really only owning an eighth of it.
George Weston TSE:WN Loblaws Companies Limited TSE:L Choice Properties TSE:CHP.UN
On the other side of the Pond, the Weston's also have another Top Order shell called Wittington Investments, which is 80% owned by Garfield Weston Foundation, which is a charity (or "charity" for tax avoidance if you feel it more appropriate). The other 20% is owned by individual members of the Weston family. The main holding of Wittington Investments is Associated British Foods at 54.5%, and some department stores in the UK and Ireland. Associated British Foods is a component of the British Stock Exchange Index the FTSE100, much like Loblaws they also own clothing brand/stores, and they also have a monopsony (a situation where there is one buyer rather than a monopoly where there is one seller) where they process the entire Sugar Beet crop of the UK with British Sugar which is responsible for about half of the UK's sugar consumption.
Associated British Foods LSE:ABF
Next lets move on to the richest man in Canada. Again guess? Hint he is literally a British Lord.
Okay all guesses? It is David Kenneth Roy Thomson, 3rd Baron Thomson of Fleet. The descendants of the late Baron of Fleet own the Woodbridge Corporation which is itself the majority owner of 62.35% Thomson Reuters. The Thomson portion is difficult to explain, as they provide "business services", but it seems like the consist in providing information for legal and tax matters. Might be kind of like the Bloomberg of Canada who knows. Reuters was a British media company before it was acquired. How this particular guy became the richest person in Canada is because he actually doesn't even like having to run the family business and instead has started an independent real estate empire. Pinning down exactly what that entails is difficult, but his investment activities are run by a Toronto Hedge Fund Morgan Bay Capital, and the real estate empire is called Osmington Incorporated. Osmington has sold some of its properties to the Canada Pension Plan, and seems to have intersts in "precision agriculture" at FarmersEdge whatever that means, and it is a partner in the group that owns the Winnipeg Jets. He is not the richest man in Canada entirely because of Thomson Reuters, but it certainly contributes to it, and what billionaire doesn't own a media conglomerate or two?
Thomson Reuters TSE:TRI
Now Galen Weston is the 3rd richest Canadian, and David Thomson is the 1st, so who is on second? Tsai's on second. Joseph Tsai. Taiwanese born co-founder and Executive Vice-Chairman of Alibaba. At 13 he was sent to a prep school in New Jersey, and eventually went to his father's alma mater at Yale. He started his career as a tax associate at a New York lawfirm and eventually became an attorney following in his father's footsteeps. From there however he eventually left for Hong Kong and became involved in Asian private equity, which resulted in him eventually meeting Jack Ma, where he was so impressed that he quit his investment firm to join in the founding of Alibaba as the only western-educated founder where he was COO and CFO as he was vital due to the cross-pacific nature of Alibaba's business model and being the only one with experience in venture capital and law. He is the second largest individual shareholder of Alibaba behind only Jack Ma. Beyond that he also bought the Brooklyn Nets off a Russian billionaire, as well as being the owner of several other sports team like football and including Lacrosse which he was the avid player while in prep school and at Yale.
Alibaba NYSE:BABA
He is a dual Hong Kong and Canadian citizen. You would think it would be American given most of the time he spent in the west was in America but when you are rich obtaining Canadian citizenship is easy and it provides most of the same benefits as American citizenship. Controversial when on the question of the NBA and Hong Kong, we weighed in stating that many Chinese were angry over tweets in support of Hong Kong because they sounded like support for separatism which is a no go for China.
Taiwanese politics is a bit complex, the KMT the right-wing on the island believes in a United China, its just that this united One China ought to be under the KMT, strong, free, and independent, but ultimately friendly with the West, in the vein of Sun Yat-Sen who was also western educated. It is generally the left-wing DPP which is both more independent of the Taiwanese business community and also thinks of itself as independent from China. Taiwan's biggest trade partner is China, and the KMT sees no issue with this as they see it as business being done from a province of china that is free doing business with other provinces of china which are just temporarily under Communist Party of China occupation.
The business community loves the One Country Two Systems because it lets them have their cake and eat it too, but if it came down to it since Chinese business is the most important trade partner for the Hong Kong and Taiwan and they are torn when it comes to the CCP power grabbing the two systems into one system. For the business community being one country is more important for the bottom line than the two systems, so while they are against the power grab, they are also against seperatism. This is difficult to understand but many chinese still see a United China as being in a protracted civil war that has just been on pause for decades, the same way people in Korea see the Korean War as a protracted civil war that never ended rather than a war between countries. They want their freedom, but they also want their country to remain united. Ultimately this is not too dissimilar from the powerful Quebec Federalist business families which are generally the historical owners of the Liberal Party who oppose Quebec sovereignty and want a united Canada even if they support francophone rights within Canada
Which brings as to the Desmarais. Paul Desmarais was the fourth wealthiest person in Canada before he died in 2013, and his family is considered the seventh on the list currently. The Desmarais Family Residual Trust controls Pansolo which itself owns about 80% of the voting shares of the Power Corporation of Canada, but 60% of those votes come from owner almost all of the preferred voting shares which give 10 votes, while they own 11% of the regular shares which translates to another 20% of the voting power. Power Corp is itself a fan of complicated ownership structures as I basically wouldn't even be able to explain all the things they own. The largest holding is 67% of Great West Life and 62% of IGM financial, both of which also have subsidiaries who operate in the United States. The also have a Partnership ownership of Group Brussels Lambert with Frere Bougeois who was the richest man in Belgium while he was alive. As a result of complicated ownership structures, with Frere Bourgeois they actually control a French Materials company called Imerys, and also own minority stakes in Adidas and Pernod Ricard. Overall the European holdings are quite diversified, and its North American holdings in Wealth/Retirement Management and Life Companies functions as a diversified asset pool due to the nature of how life insurance companies use the premiums to invest so they can eventually cover the payouts. They also own wealth management companies in China which makes it globally diversified and sector diversified. Through the complicated ownership structure it owns WealthSimple in part via Power Corp itself, but also through their majority stake in IGM financial. They also have a renewable energy division where they live up to the "Power" name, and beyond renewable energy they also have a 60% stake in Lumenpulse an LED manufacturer, and a 44% stake in Lion Electric and electric school bus manufacturer.
Power Corp TSE:POW
Great West Life TSE:GWO
IGM Financial TSE:IGM
Group Brussels Lambert EBR:GBLB
I own Power Corp shares because I couldn't believe it was trading as low as it was and for so long, as it has a 9% yield it has since gone up almost immediately after I bought it so I got in at the right time but still has a 7% yield. Power Corp is likely the closest you will get to the concept of the revolving door of politicians in business which you can read up yourself, but safe to say all our Francophone prime ministers have been involved, mostly Liberal leaders like Chretien, Martin, and Pierre Trudeau, but also Brain Mulroney, and many Premiers of Ontario and Quebec as well. If there was ever a company that made the concept of "the Laurentian Elite" that run Canada clear, it is Power Corp. In regards to my politics, I'm actually in favour of the concept of seperatism as a general idea so I'm sort of inverting my politics in my investments, but despite me supporting seperatism generally, the only victory for the concept in decades has been Brexit and even then that was not really the same thing. I'm politically infavour of renewable power so I found Power Corp attractive for its investments in Power Energy. Seems as if a good investment strategy would be to inverse your political positions which have never had victories like ever and go long on your political positions which seem to be where the political headwinds are going. Power Corp seems to get its way in politics regardless if I am in support of it lol, might as well own the company that controls everything I guess.
The guy who owns Rogers is next on our line of Oligarchs. Rogers is similar to Power Corp in that they attempt to have voting shares and non-voting shares so the family can control the company while not actually owning the whole thing.
Rogers TSE: RCI.A prefered voting shares Rogers TSE: RCI.B non-voting shares for us plebs
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Canadians_by_net_worth
You can look at the full list here but I'm going to stop as Saputo as they are the dreaded Milk Cartel of the Bernier's nightmares
Saputo TSE:SAP
Rapid Fire Round
Garret Camp NYSE:UBER
Irvings (Private, Oil, New Brunswick)
Richardson (Private, Agricultural and Food Production)
Jim Pattison (Private, British Columbia Conglomerate, fun fact owns Guinness World Records)
Jeffery Skoll (NASDAQ:EBAY, Participant a privately owned film production studio)
Richard Li (Hong Kong Telecom, SEHK:8)
Azireli Family (Israeli Real Estate, TLV:AZRG, fun fact the Azireli Towers used to be the tallest buildings in Israel)
Carlo Fidani (Mississauga based real estate)
Bernard Sherman (Privately held Pharmaceutical company Apotex)
McCain family (Beyond McCain foods, Wallace McCain after being ousted from McCain by his brother Harrison purchased Maple Leaf Foods together with the Ontario Teacher's Pension Plan ... somehow lets not question it. TSE:MFI)
David Cheriton (Google NASDAQ:GOOG, and Arista some computer networking company NYSE:ANET, a S&P500 component)
Alain Bouchard (Alimentation Couchetard, TSE:ATD.B for us plebs)
Daryl Katz (privately onwed real estate company, owns the Edmonton Oilers)
Michael Lee-Chin (NCB Financial Group, a Jamaica based Caribbean conglomerate, JSE:NCBFG)
Tom Gaglardi (Owns the Dallas Stars and a privately held real estate company Northland Properties)
There are some people who are so mysterious they don't even have wikipedia articles the Zekelman and Apostolopoulous families
Marc Scheinberg (Pokerstars, The Stars Group used to be publicly traded but it has been delisted)

Been playing on PokerStars for a year now. It is not merged with other states so you don’t get a huge player pool. 300 people in a MTT is on the high side. I think WSOP merges NJ with the other states. I’d prefer to stay legal but have considered giving ACR a shot.
Anyway, what site do you play on and why do you like it? Wondering if I should move around and try something else.

So im sure this has been posted before but im interested in more recent information. What is the best online poker site for New Jersey. Im a live player mostly but have dabbled over the years in online play. Recently I threw some money on pokerstars and it was never my favorite back when poker was legal the first time around. But im not exactly head over heals about pokerstars and i hear alot about the rake being high for lower stakes. Which is what i play. I play anywhere from .25/50 - 1/2. Im not a pro but ive been playing some form of cards since before i can remember. Id appreciate some input as to which sites are best and also does the player pool include all of the other states that poker is legal in? Id like some input from players who are playing rather than read websites that may be sponsored. Thanks in advance for the info.

Hello everyone. I'm from Serbia, a country in the Balkan region. As a part of former a socialist state (a.k.a. Yugoslavia) there are still remnants, although not obvious to those who aren't looking, of high state control over some of the fields that should be a part of the free market. Combined with high levels of corruption, absolutely nothing good can come out of something like that. One of such fields is gambling. As, I presume, none of you know, Serbia is, as far as I know, the only country in Europe (and one of the very few in the world) in which the only allowed gambling companies are based in the country itself, achieving a state enforced monopoly and the restriction of the free market. This was achieved by lobbying, corruption and the bribing of the justice system to ensure the entirety of the Serbian gambling market goes to those domestic companies, (while those in power without a doubt having a share in the profits). Any attempt to deposit to a gambling company not based in Serbia is blocked by banks, as they are enforcing this bogus law (which I'm pretty sure is unconstitutional, as all modern constitutions protect economic liberty, including the freedom to choose what to do with your money), which states exactly what was mentioned above: it's forbidden to take part in Games of Chance that are based in another country. We have reached a turning point in this paragraph, as my extensive research on the unjust state-enforced monopoly yielded fruit. In a 2008 agreement as part of the (still ongoing, oh I wonder why?) negotiations with the EU, in the Articles 59 (paragraph 1) and 60 (paragraph 2) it's clearly stated:
"The Community and Serbia undertake, in accordance with the following provisions, to take the necessary steps to allow progressively the supply of services by Community companies, Serbian companies or by Community nationals or nationals of Serbia which are established in the territory of a Party other than that of the person for whom the services are intended."
"The Parties shall not take any measures or actions which render the conditions for the supply of services by Community and Serbia nationals or companies which are established in a Party other than that of the person for whom the services are intended significantly more restrictive as compared to the situation existing on the day preceding the day of entry into force of this Agreement."
Is there anything I can do with these contradicting documents, both officially signed? Is there anything potentially alarming to my discoveries? Can I sue the government? Can this lead to the change of such a law? Will I be disposed of when I go down the street to buy bread by some meatheads? So many questions, ripe to be answered by your legal advice.
I just want to play PokerStars really bad lol

So for two weeks+ I couldn’t get on pokerstarsvr. It drove me nuts! Always a black screen and before that it was a black screen followed by it being unresponsive.
After harassing the discussion board a dev finally told me that PVR isn’t available in Washington State, USA.
Turned on my vpn to a new york ip address and I haven’t had anymore problems.
So if you gave up but have a vpn. Give it ONE LAST TRY!
Edit: I AM NOT A LAWYER AND THIS IS NOT LEGAL ADVICE This might only be tied to my state so might as well just say WASHINGTON STATE. To any doubting or confused as to what is causing this. ""The Washington state law defined gambling as “the staking or risking something of value upon the outcome of a contest of chance or a future contingent event not under the person’s control or influence, upon an agreement or understanding that the person or someone else will receive something of value in the event of a certain outcome.”
Based on this definition, Big Fish Casino constituted illegal online gambling, according to the appeals court.
Despite the ruling, the Washington State Gambling Commission was quick to point out that they did not order social gaming sites to stop their free online play offerings in the state. In a tweet, the gambling commission said, “We are not a party to the civil court case, we did not testify in the case, and we did not order these sites to discontinue free online play for Washington residents.”
In a statement to USPoker, PokerStars’ parent company The Stars Group said it is “reviewing the rulings and ensuring that our activities are in line with state regulations.”
“We are hopeful the law will be clarified and that when it is, we will be able to reinstate all Washington players at their current status,” according to The Stars Group."" https://calvinayre.com/2018/04/06/business/pokerstars-stops-offering-free-online-poker-washington-state/ Seems to explain what is happening. Due to a court ruling in a case with big fish games or whatever. Pokerstars is keeping themselves safe until they can get a 100% guarantee that they are legal. Even though the gambling commission did not come after them, and they stated they have no intention. Pokerstars realises it COULD get in trouble BECAUSE the other company got in trouble in a different form of court. So it creates a "gray area" that they simply don't want to risk.
With the statement
"In a tweet, the gambling commission said, “We are not a party to the civil court case, we did not testify in the case, and we did not order these sites to discontinue free online play for Washington residents.”"
I interpret that as legal, so long as you do not purchase any tokens. Which I never have and think is fucking retarded. No loss due to never having the intention. I use the free tokens and what I win. So I don't see it as circumventing the law when it comes to gambling and all that legal jazz and jargon.
I realized this(the above info) might be good to look into to make sure I wasn't encouraging anything "bad". So I gathered this info for you to determine your own opinion and decision in the matter. This is not all the information and I encourage you to do your own fact checking due to this being made in 2018 and that I AM NOT A LAWYER AND THIS IS NOT LEGAL ADVICE nor encourage anyone to participate in illegal behavior. I am simply informing you of a way to enjoy pokerstars. If your IP address is washington state based. You will need to change it if you want to access pokerstars. If you are temporarily in Washington, this is why you can't get on. I AM NOT A LAWYER AND THIS IS NOT LEGAL ADVICE

Could someone give me a quick update of the general state of things?
I've noticed Card Runners no longer exists. Are there other coaching video sites?
I've noticed PokerStars number of players is down. How are the games? Are there still people making money online? What games are profitable?
​
EDIT: so I guess to second wave from legalization in US and from asian countries never came, huh?

FunFair has been up to a lot of things, and thus, the post made a few months ago is quite outdated. I’ve written this just to keep the subreddit updated, and to have a nicely formatted post full of information regarding FunFair for both newcomers and “veterans”. This post will be updated more often than not, and when the time comes for a new one again, it shall be written! Cheers.

What is FunFair?

FunFair is a decentralized gaming technology platform which uses the Ethereum blockchain, smart contracts, and proprietary state channels (Fate Channels) to deliver casino solutions with state of the art games that are fast, fun, and fair.
FunFair is not a casino. Instead, FunFair will license its technology out to casino operators. Being a casino carries with it risks and burdens stemming from statutory and regulatory hurdles. Being a licensing entity instead, provides legal safeguards and will enable a more widely used platform.

Why was FunFair created?

There are many costs, headaches, and complications with online casinos. Briefly, they are the fees associated with operations (servers, infrastructure, large employee-base, fraudulent activity investigations, chargebacks) etc. Attracting players and gaining their trust comes afterwards, which is another issue within itself. There is a blatant trust issue with conventional online gaming that FunFair aims to diminish, while creating a seamless experience for both operator and player.

The Market.

Online gambling is a large market: Currently over 47.1 billion dollars in market volume and projected to continue increasing quite exponentially. FunFair is also attempting to capture a new market of casino operators and players that aren’t currently factored into this estimate.

The Team.

The FunFair team consists of 40+ developers, industry executives, and professionals. They have one of the largest teams in cryptocurrency. Feel free to check them out on their website: https://funfair.io/how-it-works/our-team/
Notably, the first five employee profiles presented on the website are:
Jez San OBE, Founder, CEO
Jez San is a British technology entrepreneur and investor whose pioneering work in the field of real time 3D computer graphics led to being awarded the OBE for services to the computer games industry.
Jez founded Argonaut Software in his teens and designed the first chip used to power 3D games including multi-million-selling Star Fox, Harry Potter and Croc. He also founded 3D online poker room PKR and microprocessor developer Arc International.
Since 2013 Jez has been an active investor in the blockchain and cryptocurrency sector. His investments include Google’s DeepMind and online cryptocurrency exchange Kraken.
Jeremy Longley, Founder, CTO
Over 15 years’ experience managing technology teams – from the development of advanced video-game software through to the deployment and operation of enterprise-scale infrastructure.
Oliver Hopton, Founder, Developer
Oliver Hopton is an experience developer and team lead with over 15 years experience building gaming products. He spent 10 years working at online poker room PKR as Software Development Manager working on a huge variety of administration tools and integrations with 3rd party gaming content and providers. Heavily involved in technical compliance for gaming license applications in Guernsey, the UK, France, Italy and Denmark.
He then spent 18 months as CTO of EveryFan, responsible for architecting and building a UK facing sports betting product.
David Greyling, COO
David has more than 20 years’ experience in E-Commerce related organisations. In his role as COO, David is responsible for leading the business development, strategy, operations, finance and corporate functions.
With extensive leadership experience in Digital marketing and E-commerce international companies, David specialises in leading business integration and transformation programmes.
Prior to his current position David was Director of International for William Hill PLC, reporting to the board on market expansion, regulation and strategic change management programs.
Stefan Kovach, Business Strategy and Marketing Consultant
Stef is an industry executive with with a wealth of experience, having headed up the marketing functions of both PokerStars and bwin.party - two of the biggest brands in online gambling.

Career Opportunities

Further, FunFair is looking to expand – and fast. They expect to have a team of 50+ people in the not-so-distant future, as they are currently hiring developers, business and marketing professionals, and so forth. So, if you’re looking for an opportunity to showcase your expertise in these fields, try your shot at securing a position within the company! (https://www.funfair.io/careers) The FunFair team’s base of operations is in London, UK.
Some of the positions currently offered in the United Kingdom, England, London:

• C#/Javascript Developer
• C#/Javascript Developer - Domain
• C#/Javascript Developer - KYC
• Community Manager
• Senior Business Analyst
• UI Developer
• Senior Developer - Typescript
• VP Product Owner

When did they start the project?

Technically, FunFair started on June 22nd, 2017, because all FUN tokens that will ever exist were created on this day. However, the idea, technology, and product were being developed before the ICO started.

What have they accomplished to date?

FunFair have accomplished a lot since their inception- consistently updating development, business operations, and hiring many new staff. From Sponsoring DevCon 3, receiving awards from the Malta Gaming Awards, excellent showcase updates, and launching their product to the gaming industry at the International Casino Exhibition which boasted over 30,000 industry attendees, they have been on track to their public release. With the release of the closed beta right around the corner, the future is bright for FunFair.

Ok, so what is the technology? What are they developing?

FunFair is building their decentralized platform and protocol on top of Ethereum’s blockchain. FunFair is developing the game technology, and their proprietary, advanced state channel technology which they call Fate Channels. The platform that FunFair has created and continues to develop, will allow anyone to run a casino in just a few clicks, allow third party developers to distribute and integrate their own games to a new, global audience, while creating the ultimate casino experience for end users.
Fate Channels are FunFair’s custom, proprietary version of State Channels. They are superior technology to current State Channels, as they are what support the communication during game sessions between player and casino, while executing entire game logic and random number generation off-chain. They provide a fast, low cost method for RNG, starting game sessions, ending them, and settling with smart contracts on the blockchain. There is only one gas fee needed to start the game session, which solves scalability issues with platforms like Ethereum.
For an in-depth explanation that you won’t be disappointed in reading, please refer to the technical white paper here: https://funfair.io/wp-content/uploads/FunFair-Technical-White-Paper.pdf

What really happens in the Fate Channels?

FunFair’s random number generation is executed within the Fate Channel, and is a commit/reveal scheme that makes it provably fair. There are also a hash chain to prove that the overall sequence is indeed fair.
A player enters a FunFair-powered casino with some FUN tokens in their wallet, and then both the casino and player send FUN tokens from each of their personal wallets into a smart contract which then holds the FUN in escrow via the Fate Channels (off-chain) until the player cashes out/closes the channel.
The player and casino swap random seeds that they have generated locally, and these are then hashed numerous times by both parties in private. The sequence of hashes are stored locally by each party. There could be thousands of hashes, which become the random numbers, and are passed one by one, in reverse order, by the casino to the player and vice versa when the game needs randomness. Since the hashes are in reverse order, a new hash will always hash into the previous one, so that it can be verified that it’s the correct value of the next hash. The first hash is committed in the state channel on the blockchain as it was opened, and this is what will be used later to reveal that the random number generation was correct.
The position that a ball lands on in a roulette spin, for example, is computed this way. The two hashes provided by both player and casino are combined into a random number that neither side could have predicted. It’s provably fair because because it can be shown that they come from the same hash chain in the correct sequence, and it can be shown after the game session is over, using the reveal to show the seed was in fact, committed to the blockchain in advance of the games played.
The random number generation scheme works extremely fast, and is not dependent and waiting on the blockchain for verification every time, yet it is provably fair in both randomness and sequence. It is easy to detect cheating by either side (for instance, the random number generations would go out of sequence). The security of the hash chain is what makes the randomness unpredictable. If it is possible to reverse a hash, you could predict the random number generation. FunFair uses SHA-3 for hash generation, which has not been reversed yet, and is likely to last in strength for some decades.

The platform.

FunFair presents its casino operators and players with a gaming opportunity never seen before:

• Decentralized, essentially serverless
• Provably fair, blockchain-based
• Trust-less outcomes that can be witnessed on verifiable smart contracts
• Instant cashouts - casinos do not hold your funds
• Accessible through web browser on desktop or mobile
• Fun games with an exciting user interface
• Casinos feel safer, with no risk of fraudulent charge-backs from player credit cards
• Fast gameplay conducted through Fate Channels – the team’s custom version of State Channels.
  
• FunFair is preparing for mass adoption and has a working solution for Ethereum network congestion.
  

The games.

FunFair is pursuing a full suite of traditional casino games:

• Blackjack
• Baccarat
• Craps
• Roulette
• Slot machines (many variations)
• Let It Ride
• Caribbean Stud
• 5-card Poker
• 3-card Poker
• Many more to come

You can test all of these games, right now at https://showcase.funfair.io . Some are currently testable on the Ethereum test networks.
Regarding mobile functionality: A number of mobile dapp browsers are being built (ciphestatus) – FunFair support these. Their games are built with technology that works in mobile browsers.
FunFair is one of the only projects in the cryptocurrency space that has a working product.

FunFair’s vision for the future- an updated roadmap for 2018:

FunFair’s writeup of the updated roadmap can be found here: https://funfair.io/updated-funfair-roadmap-explained/
The roadmap can be found here: https://funfair.io/latest/roadmap/

Q1: In January, the team submitted to the UK Gambling Commission their application for a Remote Gambling Software License.
February 6th-8th,

Official launch into the gaming industry at the ICE (International Casino Exhibition).

Read FunFair’s written re-cap here: https://funfair.io/ice-2018-round/

Watch FunFair’s video round up here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zEjC3_5Q5jA

March 8th-10th,

EthCC Conference.

FunFair CEO Jez San gives a presentation on FunFair platform and protocol to Ethereum community in Paris.

Watch the video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irpu2iHDiK0

Q2 Goals:

• Live Beta on main network.
  
• Announce and start integration of first 3rd party games developer.
  
• Further license applications.
  
• If Beta proves successful, look to go live with first operator.
  
• Continue to attract & retain blockchain talent.
  
• Continue to build FunFair brand.
  

April 2018

• V1 product enhancements and initial stage of Go-Live readiness.
• Announce 3rd party game development partner.
• Further production quality games released.

May 2018

• V1 completes and closed Beta launches

May 15th - 17th,

G2E Asia - launch FunFair brand to Asian gaming market

Website: https://www.g2easia.com/

May 16th - 17th
Consensus and Token Summit in New York

Networking and updating community

Website: http://tokensummit.com/

May 23rd - 24th
Disruptive Online Gambling conference (London)

Exposure to UK gambling industry

Website: http://www.arena-international.com/gambling/

Q3 Goals:

• Continue roll out of early operators
• Learn, iterate and improve partner integration process
• Drive further product improvements & platform features

Q4 and beyond:

• Go live with first 3rd party games content
• Continue to build FunFair brand

Some Information Regarding Casino Operators:

Casino operators will save significant money on hardware, chargebacks, and operational headcount. The number of physical servers required is reduced as gameplay executes in immutable smart contracts deployed to the ethereum network.
An operator will, at all times, require a reserve of FUN tokens to ensure they are able to accept bets, and cover their liabilities. If, after a period of time, they wish to convert some of their FUN token balance they will have a number of market exchanges which are capable of facilitating this type of transaction.
FunFair is working on the many customization options right now and up until release. You will definitely be able to customize the look and feel. You can add your own graphics, logos, colour schemes, etc. You will also be able to choose which kinds of games are offered, and how they will be laid out.
FunFair fully supports KYC. They’ve built their own KYC technology that’s crypto-friendly. FunFair’s tech will allow each operator to have their own policies on who they exclude and whether they require KYC/AML etc.
A reminder, FunFair isn’t an operator, it’s a technology that operators use, and some will be in countries where they need to do KYC/AML and some will be in countries where they don’t. FunFair’s tech works for all cases and will support the full strength KYC if that operator requires it.
Lots of information can also be found on the website. Here are some excellent links:

• Regarding casino operators: https://funfair.io/use-cases/casinos/
• Regarding players: https://funfair.io/use-cases/players/
• Regarding game developers: https://funfair.io/use-cases/developers/
• Regarding affiliates: https://funfair.io/use-cases/affiliates/

The Past, Present, and Future of FunFair..

FunFair has been consistently networking, and the team have been continually attending blockchain conferences and events. From launching their product to the gaming industry at the International Casino Exhibition in early February, launching their product to the Asian market at G2E Asia, and just recently announcing their industry first game development partner; Spike Games, FunFair is advancing very well, on track and ready for industry disruption.
For questions that you may have think I've missed, please refer to this updated FAQ on the FunFair website: https://funfair.io/frequently-asked-questions/#the-fun-token
TL;DR - Read^{thewholething}

The rumors were proven correct by Amaya Gaming who just announced the fact that the final papers were signed and the acquisition of Rational Group is now complete. For those who don't know anything about the big purchase, by buying the parent company of PokerStars, the Canadian gambling group has just become the biggest online poker operator in the world. The purchase was anything but cheap, with the Canadians paying almost $5 billion to take over Rational Group, but the investment is definitely worth making. Most of those who play poker over the Internet and the vast majority of highrollers are choosing PokerStars or Full Tilt Poker. The reason is that here they have the best chance of finding worthy opponents at any time of day or night and this translates into numerous opportunities to win big pots. Instead of purchasing just a share of Rational Group, Amaya decided to completely take over and as a result they will have unrestricted freedom in passing future acts. Their representatives are thrilled with the acquisition and even though they know that they had to pay a lot of money, they only think about the return on investment. They will now be able to tap into the immense potential of the biggest poker fan base in the world and build on the success of numerous live and online poker tours. On the other hand, PokerStars is also very likely to benefit from this acquisition, not only due to the funds that are guaranteed to pour in. Amaya is a huge company with a lot of money and just as much influence, which means that they can easily sway legislators into passing favorable laws. This is exactly what the poker company has been trying to do for many years, since the American legislators decided to ban online poker from the United States. A couple of states have legalized online gambling in general and poker in particular, but there are just as many who are yet to jump on the bandwagon. Since PokerStars was launched in 2001 it constantly grew its customer base, but it had a hard time offsetting the losses suffered as a result of UIGEA. Under the Amaya umbrella, they are entitled to expect good things to come their way and it is only fair to assume that these positive changes will also benefit poker players.
from
via Casinoreviews

The following post by Commissar_ is being replicated because some comments within the post(but not the post itself) have been openly removed.
The original post can be found(in censored form) at this link:
np.reddit.com/ CryptoCurrency/comments/7o2gtl
The original post's content was as follows:

FunFair. An in-depth analysis.
Intro.
FunFair is a decentralised gaming technology platform which uses the Ethereum blockchain, smart contracts, and proprietary state channels to deliver casino solutions with games that are fun, fast and fair.
FunFair is not a casino. Instead, FunFair will license its technology out to casino operators. This differentiates FunFair from the competition in the blockchain gambling sphere – being a casino carries with it risks and burdens stemming from statutory and regulatory hurdles. Being a licensing entity instead, provides legal safeguards and will enable a more widely used platform.
I’d like to touch on the many aspects of FunFair that makes it an extremely promising and undervalued project. However, I won’t be making any price projections. As always, do your own research. In this case, I’ve done a lot of it for you.
The market.
Online gambling is a large market: currently over 47.1 billion dollars, and projected to continue increasing. https://www.statista.com/statistics/270728/market-volume-of-online-gaming-worldwide/. However, this is not to say that the price of the FUN token should be compared to the market cap of internet gambling. FUN is not a measure of casino capital/wealth, it's an entirely new animal.
The problem and the solution.
Trust. Traditional online casinos rely on you trusting them to be fair. The chance of red coming up on roulette is 48.65%. How do you know your traditional online casino is giving you those odds? You don’t – you need to trust them. Most online casinos are incorporated in island microstates. Do those nations have online casino regulators? Do they possess the willingness, manpower, and expertise to audit online casinos?
FunFair puts the gambling on the blockchain so it’s trustless – you know you have a 48.65% chance of having red come up. It’s fair.
The team.
FunFair has their ground covered and bases loaded. With their team of 30+ professionals they are way ahead of the competition. You may know CEO Jez San, OBE, from his career track: Argonaut Games (founder), Star Fox (programmer), and PKR Poker (founder). He has been in the gaming industry for more than two decades, and has built valuable relationships along the way. Constantly engaging with the FunFair community through Telegram, Discord, and Reddit, it seems as though he leaves no engaging question unanswered. Alongside Jez as COO is David Greyling (https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidgreyling/), former International Director of William Hill, one of the world’s leading betting and gaming companies and one of the most trusted brands in the industry. (https://www.williamhillplc.com/about/). Recently, Stefan Kovach joined the team - Stef is an industry executive with a wealth of experience, having headed up the marketing functions of both PokerStars and bwin.party – two of the biggest brands in online gambling.
Further, FunFair is looking to expand – and fast. They expect to have a team of 50+ people in the not-so-distant future, as they are currently hiring business and marketing professionals. So, if you’re looking for an opportunity to showcase your expertise in these fields, try your shot at securing a position within the company! (https://www.funfair.io/careers) The FunFair team’s base of operations is in London, UK.
The platform.
FunFair presents its casino operators and players with a gaming opportunity never seen before:

• Decentralized, serverless
  
• Provably fair, blockchain-based
  
• Trust-less outcomes that can be witnessed on verifiable smart contracts
  
• Instant cashouts – FunFair does not hold your funds
  
• Accessible through web browser on desktop or mobile
  
• Fun games with an exciting user interface
  
• Casinos feel safer, with no risk of fraudulent charge-backs from player credit cards.
  
• Fast gameplay conducted through Fate Channels – the team’s custom version of State Channels. The Fate Channels developed by the FunFair team are superior technology. In very basic terms, Fate Channels are what supports the communication during a game session between the player and the casino. They provide a fast, low cost method for random number generation, starting gaming sessions, ending them and settling with smart contracts on the blockchain. This allows for secure, deterministic, fair gameplay. There is only one gas fee needed to start the game session. For an in-depth explanation that you won’t be disappointed in reading, please refer the the technical white paper here: https://funfair.io/wp-content/uploads/FunFair-Technical-White-Paper.pdf FunFair is preparing for mass adoption and has a working solution for Ethereum network congestion. Fate Channels.
  

For more discussion both technical and company related, have a look at both whitepapers: https://funfair.io/explore/whitepapers/
The games.
FunFair is pursuing a full suite of traditional casino games:

• Blackjack
  
• Baccarat
  
• Craps
  
• Roulette
  
• Slot machines (various types)
  
• Let It Ride
  
• Caribbean Stud
  
• 5-card Poker
  
• 3-card Poker
  
• And more to come
  

You can test all of these games right now at https://showcase.funfair.io/. Some are currently testable on the Ethereum testnet.
FunFair is one of the only projects in the cryptocurrency space that has a working product. They are set to launch in the beginning of Q2 of 2018.
What have they been up to? Are they on track?
Consistently ahead of schedule and on top of their roadmap in many ways, FunFair was a sponsor of DevCon 3 and had one of the most engaged-with booth setups. They connected and networked positively with many developers at the event. https://twitter.com/FunFairTech/status/926113230677856256
They’ve recently received the Malta iGaming award for “Best ICO of 2017” which was determined by a nomination panel of 5 industry experts, and a panel of 32 judges with many years of combined experience in gaming. The awards were hosted during Malta Gaming Week; a very large event attended by many business executives, authorities, and even local government: http://maltagamingweek.com/
They’ve been constantly updating their product showcase, and adhere to all feedback received by community members. Their new showcase was designed to “be able to cope with adding more games easily by the team + third parties, and also to be configurable by casino operators.” Some of their product update can be found here: https://funfair.io/awards-latest-product-update/
How does the token (FUN) derive value?
FunFair does not issue dividends or offer profit sharing – FunFair doesn't have much to share. The technology will be licensed to casino operators for almost nothing – itself a major draw for existing casino operators to adopt the FunFair platform. With a fixed supply, the value in FUN is derived from scarcity of the token in the marketplace. Scarcity comes from four sources:

• Casinos holding FUN as part of their bankroll (described more below);
  
• Players holding FUN and not cashing it out immediately after they play;
  
• Speculators (investors) holding FUN anticipating it will increase in value;
  
• Token burn: a small amount of FUN will be slowly destroyed over time. The exact amount has not been announced, though it will likely be quite small.
  

That first scarcity factor will be key, as casinos will need extremely large bankrolls of FUN to operate a large casino with multiple games, high max bets, and a large number of seats (allowing numerous people to play concurrently).
Right now, price has been set purely by speculators. As casinos open down the road, scarcity will ramp up --- Casinos will need to buy FUN, which will lead to players buying FUN which will lead to greater popularity of the platform causing more speculators/investors to buy FUN. Scarcity and utility are what drives price.
Plans for the future & the latest company update.
FunFair will be attending the ICE Totally Gaming Conference on February 6-8 (https://www.icetotallygaming.com/exhibitors/funfair-casino). This is a major business-to-business conference for the online gambling industry. The team plans to have the developmental side of the FunFair project done in time for the conference.
Tech completion in February will allow for the advancement in operations and partnerships, which will lead to live FunFair-licensed casinos going live in Q2 2018.
FunFair is in the process of acquiring their Remote Gambling Software License from the UK, which will enable them to license their technology to existing and regulated casino operators.
FunFair has steady operational costs covered for the entire year, as well as an 85,000 ETH reserve/storage for any and all upcoming costs.
An Updated Roadmap (December 20th, 2017)
(available here: https://funfair.io/company-update-december-2017/)

Q1:
In January we will be submitting to the UK Gambling Commission our application for a Remote Gambling Software License.
In February we will be attending ICE Gaming, an international B2B conferencing event, where we will be introducing the FunFair brand to the gaming industry.
By the end of March V1 of the FunFair blockchain casino nears completion. This release will allow for real FUN to be used on the Main Ethereum Network for the first time.
Q2:
Operator On-Boarding: Deploying the FunFair casin...

DISCLAIMER: I copied this post from my blog: https://www.pokervip.com/forum/my-poker-journey/hakuna-matata-kinglylion-s-blog?nav=58692d0cd39043165f8b45ce
.
At the start of this year i was playing on pokerstars. I was taking poker seriously for exactly a year, started at 2NLz, and at that point i was probably a small winner at 25NLz.
At the end of 2015 i wrote an excessive and detailed blog on reddit about my first real poker year, and i definetely recommend you checking it out!
https://www.reddit.com/pokecomments/3z1avx/2015_my_poker_yea
In that blog i set myself the goal to beat 100NL by the end of 2016. Lets see how far i've gotten...
So right at the start of the year (or sometime in the first part of it) i started losing my motivation. To be honest i cant remember the exact circumstances, but it had something to do with a downswing i had at 25NLz (had to drop to 16NLz), me being a lazy fuck and not working hard enough to get better. I got more interested in computergames, and grinded less and less.
My bankroll had dropped a lot within that timeframe. As stated in the blog above i ended 2015 with a BR of 1400$. At some point it got to around 700$ or so. But slowly i started to regain my motivation for the beautiful game that is poker. I was a bit short on cash, and the greedy my didn't want to start paying a lot of money for coaching again, so i got a subscription to run it once, and watched a few videos of them. I took the game, and especially the study part of it more serious again, and i began doing better. At that point i was probably around a 4bb/100 pre rakeback winner at 16NLz on stars.
And then something kind of big happened to the direction my poker game was going. A friend of mine (shoutout to CRS) suggested i should try out playing in the microgaming network, because the playerpool was softer, the software was decent, and the rakeback was good.
I always thought about leaving stars for another site. But up to that point there never seemed to be a good option for me. In my part of germany some sites just dont operate because of legal stuff, and i was very picky when it came to software, because i got used to the smoothness of stars'.
But i checked the microgaming sites out, and found out that a) Betvictor has a license for my part of Germany, and b) their software is acceptable even for my standards!
I withdrew all my money from stars, and started playing 20NL on Betvictor. That was also the point when i started this blog (10th October 2016), to force myself to share what i am doing, hoping to get some more motivation out of this while still entertaining some people.
While i was struggling at 25NLz on stars i was doing extremely well 20NL on BV (this is my whole 20NL sample:)
http://puu.sh/t7HqT/7db561d6a7.png
As soon as my motivation started to rise again i also contacted my coach w34z3l and we did some lessons. I definetely got a lot out of the lessons i took in the last months, and feel like i improved a ton in many aspects of the game.
Sadly my shots at 50NL didnt go well so far. I took 2 shots of 10BIs each already as soon as my bankroll was at 1500€ (i moved down earlier than -10BIs both times though), and i am currently in progress of taking my 3rd shot. Doing better than before, i definetely expect myself to be a small winner at the limit pre rakeback.
Here is my whole 50NL graph:
http://puu.sh/t7Hsb/e53d19a989.png
Because i enjoy playing on this site so much and it was already natural for me to advertise them, because i really meant it, i took an affiliate deal with PokerVIP (so if you are interested in any details about betvictor, or want to know more about the rakeback deal just let me know).
Anyway, so here i am, at the start of 2017. Lets take a look at the goals i had for this moment, and if i archieved them:
1) From my "2015 - My poker year" reddit post:
"My plan for 2016 is to beat 100NL"
... Who knows, if i wouldve powered through the whole year maybe this wouldve been possible. But definetely not archievable for me because i took such a long break.
2) From this blog, since i left stars:
"Grind up the bankroll, and start being a winning reg at 50nl."
I think i am close. The reg part of this didnt happen yet, there is still volume missing to back this up. But i think i can beat 50NL right now. So i think i got as close as it gets before archieving this goal!
All in all i am happy about how my last poker year went. Especially taking into account that i was absent from really trying for a few months, i definetely improved a lot over the course of the last months. Of course there is still room for improvement, but if i can keep up the pace of getting coached and grinding volume i should be able to get to a decent place in the poker world.
I decided to go with more general and archievable goals for the next year:

• Get good at 50NL. Like pretty good. Winning over 4bb/100 pre rakeback would be great. Over 5bb/100 would be fantastic.
  
• Dont forget about how important discipline is! Dont stop improving. Get coached, work on your game. Also keep improving your mental game, and dont lose your will to grind and put in the hours. 20k-30k hands per months should be a reasonable volume goal.
  
• If the goals above are done, maybe take some shots at 100NL. (optional)
  

Thats it guys. A big thank you to everyone who took the time to read through the mess that are my thoughts. I hope you took some enjoyment out of this, maybe some inspiration aswell. I am looking forward to a succesful year 2017, and i wish you all the best of luck at the tables!

I have a business idea. What if someone ran a professional starcraft league that facilitates playing Starcraft for money. You go to the league's website, register for a game, pay $5, get randomly matched with an opponent (who also pay $10), then the winner gets $9.50.
$0.50 goes to the league. What does the league provide?

• Escrow service. House holds on to money and pays the winner.
• Anti-cheating. House monitors the games and watch for cheats.
• Age verification. House will require payment via credit card as to verify the players are over 18 (or whatever legal age is required in your jurisdiction).
• Player ratings. House will keep a leaderboard of the top players.
• Run large scale tournaments, where for $5 entry fee you'll have a chance to win thousands of dollars. While my version will host big tournaments, my main focus is really to allow small-time, low-level players like myself to be able to start a $5 game anytime I want to (like going to PokerStars at any time to play at a quick low-limit table).
• General promotion of esports. House will act like the PGA and lobby for activities of interest to casual and professional gamers.

I can see several problems with this already. Will Activision or the government be ok with this?
A lot of Americans play Online Poker, although technically it is illegal. But I think this is more legal because Starcraft is not a game of chance. This is not gambling, but more like a professional golf tournament.
I like this idea because this way we wouldn't have to wait for sponsors to professionalize Starcraft in the United States. This will create a whole level of semi pro players as well as make the game more interesting for casual gamers with a few dollars to spare.
TLDR Why don't we have a league that charges people to play, then give 95% of the money to winners, while keeping 5% to run a semi-pro league. What can go wrong with the idea? Help!
** Edited to add** As Kloster pointed out, there are already several sites like these (Zotac, EU Craft, Go4SC2, etc). So do you think there's room for another one? Can I improve on their model somehow?

This is probably been a thread already, but last time I played was when PokerStars was legal in the United States. What websites are popular now and still legal to gamble on in the US?
Thank you!

Hey whats up guys,
Alright, so I'm helping out on an online poker company start-up called LiveAce; I'm pretty much just interested in reviews and comparisons of LiveAce's current game platform versus Pokerstars and Full Tilt. I'm helping out with the game testing and marketing of the game so really yeah, just give me some input!
Here are the rough points about it: * You get 400 free chips daily for the first week * Any amount you win at the tables are converted to "Live Chips" redeemable for cash * They use an auction format for cash prizes * Relatively small community right now so easy to win * You get an extra 100 chips for using a referral
Here's a pic of the interface: http://imgur.com/WZ3EjRG
If you are curious to how this is legal, basically instead of a direct conversion exchange from chips to an exact monetary value, they have auctions so in-game money can be used to bet for set prizes, which are cash prizes; it follows the rules for operations of contests and sweepstakes within approved states!
Website: http://www.liveace.com/ Referral Link: http://www.liveace.com/refetv43030/
I just want some input for improvement. Every online Poker gaming site started somewhere so hit me up with some critique or compliments!

Here's what Michael from Snapcard had to say about bit license in a blog post just pushed out to their e-mail list.
Hey everyone!
There’s been a lot of talk about the Bitlicense throughout the past week and I thought it would be a good time to summarize what it is / what it means, and also give some thoughts to what it will mean for consumers and for entrepreneurs entering the digital currency space.
I’ve taken the information provided here as a point of reference. It doesn’t cover every single detail, but it covers some of the main points. Feel free to add your thoughts below.
There are a lot who skeptics that argue that New York’s Bitlicense creates for entrepreneurs barriers to entry (which it naturally does) but in the same token it takes away one of the real pain points for entrepreneurs (especially in the Bitcoin community) of gaining trust as being a reputable, honest, and accountable service.
Right off the bat, it’s important to note that the Bitlicense isn’t relevant for all businesses touching Bitcoin (and it shouldn’t be). It’s focused to Bitcoin businesses that act as an Bitcoin exchange, digital currency payment processor, or Bitcoin wallet.
Anti-Money Laundering

Maintain a detailed record of each transaction that includes the parties’ identities and physical addresses, the value and dates of the transaction, the method of payment used, and a description of the transaction
Verify customers’ identities when opening customer accounts and check them against the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Asset Control’s Specially Designated Nationals list.
Enhanced diligence would be required for accounts involving foreign entities, and accounts on behalf of foreign shell entities would be prohibited.
Notify NYDFS of any transactions that might signify illegal or criminal activity and when an individual engages in transactions that exceed US$10,000 in a single day.

If you’re a registered Money Service Business, all of the above is already quite standard. Knowing the physical address is not new to identity verification procedures. While it might seem infuriating, it’s been par for the course for companies for awhile.
Companies such as Bitstamp, one of the largest bitcoin exchanges, have an extremely thorough verification process. Now it’s not ideal for me as a user, but if it means that Bitstamp is going to exist and I get the same level of quality product, then it’s not a big deal from my side. I’d rather have them exist and verify my ID, knowing they’re not going to be shut down the next day, as opposed to knowing the site could go offline at any time for one reason or another.
It references having a “description” of the purchase. This is a little interesting. I know that Coinbase has started doing this in their procedures and there was a little bit of kick back from the community. This isn’t Coinbase wanting to know where you’re shopping and what you’re buying for their own reasons; this is Coinbase maintaining their level of regulatory compliance.
With all this being said, these are measures that worked for previous technologies. It could be time with Bitcoin to change that process, make it more efficient, and give users the privacy they seek while still maintaining some form of customer understanding.
Consumer Protection

To the extent a Licensee stores virtual currency on behalf of a third party, the Licensee would have to hold virtual currency of the same type and amount as that which is owed or obligated to a third party.
Maintain a bond or trust account (in U.S. dollars) for the benefit of its customers in a form and amount acceptable to NYDFS.
Provide customers with a receipt for each transaction with information about the firm’s name and address, specifics of the transaction, and statements about the Licensee’s liability for non-delivery and refund policy.
Disclose to consumers the material risks associated with virtual currencies, in writing, both in English “and in any other predominant language spoken by the customers of the Licensee.”
Each Licensee shall be permitted to invest its retained earnings and profits in only the following high-quality, investment-grade permissible investments with maturities of up to one year and denominated in United States dollars:
(1) certificates of deposit issued by financial institutions that are regulated by a United States federal or state regulatory agency;
(2) money market funds;
(3) state or municipal bonds;
(4) United States government securities;
(5) United States government agency securities

BitLicense businesses cannot invest or hold their ANY of their profit in Bitcoin, ONLY in US Dollars.
It was stated that companies must only and always have USD, and are not allowed to keep profits in Bitcoin, etc.
First, this means that a company based in Europe must now utilize USD at all times. This seems like it’s worded very poorly from the regulators part because then the investments they’re referring to must be ridiculously low risk… (this paragraph was a little confuding to me, I may not have gotten the correct meaning)
One part of me says they’re trying to really take the life out of Bitcoin by not giving companies a chance at utilizing it completely for their operations. Another part thinks that it’s more comcerned about companies that are day-trading with Bitcoin (either profits or customer funds) and moving the market.
The latter gives me some optimism that the regulators are aware of how big this will become. So when institutional level banks are really entrenched in the Bitcoin economy, it will take away their ability to move the market. Regardless, this does need a lot of clarification. It feels very rushed from the regulators standpoint.
Cyber Security

Designate a qualified employee to serve as a Chief Information Security Officer responsible for implementing >a cyber security program to identify cyber risks, protect systems from unauthorized access, detect data >breaches, and respond to system breaches and unauthorized use.
Conduct system penetration testing at least annually and vulnerability assessments at least quarterly.

This fair enough.
Companies use this as a way to also promote their operations as being efficient and secure. Giving the company a somewhat “seal of approval” to add confidence to the consumers. Examples of this have already happened. I know for me personally, Andreas is someone who’s opinion I take extremely seriously. He’s a rockstar in the Bitcoin world! So when he gives something the tick of approval, it certainly goes very far for Entrepreneurs in the community.
Perhaps we should introduce an Andreas Icon! It gets put onto websites that have been verified, do away with the Bitlicense, and consider that the tick of approval? Mentioned as a joke, but for me as a community member, that would actually mean more than a “Bitlicense” label at the moment :)
But seriously, for entrepreneurs this is a good way to provide legitimacy for our users and potential users. The closest thing I’ve seen to this is CrowdCurity, who is doing great things for entrepreneurs to secure their sites in a more budget friendly way. You’ll see they’ve got a big focus on Bitcoin companies in their client list.
Capital Requirements

Maintain at all times such amount of capital as NYDFS determines. The proposed rules do not set forth any specific minimum levels of capital or methods for computing required capital. Rather, the proposal would permit NYDFS to determine the required amount of capital on a case-by-case basis, after considering such factors as the Licensee’s assets and liabilities, the amount of leverage used by the firm, the liquidity position of the firm, and extent to which additional financial protection is provided for customers.

This is very similar to money transmission regulations… (Which are ridiculously messy for entrepreneurs to be honest. They vary from state to state and just provide headache after headache after headache.) For example, if I’m a money transmitter and have $150M in transactions going through my service everyday, but our cash at bank is $10,000, it provides zero margin for error in our operations and thus places more risk on consumers. It would give me a lot more confidence to give them my money as opposed to a company that doesn’t have any sort of capital reserve in the event of a problem. That’s an oversimplified example of course, but as a user, I know wallet providers/exchanges/payment processors should have this (but it should be much more clear and concise to remove the ambiguity which requires paying legal teams to help decipher it). Money Transmission Wiki
Financial Reporting and Audit

Submit quarterly and annual financial statements to NYDFS. Annual statements are to be audited and submitted with an opinion of an independent certified public accountant and an evaluation by the accountant of the firm’s accounting procedures and internal controls.

This is necessary if you’re a wallet provideexchange in my opinion. Companies are already doing independent audits to promote their legitimacy. It’s good for business. As a user, as a company, everyone wins. Example. Now, does this cost money for entrepreneurs? Yes. But what would I gain from it?
Well, I know that a user is going to be much more inclined to go with a well audited business, so for me, this is a business expense but it’s worth it’s weight in gold to show that we didn’t just whip up an exchange overnight, we’ve got proven legitimacy from reputable (reputable is a key word) 3rd parties.
If you’re familiar with the Online Poker space, there was a day called “Black Friday" which was basically the day when Full Tilt Poker was found to actually be using their players funds for company operations/spending/employee salaries etc.. This essentially means they were depending on user deposits (or as the saying goes Robbing Peter to pay Paul) - The result of this is that US players can no longer make deposits to major online poker sites (like Pokerstars) and thus the whole online poker industry took a huge decline as the USA is so influential in it. Essentially it was like a Mt. Gox, but for poker. What that means is that if Mt. Gox were to happen in the USA, the consumer protection ramifications could really damage the potential opportunity for the mainstream adoption of Bitcoin.
I know that no matter what, Bitcoin will still exist. However, if credit card processors and all banks never allow any form of deposits into Coinbase/Circle etc., the adoption of Bitcoin will be slowed down in the US. Adoption in the US isn’t where the real benefit for this currency is, but it still provides a lot of influence for the development of infrastructure. Meaning if it’s a new hot property in the US, then you increase investor interest. If investor interest increases, then the entrepreneur interest increases. If entrepreneurial interest increases, more products hit the market. This leads to awesome people building awesome things that can be used globally and helps create an infrastructure for it to grow faster and faster.
I feel like I’ve been rambling, and if you got this far, thanks for reading my thoughts!
In summary, I think the NYC Bitlicense offers legitimacy for everyday users and help hold companies accountable. It also can be looked at as a business investment for entrepreneurs, not just a drain on resources. It shouldn’t be relevant to all Bitcoin businesses.
The proposed regulations seem very rushed and require a lot more thought in order to help Bitcoin keep the things that are awesome about it. Regulators gonna regulate.
Thanks for reading!
Michael.
Source: http://snapcard.cmail1.com/t/d-l-egujy-vuimjdt-

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Date: 2014-01-24
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Questions	Answers
What has been the luckiest moment in your career? Thanks!	With 90 players left in EPT San Remo in 2008, I got JJ in against Roland De Wolfe's QQ... on a T 7 3 flop. I hit a jack on the river and went on to win the tournament for 1.4 million $
1) How long were you playing poker before you decided: "I'm going to do this for a living"? What would you consider the turning point (in terms of poker ability, a significant cash, etc) that pushed you toward doing this professionally?	I was playing for about 2 and a half years while going to school and working part time jobs, before I realized I was going to make a living solely from poker. The turning point was when I decided to go for supernova elite on Pokerstars in 2007.
What portion of the cash that you play with is actually yours?	It's almost always all mine. I sell action to the 100k+ tournaments thought.
Why do you mostly play tournaments instead of cash? Isn't the variance terrible?	I play both, you just don't hear about the cash games all the time. The variance is insane for both.
What is the worst bad beat of your career?	KK into Antonio's AA with 19 left in the One Drop where first place was 18 million dollars. I was third in chips he was second. #showers.
Jason how do i win flips?	Focus really hard, I mean really really really hard lol.
Are there any well-known poker pros out there who have obvious tells they aren't aware of?	Yes, and I'm not going to name names obv :)
Do you think that online poker will come back to the States entirely?	Eventually yes... I hope.
Is there a moment in your career that stands out as the biggest poker mistake you've ever made?	I can't think of a huge mistake that I regret, I try to focus on the positive aspects of my career!
Hey Jason, do you think it would be possible for a live grinder to grind in today's games with 2k starting at 1/2$ to like 75k in a year eventually moving up when the bankroll allows it?	If they are a good player than yes, but I can't imagine why a good player would only have 2k
When Vanessa Selbst did an AMA, she went into some detail on a hand she played on High Stakes where she stacked off to an amateur's set with her queens, her point being that the hand was one that she looked back on and cringed about, knowing that it was broadcast on tv. So, is there any tv hand (ept, big game, high stakes) that you feel that you truly misplayed and can't bear to look back on?	Actually there's a hand against Justin Bonomo that I played on the big game in which I had AxJd and check shoved the river as a bluff. Makes me cringe a little- although, I'm not sure it was such a bad play :)
What would you say the single most important piece of advice you could give poker players just starting to really learn the game?	You can only get better but playing, and through experience. there's only so much studying you can do, you have to play.
What's the best comp you've ever received from a casino?	Lotta buffet tickets :)
	Honestly, I can't recall the best
Do you treat poker like a job all the time now or do you still have the occasional beer and pretzel game with your buddies?	I had to stop doing that a long time ago. I spend so much of my time playing poker at the highest level that when I'm not doing so, I want to do something other than poker.
So what do you do for fun now with your buddies if not poker?	Boating, eating, sports, beach
How many hours did you dedicate to poker when you started?	My life
IS LIV SHAVED? HAVE YOU EVER HAD MORE THAN 4% OF YOURSELF IN A SHR?	Do u want me to say yes? because I've obviously had more than 4% of myself
Can you share some pics/vids of your boat? What are your thoughts on Phil Helmuth?	Follow me on Instagram for boat pics : realJasonMercier.
Hi -I am very curious about what a typical week looks like for a poker pro (in terms of hours)? For example 60 hours spent playing poker, 40 hours spent analyzing, xx spent sleeping, xx recreation.	Depends on the player. I spend weeks playing 0 hours and other weeks playing 100.
So, do you play golf ? And if yes, what's your handicap ? And if it's low, are you better then Ivey ? Cheers from iceland.	Only played a few times, I'm awful.
When was the definitive moment when you decided you wanted to go Pro and what impact did it have on your life (besides the obvious)and the impact of the life of others around you?	A few months into 2007 I was well on pace to achieving Supernova Elite status on Pokerstars, which meant I would make a nice chunk of money throughout the year.
	At that point, it didn't impact much, I was playing online basically working a desk job. Once I started travelling a lot for poker though, my life changed dramatically.
What do the Dolphins need to do in order to become a contender in the AFC East again?	They started the offseason off pretty right with a few firings!
What is the biggest cash pot you have won?	660k
What is the most bat-shit insane play you've ever seen made at a poker table?	Wish I could remember one specific one... I've seen so many lol.
What are the perks of being a pokerstars pro?	I get my face as my avatar :)
I tend to blush at the drop of a hat..as a pro poker player how do you generally read someone whose face turns red?	Lol ummm if there face is turning red a lot, I probably will be able to tell what kind of hand they have. :P.
How much of a financial hit did you take with your bracelet bets this past WSOP?	6 figures. don't want to say
Sweet... big fan, always love watching ept live when u final table. a few questions.	Sorry only 2 questions per person! :)
Seems like you were crazy info OFC before, but seems like to don't play as much, or at least not tweet about it?	Took a nice break but ready to get back in the mix.
After our brief pineapple session at PCA, Vlad said your ofc bumhunting wouldn't stand in Moscow. Was he referring to himself or me?	Lol I'm not sure bud... I think he meant hit and running.
	Language barrier.
Who is the player you least enjoy playing against purely from a personality/body odouall-round douchebag point of view?	I don't exactly call out my enemies on public forums
Is your last name pronounced Mer-Sear or Mercy-A? Every commentator says it differently.	Mer See Ur
Is that true that poker players get a lot of ladies?	Depends on the player...
	If they are a fat slob, then they probably aren't getting a lot of ladies.
	I do okay
Just one question Jason. When will it end? Edit- Im guessing the people down voting dont follow Jason on twitter.	Never.
Hello Jason, welcome to reddit! Do you have any thoughts on string cheese as a snack food?	Thanks! Not a fan of string cheese, stopped eating it when I was 11.
If you could give one tip to people aspiring to emulate your poker success, what would it be?	Win lots...
What tilts you the most?	Traffic
Whats your net worth give or take $1m? also what kind of boat do you own?	I don't tell people my net worth. Its a formula something. 35 footer
Who are the four people you spend the most time with?	Do u want me to name my friends?
	Do u know Dirty Dave?
	Dan Obrien when I'm on the road.
	Why 4?
You can't just drop that you bought a sweet boat and not tell us what you named it. It's corny though, isn't it? :)	It's going to be either "deuces" or "deuce to seven"
	Has to do something with the price :)
Has there been any professional poker player that you just have not been able to read? Who has been the most difficult?	There are a lot of pros that are difficult or unable to read.
Do you feel your perception ability extends past poker?	My perception ability definitely flows over into all aspects of life.
Who would you rather play between Ike Haxton and Viktor Blom?	I'd rather play Ike.
Why Ike?	Viktor is scary :)
Were you actually contemplating taking your boat to the PCA?	Yes was considering it,
I'm not sure of the logistics of it. Was it just a joke?	Ending up not because of the potential problems and bad weather
How did you select your horses? Will you ever recruit more? What cut do you get from their winnings?	I'm strayed away from backing in the last few years. Most players in the past that I backed we did a standard 50/50 with makeup deal.
It’s often a misconception that gambling is a sin but according to the bible it’s never said that gambling is a sin rather the lust of money is where we sin. I was curious since the time you posted your blog about your beliefs as a Christian how has that affected the relationships around you and has it changed your approach in live games? also, on my next visit to Miami can I drive your new boat? @heydanpowers.	Gonna pass on the boat driving, no offense.
	My beliefs as a Christian haven't really affected my relationships or my approach to live games except in that I'm trying to not put in such long sessions anymore playing cash. That is more of a health thing though.
Are you planning on playing any Irish events this year? Irish open, IPO?	No, never been to Ireland either ;/
How much money would you personally have to have in order to play $100,000 buy-in tournaments without swapping/selling action?	Many more millions :)
Just how much harder has the game gotten from when you first started out to current day?	There are a lot more elite players nowadays.
Do you watch hockey? If so whose your favorite team?	Nope
Is the no-drinking bet going to actually happen? What's your motivation for proposing it? Glglgl tho.	It might, but it hasn't happened yet. I was not feeling well after a night of drinking... so I fired off on twitter looking for action.
Hey Jason, Gonna be making my way down for my first WSOP in vegas this year. Any tips? Is late registration the way to go?	I recommend showing up early, regging the night before to avoid lines, get comfortable and prepare for a long day. Patience.
What I'm trying to get at is, as a (amateur) poker player myself, I often find it hard to separate the skill from the variance, and when I win money I wonder if I got lucky and when I lose money I wonder if I just suck. Do you ever doubt your abilities and how do you overcome this doubt?	Doubting your abilities is something that almost every poker player struggles with. It's hard not to during the downswings. Overcoming this is difficult, but a lot of times you just have to play through it.
Who's your inspiration?	My dad
If you could only choose one horse for a ten man sng for your life, who would you pick? Besides yourself.	For my life???
How do you see yourself in 10 years? still at the top, still playing?	I can't imagine a year from now, much less 10 years. I hope to still be at the top.
How hard was it to get there where you are standing now?	I can't put into words how hard it was, it took many many hours and a lot of hard work.
I know that you're a big sports fan. How often do you bet on sports? Also, do you do most of it online, with friends, or at a Vegas sports book?	I don't really bet sports much anymore, had to stop after really slamming it for a while. Was doing it mostly with friends.
Will the Knicks make the playoffs?	Nope.
Hi Jason, In your opinion, is Ole Schemion or Vanessa Selbst a more formidable opponent?	They are both very tough and very good
Any plans to relocate long-term and focus on online games again instead of live? If so, how much would another online MTT reg like me have to pay you to cancel those plans?!	Let the bidding begin!!
	I have no plans as of now to do so, you're safe! :)
Online poker is legal in my state now, and I have a $200 bankroll to start with. What would be the best way to grind it out into a decent amount?	What are you good at playing?
Tell us how you REALLY feel about the Stars High Stakes Regs Problems twitter account.	Lol who?

Last updated: 2014-01-28 19:29 UTC
This post was generated by a robot! Send all complaints to epsy.

Hey whats up guys,
Alright, so I'm helping out on an online poker company start-up called LiveAce; I'm pretty much just interested in reviews and comparisons of LiveAce's current game platform versus Pokerstars and Full Tilt. I'm helping out with the game testing and marketing of the game so really yeah, just give me some input! .
Here are the rough points about it: * You get 400 free chips daily for the first week * Any amount you win at the tables are converted to "Live Chips" redeemable for cash * They use an auction format for cash prizes * Relatively small community right now so easy to win * You get an extra 100 chips for using a referral
Here's a pic of the interface: http://imgur.com/WZ3EjRG
If you are curious to how this is legal, basically instead of a direct conversion exchange from chips to an exact monetary value, they have auctions so in-game money can be used to bet for set prizes, which are cash prizes; it follows the rules for operations of contests and sweepstakes within approved states!
Website: http://www.liveace.com/
Referral Link: http://www.liveace.com/refetv43030/
I just want some input for improvement so I can suggest it to the programmers haha. Every online Poker gaming site started somewhere so hit me up with some critique, what's good and what needs work.

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Date: 2012-04-18
Link to submission (Has self-text)
Link to my post

Questions	Answers
You're about to die. There is an amateur poker player sitting right next to you. You decide that your final words will encompass the most important thing you have learned throughout your years of pro poker. WHAT ARE YOUR FINAL WORDS??? Tldr: gimme some good poker tips.	1st off, your screenname is priceless...This one's an easy one for me though. Never let your ego get in the way of continuing to try and learn as much as you can about the game. Too many players hit a point where they start to win and then refuse to admit they can always learn more. I call this the game over point lol.
Can you loan me a few hundred bucks? my tv just shit the bed.	You take Full Tilt transfers?
Does that eventually translate to real cash lol,	Haha we can only pray.
I wish this wasn't a joke. A friend of mine won an FTOPS event a few days before they were raided and hadn't withdrawn in months.	Sigh, yea I know...I just try and use humor not to punch holes in walls.
Can I ask how much did you lose when FT went tits up?	I didn't get killed very badly, I was taking some time off poker so had a good chunk of my online roll off the sites. I was saying in an earlier post I was with a buddy who had about 200k online at the time when we found out the shit hit the fan. Never thought I'd see someone get that emotional, but clearly understandable. :/
Are you the Jason Lee that recently got signed to Lock Poker?	I would be that same Jason Lee.
I assume that you would recommend this site to US players as opposed to bovada and the like? As this a merge skin, how confident should US players be about depositing mobnies on this site. I cant stand Bovada btw.	Yea, I actually never even got on Bovada because I just heard the most tilting stories about it. I'm personally very confident with my money on Lock, and not just saying that because I'm one of their pros. The upper management there actually cares about their players and is constantly looking to improve the customer experience. This is something I respect a lot about them.
I only have money on Bovada....well I do have a few hundo still on Full Tilt...those fucks.	If you're interested in moving over, shoot me a PM before you get on, I get some special perks I can offer people that create accounts.
Pretty much....I actually laughed at the customer service rep that I talked to, said, "you fuckin kidding me" and hung up.	Yea, I had a buddy that just posted a blog about that jacking a bunch of cash from him as well. I'd be scared playing on a site that it's sister site (Blow-dog)'s domain just got appropriated by the DOJ.
Are you still living in the states playing online or have you moved eslewhere?	Been literally bouncing all over the place as of late, but all in the states. I'm currently doing this Reddit from Vegas. Seems like a decent place to be? lol Most of my friends went to Canada, Costa Rica and a few to Panama and Thailand.
How hard is it to do your taxes?	The first year I did them it was hell because I didn't stay on top of keeping records and had to retro go back and do everything. Since then I learned my lesson and stayed on top of keeping records. Its still annoying though every year when everyone is talking about getting their returns and I'm writing a check to Uncle Sam.
But you get to write off your losses, right? I'd imagine that good records are very important. Does the IRS keep a special watch on pro gamblers for audit purposes? Seems like one of those professions that would be red flagged by them.	Yea, and they actually changed the legislation this year that if you have a net losing year, you can actually roll those loses into future years...a.k.a lose 10k this year, make 100k next...only pay taxes on 90k.
Most money you've ever lost in one pot?	Don't play a tooooon of cash games, so prolly only a few thousand in that department. The biggest tournament I've played and busted was a 20k buyin in France. I had lots of beers after that one.
only a few thousand in that department. That'd pay my rent and feed me for half a year. Fair as fuck :)	Hah, yea...I try not to get greedy like some players. I'm happy when I lose $1 and mad when I lose .01. lol.
How much vanished into the Full Tilt black hole? Any funds lost on the evil twins aka UB/AP?	I actually didn't get killed as much as a lot of my friends because it was during my 8 month hiatus from the game last year so I didn't have a ton on there. I had some friends though that had a couple hundred k on there and was with them when they found out it all went bye bye. Let's just say I saw a lot of people get a lot more emotional than I ever expected to see them get.
I'll go for the classic question... how much of poker is strategy, and how much is luck? And what can a player do when their luck sucks?	Oldie but a goodie (I heard an old person say that once lol)...I'd say if I had to put numbers on it, about 65% skill, 30% luck and 5% how much the poker gods love you. These numbers I think against worse players move to 70-75% skill because you're able to read them better and push them around more effectively. I will never deny though that there definitely is a luck factor involved, its just not the predominant factor in determining who wins and who loses.
How do you distinguish between luck and the poker gods? I'm an atheist, but if praying to the poker gods can give me a 5% edge, I'll take it.	If you can maximize what you win with the best hands and minimize what you lose with the worst, that I consider skill. Actually getting the best and worst hands, thats the luck part. Also getting it in as a big favorite = skill, losing as a big favorite=luck.
I'm no pro, but I've always said that in poker skill is what helps you get lucky, would that be adequate?	Ehhh, when you need to get lucky is usually only when you get your money in bad, so technically it would be something only happening when you're playing less than optimally. However, it would be adequate to say that a skilled player will take better advantage of hitting a miracle card or getting lucky.
Is it true that the key to winning is just winning a little bit, then leaving the table?	Def disagree with this. A lot of people after they see me win a pot are like ooooo take that cash and run. The thing is, if you're in a good game, you should stay in that game as long as you're playing well and the game stays a good game. I also think I play a lot better when I'm winning, so I will def keep playing.
	I'm mainly a tournament guy so they usually don't let me leave after I win a pot :P.
How about online poker? What do you think?	If I'm having a bad day, I'll unregister from the rest of my tournaments so I can proceed to ram my head into the wall. But I feel like its the same as live, if you're playing well and in a good game; stay in it. If people are willing to give cash away, stay and take it :)
What do you think is the major difference between online and real life poker?	I reallllly like online because I'm about as ADD as they come. I usually play 10-20 tables at once, mainly to keep my mind busy and keep me from doing anything stupid and playing too many hands. This is the biggest difference I see.
	As per strategy wise, live players love to call more (and bigger) 3 bets preflop ~ they just refuse to not defend here, the blinds usually defend a lot more live as well, raise sizes usually need to be bigger live to accomplish the same annnndd.....those are the main differences that pop into my mind.
	You can of course also see your opponent to allow for making more reads and they make me wear pants live :(
We need to get you some Adderall. You would be unstoppable!	Lol, used it before...I think I was the definition of "dialed in".
What do you mean by defend.	Basically when you raise someone's blind and they choose to not fold and fight you in the pot with a mediocre to bad holding they might normally fold, this is called defending. Usually its to send you a message to stop 3 betting them or stop stealing their blinds.
Hell of a story man, I get the same feel when I go mini-golfing with my BROS and on the 18th hole the ball just floats, time stops, my mind goes numb, and it just sinks right in for a hole in one. Then I'm like FREE ROUND BITCHES. I enjoy playing 10-2 off-suit in low buyin games just to fuck with people, you should try that for me someday. I hope you're comfortable because I've been waiting for a pro poker player for a long time now, I ain't goin anywhere. If you could play poker with any 5 people (living or dead, fictional or real), who would they be?	Great question... outside of just saying EVERYONE of the business men playing in the huge Macau game...if it were purely a social game Superman, The Devil, Ivey, Dwan and Howard Lederer...the first 4 to challenge myself since its a fun game, and Howard to punch in the face.
Yeah fuck him, I used to have a Full Tilt account and that could have been my money. Need my money for taco bell 5 buck boxes and also other things. Do you gamble much on non-skill games? Or any games involving a house advantage?	The best was right after all this shit last year, his wife tried to release her own jewelry line at the WSOP. I reaaaalllllly wanted to go up and just request my jewelry since it was clearly paid for with a bunch of our cash.
Do you think that in 2011/2012 the online games have got a lot tougher to beat? How far can you go with ABC poker online? What level can you beat with this technique? Is playing multitable with reasonably good regs profitable at high levels?	1- I think the low to mid stakes online have actually gotten considerably easier. A lot of the serious low to mid stakes grinders ended up moving on to other things leaving a bit of a vacuum at these stakes. I think the higher stakes have gotten a bit more difficult with a lot of the fish exiting the market. They are slowly returning though from my observations. 2- I honestly think pretty straight forward ABC can beat almost any level of poker. My deepest live run at the EPT Villamoura stop, I literally played straight forward ABC for all 6 days. No crazy bluffs, no wild floats etc etc, just played my cards optimally and made solid reads. Everyone else got out of line and paid when I had it. There are a few adjustments you can occasionally make - getting more aggressive on the bubble, stealing some blinds when the antes kick in, but for the most part the ABC can beat all levels. 4- Profitability defffffinetly goes way down when you start playing with all regs. I still think there are a lot of regs that are profitable that have leaks that can be exploited. I'm pretty positive I have leaks that can be exploited as well. So to answer the question, yes they can be profitable but definitely tougher to beat.
Has your game been impacted by becoming well known? I have heard every donk on the table wants to felt the big name pro so if it's true, how do you adapt to that?	Its interesting, because I never really experienced this until very very recently. As per being known at live tournaments, I get noticed and recognized a lot less than some people might expect. They usually just look at me and go, "oh look some crazy internet kid," just because I'm young, pale and have zero sense of style :)
	The crazy part is since I signed with Lock and they made my screenname highlighted in red on there, I feel like a baby goat in a sea of wolves. I have NEVER had people try and make plays and bluff me as much as I'm experiencing on there. It's increased so much that I've had to make strategic adjustments to how I play.
	I basically always tell people I want to play opposite of everyone else. If everyone is going to try and bluff me and run over me every pot, I choose to just sit back, pick up a hand and let them bluff off the world to me. It's nice to almost always get action on hands, it is a bit more boring though. Winning poker isn't always "fun poker" lol.
$3 million in winnings? Feeling charitable? :D.	Haha, as of late I've been gladly donating back to the community, not by choice though lol.
Story?	Not a super eventful one; just on a bit of a downswing. Nothing huge, I just always get annoyed when I don't win.
Oh I thought your neighbouring community I didn't get it as the ''Poker Community'' ! I thought you had gone nuts with that money and somewhat landed in trouble that required you to pay back to the community.	Hah, I am a bit of a wild one at times, but thankfully no on that...so far.
Does phil Hellmuth really bitch about every hand or is that some gimmick?	I actually did a TV show with Phil a few years ago, here's a link to an article about it.
	Best Damn Poker Show
	Basically, I asked Phil this question directly. His response was basically, he does get upset when people do moronic things but a lot of the over the top reactions are aimed at branding himself as the Poker Brat. Everyone loves to hate someone, and also loves to see what they're going to do next. This is pretty much what he's shooting for which I understand and thinks is prolly business smart, just a lot to deal with if you're the one getting berated.
3 or 4 bet Hellmuth and he will get pissed.	You'd be surprised how often if you give someone shit for 3 or 4 betting how often they'll never do it as a bluff again.
Is Bellande's twitter not the most comical poker twitter feed going or what? I mean who is that guys backer? haha.	Lol, I don't follow him but definitely going to check it out. I actually hammered one night in Canada at the NAPT jokingly tried to trade my gf at the time for a rack of chips from him. I was joking of course but apparently she didn't find the humor. Maybe this is the reason I'm single now lol.
Dude, check it out. Its hilarious.	He's def getting a new follower.
Why do you play under a recognizable screenname online? Doesn't it make you more of a target/predictable?	I think when I started playing, I had dreams of being a notable player, someone people recognized. Not so much to be a fame whore, but more for validation that I truly made it in the industry. It's def a lot easier to brand yourself this way if there is congruency in who you are everywhere.
	From a direct dollar making stand point though, different screennames is probably +ev.
Makes sense.	I'll prolly stick with the same screennames/image for the rest of time. I've started expanding my poker career into teaching, writing and some other aspects to make money outside of just playing. I also don't really mind if I lose a little bit of EV to help advance the other poker related endeavors.
Considering your skill, at what point do you imagine letting go of the pro image to make money anonymously? Do you not already have multiple accounts for this?	There are also some perks to knowing people think they know how you normally play. It allows you to take some unconventional lines some times because you know people think they know how you always play things. (If that made sense lol)
Also, pokerstars or fulltilt (or other)?	No multiple accounts for this guy, JaspudUF till I die :)
I like your integrity. Thanks for answering my questions!	Of course, hope the info helps some :)
Ever splash the pot?	Every chance I get :)
What would you advise to anyone looking to use Poker as a source of income in the future? How often do you play? Biggest Win? McDonalds or KFC?	I would say make sure that you truly are being honest with yourself about being a winner or a loser at the game. So many people tell me they beat the game and when we sit down and actually look at numbers, they're lieing to themselves. If you do find you are winning consistently, make sure its enough to sustain your desired life and more importantly you have a cushion in case of an inevitable bad run. I prolly play 3-4 days a week, I used to obsessively play 6-7 days a week but I think that was not good for the health.
	KFC if I'm running good, McDonalds after a bad session. No questions asked there haha.
What are your other hobbies?	I'm a gym rat, I kickbox and do jui-jitsu (although I havent in a few months since I've been traveling a lot :/ Reddit and internet humor have become amazing hobbies as of late lol and my number 1 hobby is actually people watching. I love the nonverbal communication/psychology side of poker and life, and just chilling trying to study what people are thinking amuses the hell out of me.
	I actually have to tell girls on dates that when I'm constantly staring over there shoulders at other people its not because I dont enjoy their company but just obsessed with people watching. lol.
Such a romantic! I need to hit the gym. When I'm much older I think instead of jigsaw building and wetting myself I will take up Poker. At the moment money isn't available to piss away. For non money games I have been good online, however I think I would be awful under pressure.	My buddies grandma just came into town and she might be the biggest gamblecard player I've ever met in my life. If I tried to make her do a jigsaw puzzle, she'd ask me how much I want to play for per piece. Def a mind stimulating game.
What are you planning to play at the WSOP this year? How many events? I cant wait to watch the "Drop in the Bucket" tourney. Im surprised Ivey hasnt confirmed yet....I realize he has a lot of shit goin on with FT and his divorce and shit.	That Drop in the Bucket tourney will be insane if it runs. I hear a few rumors that even though they have a bunch of confirmed players, no ones put the cash down yet. I can't confirm this but its what I'm hearing. As per me, I'm going to try and play as many of the hold em events as possible. I took last summer off and am completely drooling waiting to play this year.
	I always try and get backing for the series, which I haven't yet started looking into this year but that usually helps dictate how much I'm going to play. I paid for the series myself one year and frankly the potential swings on that are huge and very few players are anywhere close to properly bankrolled for these tourneys.
	The series is the most fun time of the year but its also for about 95% of the players, the most frustrating time of the year. You get so excited about the potential of the cash and a bracelet and then if you don't prevail, its tough to pick yourself up and come back the next day for more of a pounding lol.
Do you remember a few years ago, theres was this dude from NY a few years ago that had a blog on Pokerroad that would go ape shit on his blog after he busted from a WSOP prelim? I cant remember his name but it was hilarious. Joe Sebok supplied with a cam to record that shit.	Lol, I don't but if you find a link to it, please post...I love watching people tilt haha.
Theres only a few dudes that are rolled for that Drop in a Bucket...Guy Laliberte, a few Asian businessmen, and that dude that owns a few casinos in vegas.	Yea sooooooo few people are rolled for that. I've heard that they're going to run regional satellites but haven't seen any links or anything. I'm going to choose not to play that one, unless someone gives me a milly to play it. I won't say no :)
This dude Eugene Todd theres a few on there...if you can find the pokerroad blogs...they are epic.	Lol, I just watched about 45 seconds of the intro to his new show. I think I'm somehow on tilt already.
Do you play for fun or just for the money? Also, what's the most you've ever won in a day?	I actually do play for fun quite a bit with friends; I almost always lose when I play for fun too lol...When I'm playing to make money, I still love the game and the adrenaline rush accompanied. I stopped loving it for a while last year and got burnt out and immediately took like 8 months off. Best move ever...My largest score was $240k for a 3rd place in an EPT. I guess technically that's 6 days but still my biggest win.
So you won that $240k..what % did you have to pay in taxes? What was your net from that $240k?	I was backed in the event; so half of it went to the backers right away. I was in whatever the higher tax bracket was that year, so the taxes on that were rough. The toughest part some card players deal with is taxes aren't always immediately withheld on winnings, so you have to put money aside for when it's time to pay taxes. I have some friends that have won tournaments, spent all the money and come tax time had to figure something out to be able to cover the bill to Uncle Sam.
I would imagine winning the $8.8M 1st prize in the Main Event, they net around $5?M after paying 30-40% in taxes?	I'm lucky that my parents stayed involved in my life the past few years to inform me of these things before I also went and did something stupid like that. I try my hardest to share this info with my friends, it occasionally sinks in.
What's the most amazing poker hand you've ever been in?	Someone asked this earlier and I couldnt think of an answer, but I think I've thought of one that amused me quite a bit. When I did Good Morning America, we spent a good amount of time teaching George Stephanopoulos the basics of tournament poker. He was definitely a beginner but seemed to be picking up things pretty quickly.
	The tournament we ended up playing was a super turbo so things were moving pretty quickly. The gist of the hand was George actually limp trapped me with Queens and owned me on national television. Now, with stack sizes and all it wasn't an amazing trap or anything but I just found it hilarious that he came up with a decent move himself and was able to bust me. I was half proud and half blah lol.
What kind of stakes do you play online?	Prior to Black Friday, I would try and play the biggest tourneys they had online and was able to get enough volume with those. Since Black Friday, there are still some good higher buy-in tournaments but not quite enough to fulfill my ADD requirements so I find myself playing everything from the highest buyins down to even playing $20 tournaments.
	Cash is cash, even making a lot of money I still get happy when I win $1. Its a perspective I hope to ALWAYS hold on to.
Do you think that poker as a game has peaked? If not, when do you think this will happen? Do you think you could re-create your success starting today from zero? Do you think that online is much harder to win at than live? How many hours a day do you play?	I dont think its peaked, I think when things go all out in the states with legislation we're gonna see an explosion. I think I could, all it is is a willingness to learn, hard work and dedication. All you really need outside of that is emotional control and I think there might be some form of x factor to it. I think 1 game vs 1 game, online can be tougher, but the ability to multi table allows you to severely cut down on your variance and I think make more in the long run. When I play, usually 8-10 hrs...I've played as much as 37 before though lol I guess technically that wouldn't be in one day. After that sesh, you could have convinced me it was though.
What have you done with your winnings?	Done a poor job of saving my winnings but a great job of spending it :) Basically, lived "the life", partied, caused trouble etc etc. Trying to change that this year. Practice and read everything you can get your hands on.
Thanks. :) Out of your winnings, after tax and stakes how much are you at? I think there's always the dream of millions for players but taxes must hurt..:(	Taxes are never the fun part haha, I'm not sure exactly where this falls...I'll see if I can pull up records later today and give you a stronger idea of the impact there.
How long did it take for you to become a pro? How did your family/close ones take to you playing excessively?	Well... - Started playing when my friends invited me to a home game in college. I was officially the worst lol - After that, I played pretty much every day and read anything and everything I could get my hands on. I think it was maybe like a year later that I started making some dollars and maybe 6 months past that I decided to look at making it a full time gig. - Great question here...I came from a super straight laced, military family. If you can imagine how the phrase of "I want to gamble for a living" went over, it was rough at first. Luckily my parents were somewhat open to the thought of it and basically said, we'll support it as long as you can prove its a viable career and you can sustain a living at it.
How long did it take for you to become a winning player? Where did you mainly play online? Did/do you use good bankroll management?	About a year into learning and playing I started actually making positive cash flow. Thankfully before that I stayed playing pretty low so I didn't really lose much. - I used to play predominately on Stars, Tilt and UB. Way back in the day it was Paradise. Now a days, exclusively at Lock. - Its funny, about 99% of my career I have except for my first decent score. I had $120 bucks online and put $60 bucks into a $30 rebuy (oops lol). Ended up cashing for about 3k I think it was and post that returned to being a good boy for the most part in the BR management department.
Best fold you have ever made? Best call? Is it "better" to make a wrong call, or the wrong laydown? Fave hand that you have seen on TV? Best and worst TV pro? Fave and least fave TV pro?	The problem with "the best fold you ever made" is you never really know unless your opponent shows you...there are times I was pretty sure I made a rockstar lay down but can't really be sure... They always say its better to make an incorrect fold than a bad call, it costs you less. I think personally a mistake is a mistake and all should be treated the same in your mind (from a learning stand point).
	Best TV pro is prolly Ivey...and worst is everyone that's cocky... especially players that go deep in 1 event and immediately start talking about how they're the greatest thing since sliced bread. I'll refrain from mentioning names to avoid the awkward situations lol My fav pros to watch are either my friends or players that are better than me so I can not only be entertained but also learn at the same time.
What's your reading recommendation to get into online poker? I want to prepare now that online gambling is legal.	Do you mean in regards to strategy or the logistics of getting back on?
Well, you've got to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em, know when to walk away, know when to run. You never count your money when you're sittin' at the table, there'll be time enough for countin' When the dealin's done.	I still randomly sing this at the table :)
Strategies. I know for online there are software programs that measure certain metrics, like how likely the person will fold for certain card combination. I'm a newb.. I want to understand how to analyze the card probabilities & apply user playing history to gain an edge. What's the best book to learn this?	Honestly, the best way to win online is just to have strong fundamentals. It sounds like an answer thats "too easy to be true" but in reality, majority of the players you encounter online are really bad and will make mistakes for you. I play more ABC poker than most people would probably expect. I rarely run crazy bluffs or anything like that, unless I'm bored, feel like being a moron or have had a few adult beverages :)
No real question here, just wanted to say thanks for doing the AMA. I've been waiting to hear from a pro poker player for awhile now. Best of luck! Edit: Actually I lied! How do you/any pro players you know, feel about shows like Daniel's "million dollar challenge"? Do you think it hurts the image of poker at all, or helps? Thanks :)	Of course, I'm really enjoying it :) Glad to see people are reading and also enjoying.
How did you get started in terms of bankroll nursing? At what point did you feel you could make a living off it?	I literally started with $1 tournaments for quite a while and was able to grind it up to like $120 (back in the day on Paradise). I decide one day that taking half of my bank roll and playing a $30 rebuy would be a great idea (I do not recommend this lol). I ended up getting like 6th or 7th for a few thousand. I was in college at the time and a few k, makes you rich haha. About a week later, I final tabled the same tournament for a few thousand more and then started grinding the low low buy-in multis. Blessed with a little run good, here we are today.
	It was basically about 6-8 months after those scores that I really started to think there was a possibility I could do it for a living. It was about 1 year after those tournaments that I really seriously began doing it full time.
Thanks! I'll keep grinding then :)). Are you going the the EPT grand final btw?	Probably not hitting many of the EPT's this year. That flight from the States is always brutal. I'm enjoying traveling a little less this year. At least thats what I always say and then I end up traveling a ton lol.
Besides you, Daniel Negreanu is one of my favorite poker players. How is he to play against? Is there a person that you seem to either always have trouble with or have bad luck playing against?	Well thank you :P Negreanu is definitely a tough player to play against. I think there a lot of other players that have equal the reading skills, but just choose not to vocalize it. It's the worst feeling in the world when someone pegs your hand exactly and lets you know.
	There are definitely people that have basically owned my soul in the past. The funny part is its never a well known pro or anything like that. Its usually some guy or girl that seems to be absolutely clueless at the table. This has happened A LOT lol Nothing gets close to tilting more than when this happens. I usually just ask them if they just want me to give them the passwords to my bank accounts.

Last updated: 2012-04-22 13:36 UTC
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