3-Barrels of pure value for you including New York State Assemblyman, Gary Pretlow, informing PokerNews of the reasons why the online poker bill didn’t see the eyes of the Assembly; PokerStars withdraw NL2 from their Belgian market, and a Polish poker man killed in the Dominican Republic.
The New York Senate voted 53 to 5 for a fully regulated and licensed online poker market in the state. Interested observers were excited, and rightly so – that’s a wide margin. The landslide even caused some poker prophets to suggest the bill might pass this side of 2016.
Everything was going online poker’s way. Especially, as legislation to pass similar laws for Daily Fantasy Sports (DFS) were also flying through the legal system like The Flash on speed.
And then came the Assembly – the big moment.
And…
And…
Nothing.
The DFS bill passed, and there wasn’t even a vote on the online poker bill. And worse of all, nobody knew why, until now?
According to PokerNews, Assemblyman Gary Pretlow believes it is clear that DFS is not gambling, and he can’t make the same determination about poker. So instead of trying to push forward a bill he didn’t think was going to win he shelved it until he could get the red pen out of his top pocket and start scribbling.
“I personally don’t think the skill v chance argument is a problem, but people in a more legal area think it’s a problem,” Pretlow told PokerNews. “I think the overall feeling is poker is a game of skill, but we’re going to have to show why it’s a game of skill rather than a game of chance.”
May I suggest an Assembly working party spends a World Series of Poker (WSOP) alongside Jason Mercier.
So there you have it. DFS is a game of skill and not gambling. Poker might be a game of chance, and might be gambling.
I call bullshit on this whole debate. There is a House of Card’s reason why the DFS bill will pass, and online pokers won’t, and we might never find the exact reason why.
PokerStars Drop MicroStakes Games in Belgium
If PokerStars ever gets to offer its service to New Yorkers, will first time depositors looking for a spot of harmless fun be able to play at NL2?
The answer to that question may very well be ‘no’ after a player on the .be PokerStars domain alerted 2+2 posters to the removal of those games for Belgian players.
2+2 poster kmeirlaen sent an e-mail to PokerStars to ask where the NL2 stake had vanished and was told that the deletion of the $/€/£2 No-Limit and $/€/£.0.01/0.02 Pot-Limit and No-Limit games were ‘intentional’ and had been the case since June 15th.
Stars Support member, Mathieu, also stated that it was a ‘trial’ but failed to explain why the trial was needed, or what purpose it intended to poke. Instead, kmeirlaen was handed a diatribe of standard corporate nonsense explaining nothing at all.
So, as per usual, because of PokerStars failure to communicate with their customers at an acceptable level (they didn’t even tell their customers they were pulling the games). It’s been left to the players to guess their intentions.
Two reasons resonate loudly than most. The first is a pure money grab forcing players who used to frequent NL2 to play higher, therefore paying higher rake. Or it’s the old ‘poker ecology’ chestnut whereby first-time depositors playing at NL2 will have a much better experience playing at a higher level.
I will put my money on the straightforward money grab.
Former Poker Master Publishing Director Brutally Murdered
Adam Stanislaw Walczyk, the founder of poker affiliate site Poker Master Publishing, has been brutally murdered in the Dominican Republic.
The 37-year old from Poland was found dead on Monday in Bavaro, a well-known tourist area in Punta Cana. News reports suggest he was a regular visitor to the Caribbean island, and he was found tied up and repeatedly stabbed.
He was staying in a guarded residence when he died. However, several men attacked the guards before entering the home of Walczyk to murder him. Police have arrested four suspects with a fifth still on the run.
Walczyk created Poker Master Publishing in 2011. The company has since dissolved, but the website is still up and running.
