"This is not a gambling site"
Does anyone know why all the poker site advertisements have this disclaimer?

the .net sites do so that they can advertise on US television. The discovery channel got a bunch of money siezed for taking partypoker.com adverts.

Yes. Technically PartyPoker.net is NOT a gambling site since you can only dowload the play money version.

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Lots of good rakeback options at http://www.raketherake.com/?refer=RTR25126

KRE8R probably has about seventy college funds in his NL5 roll.

So if I understand what you're trying to say, it's illegal to advertise for gambling websites. So they get around this by advertising for play money versions of their websites. Sound right?

ding ding ding ding

I guess PLay Money..Isnt really classified as "gambling"

But Some may argue that poker and Gambling might be diffrent

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Poker

Not according to Sklansky who is practically the smartest man in poker. He says in SSH that it is a mistake to pretend that poker is not gambling. He says it is no different that Blackjack or craps in a casino other than that with the right play you can swing the percentage advatage in your direction kind of like the house does.

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Lots of good rakeback options at http://www.raketherake.com/?refer=RTR25126

KRE8R probably has about seventy college funds in his NL5 roll.

I understand what Sklansky is saying and I've read SSH, however I still disagree with that statement. Mainly because in all forms of gambling (IMHO) the house has the advantage. You can make correct decisions to limit it's advantage, but in the end, the house wins.

In poker however, you're not playing against the house, you're playing against other people. At this point, IMHO again, it becomes a game of skill. I feel that unlike BJ, craps and such, skill plays a much bigger roll then luck.

You'll notice that I don't say that luck isn't a factor, but it's so muted by skill that it's almost non-existant for decent players. This is one of the reasons we read SSH, to increase our skill and decrease the luck factor.

That's not to say that without skill, you can't win at the other games...but if you look at craps, there is no break even EV...the whole game is -EV...In BJ (don't know that much about it) I've heard basically the same thing. While it's possible to win short term, in the end, the house always wins...While the house wins with poker too (in the form of rake) they have to charge a rake because they have no other way to make money...the house doesn't care whether you win or lose because they get their rake regardless...This puts it more in the realm of a chess match where each player puts up $X, the house says "We'll rent the board and pieces, have fun!" Nobody would confuse Chess with gambling.

Before anybody starts argueing with me, or trying to tell me that luck plays a much bigger roll then I care to believe, how many of you would be willing to sit down with your entire BR against Helmuth, Brunson, Chan, Dan N, or any of the other greats and hope to get lucky...

I honestly believe that the majority of us (myself included) tend to over emphasize the roll luck plays in poker because of the bad beats we experience. I believe that we do this because it's much easier to say that somebody got lucky against us then to admit we made a mistake (or analyze the hand and determine the other guy made a mistake). Let's face it, if Luck played such a huge roll in poker, in the end, we'd all break even...

I think Sklansky's words on concidering Poker gambling was geared more towards being watchful for poker becoming a problem for the average person (losing their house or car because they couldn't stop) then because he really believes that (or maybe he's in denial also).

Now, there are truely lucky or unlucky hands (you flop a boat against his 4 of a kind) but those happen so rarely that while they are unlucky (or lucky) they (in the long run) don't affect your BR significantly...

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Trons
JstTrons
Toyotatruck

Poker is gambling in the sense that any hand with even the smallest % of a chance can win in the end. Luck has a small factor(tournaments more then ring games), but anyone can go against the odds with thier 22 against AA with a flop of AK7 and hit running 2s to take a pot.


Of course I had this happen to me yesterday on the bubble in a tournament. Pocket 8s in LP. I raise it and the SB just calls. Flop K8K, he puts in a small bet and I go all in(one of the short stacks). Take a guess what he had... KK of course.

and that skill you speak of is patience.

When I multi-table (helps prevent me from getting bored and tilting) I find if I'm patient and restrict myself to good to excellent starting hands, I can fluctuate a lot, but in the end I almost always come out on top, more so than when I looose at least.

The "trick" to poker is knowing how to leverage the odds in your favor by playing hands with a high EV, and betting accordingly in NL to lower the variance that more players bring to the table.

I used to look for tables with low average pots. Now I look for tables with high average pots because that's typically where I can find the people that play everything.

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-Chris