I saw a story recently where Loto-Québec is going to launch online poker. I also read that Ontario is thinking of launching a similar site.
To some this might seem like a good thing. It would seem to legitimize online poker more.
For me I'm concerned about it. Right now things are pretty good for online poker players in Canada. You can deposit money to the sites easily, [I'm told] you can withdraw your money easily and the banks will take the cheque no problem, we can play on whatever sites we choose for real money in the privacy of our homes without being hassled by the government about it. While online we can play against other Canadians or anyone in the world for that matter in cash games of any stakes or in play money, small buyin, and up to High Stakes Poker Tournament.
Here's what I'm concerned could happen if the Canadian provinces attempt to muscle in on the online poker scene. First the lotto corp declares legal monopoly rights over online poker. They make it illegal to play online for real money and pressure ISPs to block access to PokerStars, UB, Full Tilt, etc.
With only being able to play on the provincial lotto sites players would be required to enter their SIN number to be able to play. This becomes important below.
With a legal monopoly and a government agency running it and a limited player base the sites, games, security, software, support etc. will all suck. Rake will be prohibitive and it will be exactly like lotto tickets - the only people able to win will be favored insiders whose blatant cheating is disregarded.
Speaking of rake, with player SIN numbers the lotto will treat won pots as T4 taxable income while disregarding money lost at the tables. It could play out something like this.
A casual player sits down at $25 NL with $25. He then loses down to $10. Then he gets all in on the flop with a flush draw and catches on the river to double up to $20. He then leaves down $5 right? No the $10 he won in the all in is sent on a T4 in January as raw income and he has to pay $5 tax [at 50% tax, standard in Canada]. So he really lost $10. By requiring players to give their SIN number to play they can basically make it a raw cash grab from the captive players.
So all in all I hope this doesn't happen. Right now things are pretty good for Canadian online players and we don't need some government bureaucrats coming in to take it over and ruin it. A lot of bad could come of this and not much good.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Sunday, March 07, 2010
on acid? uh no
I was playing $1/$2 at the local casino last night. It was around 11:30 PM or so.
So between hands, this guy two seats to my left asks me if I'm on acid. what the?? First I asked if he was talking to me. He said he was. He said he'd been at the table for two hours and during that time I hadn't played a hand or spoken. I guess he thought probably jokingly that I must have been spaced out on an acid trip to act like that.
Alas he was incorrect. I wasn't on anything. I do play tighter than most of my $1/$2 live opponents. Although at 25 hands an hour live that's only 50 hands without being dealt anything. Anyone who plays on the Internet knows you can go card dead for considerably longer than 50 hands. Although I'm sure I was involved in a couple of hands the previous two hours, he just didn't notice.
It's true I usually don't jump into the ongoing table banter. I'm not unfriendly, but I'm not real talkative. A lot of the regulars know each other well and so I'm not really part of that clique. And that's fine. I do talk, we got talking about pro football, pro hockey, where to buy Kem cards locally in Halifax, and my card protector [it's a New York Jets challenge coin I got on ebay]. I guess he just missed it.
He was pretty good natured and I didn't take it personally. Although the drug chat continued among some of them; and the guy to my direct left was going on for around an hour about how he'd like to go out for "a smoke". I don't know why he just didn't step out if he wanted a cigarette. I'm a bit slow on the uptake since as I was about to leave he and the guy two seats to my left did leave for their smoke. He asked me if I wanted to join them for a doobie. I politely declined and said I was leaving shortly and would be driving. lol
I don't normally talk about bad beats on this site. After all nobody cares about your bad beats. But this one I put on a guy last night at the casino was pretty bad. I'm dealt KK in the big blind with around $275. A loose kind of spaz player made it $5 in early position. Around 3 people call. Small blind who has around the same as me raises it to $25. I reraise to $75. Everyone folds and SB shoves for over $200. I didn't really think and quickly called. I've never folded kings preflop. We roll and of course he shows AA, lol.
Then an Ace flops and I'm thinking well I just dropped a buyin. The turn is some blank and the dealer mentions that I now have a flush draw. Of course the river is another diamond and I win the nearly $600 pot with runner runner flush lol. Horrible, an Internet hand. I felt bad about it but what can you do. Before the flop I was thinking I'd lost three times in a row preflop all in to overpairs [always to short stacks] so maybe I'd get my 25% here. Opponent said nothing and just stormed out, perhaps to the blackjack tables. That was a mistake. I would have quickly reloaded full if I was at a table where I could get it all in preflop with Aces.
So between hands, this guy two seats to my left asks me if I'm on acid. what the?? First I asked if he was talking to me. He said he was. He said he'd been at the table for two hours and during that time I hadn't played a hand or spoken. I guess he thought probably jokingly that I must have been spaced out on an acid trip to act like that.
Alas he was incorrect. I wasn't on anything. I do play tighter than most of my $1/$2 live opponents. Although at 25 hands an hour live that's only 50 hands without being dealt anything. Anyone who plays on the Internet knows you can go card dead for considerably longer than 50 hands. Although I'm sure I was involved in a couple of hands the previous two hours, he just didn't notice.
It's true I usually don't jump into the ongoing table banter. I'm not unfriendly, but I'm not real talkative. A lot of the regulars know each other well and so I'm not really part of that clique. And that's fine. I do talk, we got talking about pro football, pro hockey, where to buy Kem cards locally in Halifax, and my card protector [it's a New York Jets challenge coin I got on ebay]. I guess he just missed it.
He was pretty good natured and I didn't take it personally. Although the drug chat continued among some of them; and the guy to my direct left was going on for around an hour about how he'd like to go out for "a smoke". I don't know why he just didn't step out if he wanted a cigarette. I'm a bit slow on the uptake since as I was about to leave he and the guy two seats to my left did leave for their smoke. He asked me if I wanted to join them for a doobie. I politely declined and said I was leaving shortly and would be driving. lol
I don't normally talk about bad beats on this site. After all nobody cares about your bad beats. But this one I put on a guy last night at the casino was pretty bad. I'm dealt KK in the big blind with around $275. A loose kind of spaz player made it $5 in early position. Around 3 people call. Small blind who has around the same as me raises it to $25. I reraise to $75. Everyone folds and SB shoves for over $200. I didn't really think and quickly called. I've never folded kings preflop. We roll and of course he shows AA, lol.
Then an Ace flops and I'm thinking well I just dropped a buyin. The turn is some blank and the dealer mentions that I now have a flush draw. Of course the river is another diamond and I win the nearly $600 pot with runner runner flush lol. Horrible, an Internet hand. I felt bad about it but what can you do. Before the flop I was thinking I'd lost three times in a row preflop all in to overpairs [always to short stacks] so maybe I'd get my 25% here. Opponent said nothing and just stormed out, perhaps to the blackjack tables. That was a mistake. I would have quickly reloaded full if I was at a table where I could get it all in preflop with Aces.
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