Bigger Deal

On-line the other day, a player responded to a particularly cruel bad beat by launching into a bitter tirade against the injustice and dishonesty of all internet poker sites. The games were fixed, he wrote, most of the players were shills working for the virtual casinos, innocent amateurs like him didn’t have a chance. And so on. The usual rant.

All nonsense, of course, and my vastly experienced colleague Lee Jones, who until very recently was responsible for the games at Poker Stars, has refuted it forcefully: "On the Internet," he says, "there is a permanent history of evidence of any wrong-doing. In the Bricks & Mortar world, such evidence is forever gone seconds after the hand is over. On the Internet, the dollars are so huge that the sites are run by businessmen who have public floats and billions in their eyes. The integrity and honesty of their games are their lifeblood, and they guard them accordingly."

In other words, internet gambling is safe for the same reason as the B&M casinos in Las Vegas are safe: because it is more profitable to be straight than crooked. Fifty years ago, when the mob used Las Vegas as a Laundromat for dirty money, nobody much cared how the suckers were fleeced and anyway, for the suckers, part of the attraction of the joint was the thrill of rubbing shoulders with gangsters without getting hurt. All that changed when big public companies took over the casinos. With reputations to protect and shareholders to please, the potential profit was so great that honesty had to be the best policy, like it or not, because without it the customers would stay away.

So what are we scared of when we play on-line? I think the answer is the computers themselves – or rather, the technical implications of using them. It is not a matter of the usual human poker variables – skill, discipline, insight, knowing the percentages, reckoning the odds – nor is it even a fear of collusion. If the players out there aren’t where say they are – New York, Rio, London, Rome – but are all in the same room or exchanging information by instant messenger, then I’m sure the people who run the site will pick that up and act accordingly. The real source of anxiety, for me at least, is computer know-how. If I’m dealt rags, I mean, should I press the "Fold" button in advance to speed up the game or is there a nerd at the table who has somehow hacked into the software and can use that information against me? Computers themselves are no problem; I’ve been using them since Alan Sugar made little Amstrads; but computer science is not my thing. Call it the paranoia of the unknown, but I don’t think I’m the only one who suffers from it.

As for bad beats: social games always find their own level, so the players know more or less what to expect. The formidable Mel Judah, for example, played for a while in our now defunct Tuesday game here in London, but he was far too good for us and eventually he was asked, politely of course, to leave. This wouldn’t happen on the internet. What stakes you play for and whether you win or lose is entirely your affair. So maybe there are more bad beats on line for the simplest of reasons: there are more bad players in the games.