After Black Friday, like a lot of poker players living in the United States, I stopped playing online poker. I had money on one or two sites and dabbled here and there, but for the most part, I quit because a) there was little traffic where I had money and b) I decided it wasn’t… Read more »
Online Poker
Online poker news
PokerStars Expects to Compete in Pennsylvania Online Poker Market
At the end of October, Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf signed a bill to legalize and regulate online gambling – including poker – in the Commonwealth. Pennsylvania is now the fourth state – behind Nevada, Delaware, and New Jersey – to legalize online poker, so now the discussions in the poker community revolve around when, exactly,… Read more »
Bovada Launches Jackpot Sit & Go’s
It took long enough, but Bovada Poker finally joined the year 2017 and launched its own version of the Lottery Sit & Go called Jackpot Sit & Go. Actually, I shouldn’t be harsh in such a sarcastic tone, as Bovada only recently brought its online poker room back to life after selling it to Ignition… Read more »
Nevada F2P Poker Site acePLAY to Fold
Nevada-based free-to-play poker and casino sites, acePLAYPoker.com and acePLAYCasino.com, have announced that they will be closing in less than a month. Yes, there were play money gambling sites in Nevada unrelated to WSOP.com. In a blog post, the farewell message was penned: It is with a heavy heart we are announcing that acePLAY Casino will… Read more »
Second Wave of Absolute Poker Refunds Approved
A month ago, former Absolute Poker (AP) customers who had their funds stolen by the site’s owners when AP disappeared after Black Friday saw the first wave of refunds hit their bank accounts. Those people who did not receive their money but still submitted valid claims should be seeing their money in the near future.… Read more »
What Is the Path Forward for Online Poker After Pennsylvania?
The passage on Thursday of online gaming, poker, and daily fantasy sports (DFS) regulations in the state of Pennsylvania (among other gaming such as video gaming terminals and “mini-casinos”) was arguably one of the most surprising things to occur this year. Although they had been discussing it for upwards of two years, legislators in Pennsylvania… Read more »
And Then There Were Four…Pennsylvania Passes Online Gaming and Poker Regulations
After a frenetic two days of action in the General Assembly, Pennsylvania has joined Nevada, New Jersey, and Delaware in the fraternity of states that have regulated and licensed online casino gaming and/or poker. As reported by my friend and colleague Dan Katz yesterday, the Keystone State – faced with the end of a legislative… Read more »
Power Up Expands to More PokerStars Domains
It now looks like if you have the ability to play on PokerStars for real money from wherever you live and DON’T have access to the new Power Up game, you are in the minority. After initially only rolling the game out to the .EU platform a couple weeks ago, PokerStars has now expanded it… Read more »
Compact Agreement Signed Between New Jersey, Nevada, and Delaware
Since 2013 the three states that passed online gaming and/or poker regulations – Nevada, New Jersey, and Delaware – have gone their own ways in trying to be successful in the online gaming industry. Now, the trio of states have made the historic decision to compact between each other. In a press release, Governor Chris… Read more »
PokerStars Power Up Real Money Games Go Live
It has been previewed for months now, but PokerStars new game, Power Up, is finally available for real money play as of Tuesday, October 10th. Currently, players on the .EU site can participate in Power Up games for real money ($1, $3, $7, and $15 buy-ins), while those on the .COM, .UK, and other PokerStars… Read more »
First Wave of Absolute Poker Refunds Have Been Sent to Players
When Absolute Poker and UltimateBet disappeared on April 15th, 2011 – best known in the poker world as Black Friday – it seemed as if all of our deposits with the two poker rooms had disappeared, as well. But six years later, the U.S. Department of Justice announced that there was money left over from… Read more »
Iowa Tribe of Oklahoma Granted Online Gaming License in Isle of Man
The Iowa Tribe of Oklahoma has announced that it has been granted an online gaming license in the Isle of Man, a huge step forward in its efforts to become the first Native American tribe to launch a legal real money online poker site. The Tribe had intended to launch real money online poker on… Read more »
PokerStars Continues to Massage Power Up Alpha
Power Up, PokerStars’ Sit-and-Go with Hearthstone/Magic the Gathering-like strategic card-play elements, has been in Alpha testing for most of this year. It has not been a constant offering, as it does get taken out of the lobby while PokerStars makes improvements, but in its most recent appearance (it was just taken away again, at least… Read more »
PokerStars Reveals 2017 NJCOOP Schedule
PokerStars has released the schedule for the New Jersey Championship of Online Poker (NJCOOP), a 46-event tournament series featuring more than $1.2 million in guaranteed prize pools. Of course, it is only open to people who can play from within New Jersey’s borders, but you knew that already. NJCOOP will run from September 30th through… Read more »
PokerStars Kills Beat the Clock Tournaments
Online poker rooms and networks are constantly trying to innovate, creating new games in order to keep players interested. PokerStars much by virtue of its standing as the world’s largest online poker room, as added many game types over the last few years (not necessarily their own original creations, mind you), most notably Zoom Poker… Read more »
Absolute Poker, UltimateBet Claims Being Reviewed, Disputed Claims Up Next
The Garden City Group (GCG), the Department of Justice-appointed claims administrator for millions of dollars-worth of lost Absolute Poker and UltimateBet deposits, announced this week that the deadline for claims submissions has passed. Petitions that were filed on time are being reviewed and after that phase is completed, the GCG will move on to look… Read more »
PokerStars Stretching Tournament Payout Structures
In an ongoing effort to satisfy more players, PokerStars is widening the pay structure of many of its tournaments today. In a blog post from late last week, Mike Jones, Poker Operations Manager for PokerStars, took readers through the online poker room’s history with tourney payouts and explained the reason for the changes. Jones hearkened… Read more »
Fedor Holz Signs with partypoker
Online poker room partypoker announced this week that it has signed German superstar Fedor Holz to its roster of sponsored poker pros. Holz, one of the most highly regarded and well liked poker players around, has been on absolute fire the last couple years, banking about $16.5 million in live tournaments since the beginning of… Read more »
PokerStars to Restrict Satellite Winners to One Prize Package Per Live Event
PokerStars has made yet another significant change to its online poker room policies, eliminating the ability for players to earn multiple seats into live tournaments via satellites. This is a massive departure from tradition, as many players (though not “many” relative to the total poker playing population) found satellites to be profitable endeavors past the… Read more »
America’s Cardroom, WPN Hit by DDoS Attack Again
It had been a while, but America’s Cardroom seemed due for another cyber attack. Yup, leading into the Labor Day weekend, ACR and its network, the Winning Poker Network, were hit with a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack, something that is unfortunately not a unique event for either the online poker room or the… Read more »
Bovada Re-Opens Online Poker Room
A little more than a year after closing its online poker room, Bovada has decided to re-open it, initially accepting players from nine countries: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Peru, Venezuela, and yes, the United States of America. So is this what making America great again was all about? Bovada took full advantage of… Read more »
888poker Launches Flopomania
888poker launched its new game, Flopomania, on Sunday, three weeks after accidentally activating the Flopomania tables early (and that was the second time 888poker jumped the gun). The game is official now, though, and it seems that so far, players have been eager to try it out. A Flopomania game plays just like a regular… Read more »
Partypoker Withdraws from Australia
The fallout from the recent online gaming regulatory changes in Australia continues, as partypoker has announced that it will be withdrawing from the country’s internet poker market, effective August 31st. In a brief statement, which can be found on the website of party’s parent company, GVC Holdings, partypoker said: It has been announced that Australian… Read more »
AB, UB Claims Approval E-mails Hitting Inboxes
On Friday, Garden City Group, the claims administrator for the Absolute Poker and UltimateBet remissions process, began sending out e-mails to former players of the two online poker rooms, confirming the approvals of claims. AP and UB, which together comprised the CEREUS Network, are infamous in online poker history both for their superuser scandals perpetrated… Read more »
PokerStars Announces Withdrawal from Australia
PokerStars has sent an e-mail to its Australian players that it will withdraw from the Australia market in mid-September following the passage of a new online gambling bill in the country. The Interactive Gambling Amendment Bill (2016) passed parliament on August 9th and effectively bars all internet gaming sites that are not licensed in Australia.… Read more »