I’m of course looking forward to whatever Dream Team Poker’s next event is … and plausibly defending Team Tao of Pokerati’s title. Seriously, having played in three Dream Team tourneys now (winning one), and taken part as either a player or analyst (?) in a few other team-concept no-limit hold’em freezeouts, I have some genuine strategy thoughts on this format … and fugk, just as much authority on it as Matt Parvis or Jamie Gold.
Anyhow, check out their rockin’ new promotional vid from the WSOP team tournament … they’ve got a few different musical varieties on their site and YouTube, but I liked this one best:
Starring Kenna James … with splash appearances by Lacey Jones, Liz Lieu, Jerry Yang, Dennis Phillips, Susie Isaacs, Alex Outhred, Barry Greenstein, David Williams, Evelyn Ng, Gavin Smith, Bryan Micon, Pam Brunson, Jose Canseco, et al.
According to official info (click below), current operations should remain essentially in tact — meaning no friends or colleagues about to get insta-fired — and Gamynia’s big plans have everything to do with getting into the online poker market. All we know about Gamynia Limited (at the moment) is that it’s a company forming part of a privately held investment firm.
WPTE stock climbed 12 percent, to $1.49, on the news.
WPT Enterprises, Inc. (Nasdaq: WPTE – the “Company”) today announced that Gamynia Limited (“Gamynia”), a company which forms part of a privately held investment group with substantial holdings in a range of diversified assets, has agreed to acquire substantially all of the Company’s operating assets other than cash, investments and certain excluded assets. Gamynia will pay the Company $9,075,000 plus a percentage of future revenues earned by Gamynia from the World Poker Tour(R) and Professional Poker Tour(R) brands.
Under ownership of Gamynia, the World Poker Tour and Professional Poker Tour brands will continue all operations including the Company’s television, sponsorship, distribution and licensing units and will under the agreement enter the online gaming market. Gamynia has secured the services of an industry leading online gaming marketing company Hardway Investments Ltd. which will seek to exploit and develop the WPT brands with the goal of maximizing future revenue opportunities.
Under the asset purchase agreement, the Company will sell its television library, including all related intellectual property rights, brand names, trade names, certain assumed contracts and tangible personal property. Gamynia will assume specified liabilities including one of the two corporate leases. The Company will retain its cash and cash equivalents, investments in debt securities and put rights, certain other investment and litigation assets, and future foreign sponsorship revenues from the sponsorship of Seasons Four, Five and Six of the World Poker Tour and Season One of the Professional Poker Tour by PartyGaming and the license of Season Seven of the World Poker Tour to PokerStars. The Company will also retain certain office lease obligations and all of its employee obligations.
The net cash proceeds from the asset sale will be retained by the Company and the Company plans to use the cash to develop or acquire a non-poker related business. The Company does not currently intend to distribute any proceeds from the asset sale to the Company’s stockholders.
Not sure yet where to begin … and while the concept of playing competitive video-game tournaments online for real money isn’t exactly new (FIFA interactive World Cup, eg) … it’s apparently about to get a whole lot easier.
The site is called BringIt.com, and will be legal in 39 US states. (Like holy fugk, you can even transfer funds via PayPal!)
Depending on how all this shakes down, game of luck vs. skill definitives will be even more relevant than before … and at a minimum may open a new window for online poker to distinguish itself from online gambling. The online (non-poker) gaming sites that will inevitably spring up should BringIt actually bring it, meanwhile, will have to deal with all the same regulatory stuff that we want to deal with to protect fairness, ensure integrity, disable cheat codes, etc.
Still too early to tell. And BringIt is only supposed to go live in low-stakes Beta this week. But it should be a very interesting site to watch …
First off, I just get pissy — because why can’t Texas see what we are missing by being so anti-poker. I mean sheeot, the state of Texas is building what may well become one of the biggest non-Vegas casinos in all of America right across the border in Oklahoma … because of the belief that poker offends Republican primary voters’ moral sensibilities. I mean either we don’t believe that, and just are stupid for letting OK make all the $$, or we do believe that, and therefore are being pretty unneighborly (at least from a Christian perspective) by letting our good friends to the north destroy themselves — and our people — with poker.
But I digress … this tournament reminds me why poker is different from so many other similar political issues — and it’s stuff “our side” should remember when trying to push through our political agenda.
As far as “alternative” political issues … the one most in line with poker right now would seem to be marijuana. They too are flooding Washington DC with supportive letters — and are making essentially the same plea: regulate and tax us, please!
While I’m not so sure potheads are the best company to be in, politically — they’re making moves, but it’s taking decades, because you know, potheads are seldom in a hurry — there is such a clear difference here. And that is you would never see a group of cops hosting a “bake” sale to raise money for a comrade-in-need … as good of an idea as that may be.
Though a few cops playing cards certainly isn’t any deal-maker on the political front, separating poker from other forms of “vice” seems to me would be an essential part of any plan to legitimize the game … so this helps. Save Captain Sargent!
There seems to be a cheating scandal brewing at Pitbull Poker, or at least a group of well-documented incidents that don’t sit well with players, according to an ever-growing thread on 2+2. While they can’t seem to pinpoint what is wrong – not quite a superuser situation – many players are citing the fact that hand histories aren’t easy to examine, they sometimes disappear from the site, and hole cards that sometimes appear randomly.
It’s a bit confusing, but Poker News Daily seems to have broken down the allegations of superuser accounts, stack shaving, odd hand history formats, and software glitches. The latest, as of a few days ago and just before the topic was closed by 2+2, original poster chesterboy wrote the following:
I believe all relevant people and companies have have been identified.
If there was wrongdoing, I believe I should be hearing back from some people that can verify the stories, especially if the sweatshop story has any truth to it.
If there was no wrongdoing, I am now back in productive dialogue with [Network Manager Dave Brenes], and we should be able to verify these things in a somewhat timely manner.
I am sorry things had to get this unpleasant to get an appropriate reaction from pitbull. So far the only verified shortcomings of pitbull are poor communication and slow response times. Kevin, while having a questionable history has not yet been shown to have done anything wrong here. I too do not have a perfect past though it may not show up on the internet so easily. We can’t condemn someone in this case for past wrongdoings.
They have been misleading regarding licenses but this is standard for the industry and not something I intend to pursue if there is no evidence of cheating on the site. I play in a state where poker is banned so it benefits me that some companies are willing to bend the law. Being that they are in Costa Rica it is possible they have not broken any laws.
Anyone have any history with Pitbull? Does anyone even play at Pitbull?
I’m watching it, for the first time. ESPN just did the sidebar piece on Justin Bonomo’s prop bet on one of the 40something players living in Panorama Towers winning a bracelet. (Does anyone know if he won that bet? I’m sure Panorama Towers had at least as many final tables as Denmark.) Greg Raymer just busted out … Norman Chad’s same ole shtick seems fresh, not tired … and the poker itself is good.
I gotta say, like the way the 2009 season is starting … I could see a few people getting hooked during a weekend marathon. Go ESPN. I think my reluctance to give a shit about first airings might say more about an evolving desire to watch TV podcast-style, at one’s own convenience, than it does about non-excitement for what is clearly a great poker show. Well shot, well edited.
MORE: The cutover to the Champions Invitational … with Raymer coming over after busting out in third, to take a seat amongst a bunch of recognizable-to-grandma champions … nice! Seriously, semi-interested in that tourney now. (If only it had more money at stake.)
randompoker: RT @MeanPokerDealer: I think it's SO cool how you guys loop the earbuds around your ears so they're hanging there all not in your ears and stuff. I hate you. 45 minutes ago
The going price: $9 million (+ a percentage of future profits):
There seems to be a cheating scandal brewing at Pitbull Poker, or at least a group of well-documented incidents that don’t sit well with players, according to an 
