60 Minutes report now online
by Kevin Mathers, Nov 30, 2008 | 5:44 pm
They report, you decide:
As has been discussed earlier, Mike Sexton, Greg Raymer and Linda Johnson were also interviewed for the story. In this web exclusive, Steve Kroft discusses tells with them, which seems silly to talk about in reference to online poker.
DanM says:
November 30th, 2008 at 6:36pm
Hmm, wow … not exactly the story I envisioned … and I know I’m still going to be in the extreme minority thinking the piece was still great.
A step in the right direction. Just not as big of a step as it coulda been.
zachdealer says:
December 1st, 2008 at 6:02am
what stakes should you look out for with people doing this? I’m sure it has to be atleast $25-$50 or higher?
KenP says:
December 1st, 2008 at 6:54am
Dan, if you are looking for quality, head for the print media. I thought todays WashPo piece was balanced and informative. It is a great example of how the net cannot replace good journalism.
Croft? No real dots connected. Pretty plebeian reporting that missed the sensationalism promised by all the teasers.
California Jen says:
December 1st, 2008 at 8:58am
Ken, I agree about Kroft. So many dots left unconnected – the fact that AP and UB were different scandals with different perpetrators, the fact that all of the players on both sites were reimbursed, the fact that there are many other sites out there with no insider cheating… It was a very scrambled and confusing report.
And that video in this post about tells? WTF? That has nothing to do with the online poker story whatsoever, so why was he asking them that ridiculous question? It sounded like he was just asking for his own personal knowledge and not for the benefit of this story about AP and UB.
Kevin Mathers says:
December 1st, 2008 at 9:01am
I’m assuming the tells video was supposed to help with the “poker as skill” argument in terms of regulating online gambling. Maybe they’ll release more of that part of the video online or for a future segment on 60 Minutes.
The overnight ratings are in, with two football games running late, it certainly helped them win Sunday night:
7pm hour NFL football/60 Minutes 13.1 rating/21 share
8pm hour 60 Minutes/Amazing Race 9.4 rating/14 share
DanM says:
December 1st, 2008 at 12:24pm
13.1 and 9.4 … do you know what that translates to in millions?
Final table was a 1.9, I believe, by comparison.
I actually understand why they probably made a choice to just go with the AP situation … this level of newsgathering takes a lot of time.
And though I was disappointed it didn’t go into the politics, overall, I think that was a good thing. Can you imagine how “bad for poker” it would’ve been had they just painted UB as a bad, bad company … and then pointed out that their spokesman is the biggest champion in all of poker .. and their other spokesperson is the one making supposedly compelling arguments for legalization on Capitol Hill?
Connecting Phil Hellmuth to UB here woulda been really bad for poker — making the whole industry (and the WSOP) look like the company he represents. And connecting Annie Duke to it woulda discredited her.
Kevin Mathers says:
December 1st, 2008 at 12:29pm
Rating is % of households (each point is about 1.1m households), share is % of TV’s in use watching the program.