Written By: Jess, RSSPoker.com

With enforcement of the UIGEA scheduled to begin on December 1st, I thought now would be a good time to start talking about the future of US online poker deposit options. Before I go any further, if you’re just looking for available US deposit options, you can find them on our US Poker Deposit Methods page.

While bills like H.R. 2266, H.R. 2267, and H.R. 2268 seek to improve the current situation in US online gaming, the likelihood of anything changing before the December 1st deadline is looking slim. With bigger issues like health care, two wars, and a weak economy dominating almost all of the political discussion going on, our challenge to get online poker moving in a positive direction will be difficult.

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Beginning on December 1st, banks in the US are to begin enforcement of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA). If you aren’t familiar with the UIGEA, it’s a bill that was signed into law on October 13th, 2006 when it was piggy-backed (at the last moment) on the Security and Accountability for Every Port Act of 2006 (SAFE Port Act) . This was considered a ‘must pass’ bill which was voted in at a 409-2 rate by the House of Representatives, and unanimously by the Senate.

Former Tennessee Senator Bill Frist is the person given credit for piggy-backing the bill onto the SAFE Port Act. It is commonly thought that the reason Frist did this was to look good in the eyes of his conservative Republican colleagues, helping him make a run in the Presidential election in 2008. Like every politician, Frist’s job was to serve the people. In this case, he was serving himself, and his selfish political goals are the reason why millions of Americans have lost another piece of the freedom our Constitution promises us.

UIGEA Deadline & Impact on Poker Deposit Options

Beginning on December 1st, 2009, US banks and credit unions are to begin enforcing the regulations within the UIGEA. Their job is to attempt to block transactions to and from online gaming player accounts. While that sounds imposing at first glance, there are reasons to believe that enforcement of the UIGEA will be difficult at best.

Online gaming sites aren’t stupid. They use multiple processors, change processors frequently, and have too much at stake to simply wave the white flag. At the same time, most players and industry insiders are unclear on exactly how the enforcement of the UIGEA will impact player deposits & withdrawals. Will casual players find themselves having to jump through too many hoops to make it worth their time & effort? Will the fear of player funds being seized by the US government cause players to stop playing? Until several December days have come and passed, nobody will know for sure.

Among poker webmasters, it’s hard to find anyone who feels strongly one way or another. In fact, everyone I’ve talked to about this has said basically the same thing. They’re saying that while they don’t know what to expect, they feel confident that alternative deposit options will arise, or that the current options will continue to work.

Nick, a friend who runs one of the better Online Poker Room Review sites told me “Everything changes, but it all stays the same.” During our discussion, I got the clear impression that while he’s concerned about this, he’s not worried about it.

Until we have a better idea of how the US poker rooms are going to respond, guesses are about as accurate as anyone can get right now.

There are a number of significant legal and monetary issues the US poker rooms are facing. How does the enforcement of the UIGEA effect them legally? How much risk are they willing to take?  How hard will they fight to keep US players depositing and playing? Can they come up with new deposit options? These are just a few of the questions that we don’t have solid answers for.

Well, I’m not writing this article to tell you “I don’t know”, so I’ll use the best resources I have available, common sense and experience.

Common Sense Re: Post-UIGEA Poker Deposit Options

Since I can’t seem to get any of the powerful US poker room attorneys to comment (shocker), I’ll use the one resource I can usually count on, common sense. Remember, I’m no legal expert, I don’t work at an online poker room, and I have no experience in the banking industry. I’m just a guy with a good amount of time in this industry as a webmaster & player. So, take my thoughts for what they’re worth.

First, when the UIGEA was initially passed 3 years ago, the entire US poker playing population went into panic mode. While we did see publicly traded poker sites like Party Poker, Pacific Poker, and others leave the US market, privately owned rooms like Pokerstars and Full Tilt Poker stuck around. Not only did they stick around, but they defiantly fought the UIGEA by spending hundreds of millions of dollars marketing their rooms online, on TV, print ads and supporting the Poker Players Alliance (PPA). They also discovered and developed new ways for US players to makes deposits & withdrawals.

Does it make sense that on Dec. 1st the poker rooms will simply give up? After all they have invested to develop their businesses, that’s not going to happen. They’ve proven an incredible desire to offer their products to US players, there is no way they’re going to just give up.

A month after the UIGEA first set us into panic mode, the poker rooms made adjustments, and the players adjusted to the changes. With that in mind, this may turn out to be little more than a revisit to 2006.

Next, you have to remember that sites like Pokerstars and Full Tilt Poker are multi-billion dollar companies with highly paid & experienced attorneys. Knowing the deadline for enforcement of the UIGEA was coming, would it make sense for these rooms to continue to pour millions of dollars into US marketing strategies if they didn’t have a way around this? If they weren’t going to be able to provide real-money games to US players, wouldn’t their attorneys have told them this?

Full Tilt Poker has a TV show called Face The Ace, and Pokerstars has the Million Dollar Challenge. Both of these shows are new, and both target the US player market. Does it seem like a good idea to develop a TV show targeting the US market if the player base was about to go away? It sure doesn’t.

Another thing to consider (and possibly the most important), is the ease of creating processors. Every month, thousands of new businesses all over the world begin accepting credit card payments. In fact, just about anyone can do it, in just a matter of days. This means that the poker sites will likely be one or two steps ahead of the banned processor list that the banks and credit unions will be using. Before a processor can be banned, it has to be identified as a processor for online gaming. By the time one processor is identified, it’s likely the poker sites will already be using a different processor.

In 2006, after Neteller stopped accepting US player transfers, new processors started popping up. When money is to be made, someone will find a way to make it. While we may have to jump through a hoop or two, I’m suspecting that new processors will be created, catering to US poker players. As a processor, there is too much money to be made to think that nobody is going to grab it. Someone will pick up the cash.

While it’s possible that we’ll see an increase in processing fees for deposits and withdrawals, most players are accustomed to paying a fee for making a withdrawal. In most cases, players are not directly charged a fee for deposits, and that’s not likely to change.

It costs a minimum of $8 for a cashout at Absolute Poker and Ultimate Bet. Bank Wires at Full Tilt and Pokerstars typically generate a processing fee by the bank accepting the wire (charged to the player). Maybe these fees will go up, maybe they won’t.

Regardless of what happens, serious players will adjust. The real concern is for the casual player – the guy who may or may not be willing to jump through hoops to open an online wallet, pay higher withdrawal fees, etc..

Only time will tell, but we’ll keep you posted on any changes we discover. Bookmark RSSPoker.com and keep an eye on the ‘Online Poker’ section of this site for updates.

For more information about current deposit options at the best US poker sites, read our US Poker Deposit Methods page. You can also check out our sister site for details on the Pokerstars Deposit Bonus or read our Full Tilt Poker Room review for everything you ever wanted to know about Full Tilt Poker.

Written By: HowToPlayOnlinePoker.net

Following in the steps of other famous poker players like Jean Robert Bellade who appeared on CBS’s Survivor, and Annie Duke who came in second on NBC’s The Apprentice, Tiffany Michelle and Maria Ho are representing the poker world on this season of CBS’s The Amazing Race.

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The dynamic duo represents the only all-female team on this year’s hit reality show. Both Tiffany Michelle and Maria Ho are well known for being the last woman standing in the WSOP Texas Hold’em Main Event. Michelle was the last woman standing in 2008 and Ho in 2007. According to Michelle, there’s more to life than poker though.

Poker is something we do, but we don’t want our lives to be driven by it. When we first heard about it, it didn’t take us long to say ‘Heck yes, we want to do this.’ Poker is always going to be around but The Amazing Race doesn’t come around quite so often. Obviously there are a lot of crummy reality shows, but getting to star in a multiple-Emmy winning show is an amazing opportunity.

When asked about their reasons for going on the show they mentioned promoting poker in a positive way and proving something as women in poker.

Ho said,

We really wanted to go out there and represent poker in the best way possible. Sometimes poker is shown in a negative light because of the gambling aspect and we wanted to change that.

We’re pretty unique in the poker world because it’s a male-dominated game and we wanted to prove that we are some kickass girls who are nice, but also really competitive.

Michelle added,

We wanted to get away from the whole pretty girls playing poker thing and prove that we are gamers.

Bluff gone wrong
Ho and Michelle started out their journey by running a bluff on the other contestants. In her interview on the show, Michelle talked about not wanting to let other teams know that they are “rich and successful poker players”. Okay so they didn’t want to tell people they play poker for money so instead, they told other teams that they help run a shelter for kids.

It didn’t take long for a poker fan to recognize the two at an airport. At that point, the bluff was all over for Ho and Michelle. Their fellow teams didn’t appreciate the lie too much. Their attitudes elicited comments about their attitudes in general. One contestant said, “I don’t think they’re very nice”, so much for promoting poker in a positive light.

Running bad
In this season’s first episode, Tiffany and Maria were nearly eliminated in one leg of the race. In the season opener, contestants flew to Tokyo, Japan, ending up on a Japanese game show. On the game show, the host spun a huge wheel that had various sushi dishes and something called “wasabi bombs”. For those who don’t know, wasabi is an extremely spicy condiment (even in small amounts), used on sushi.

The wasabi bombs were huge wraps filled with wasabi that one player from each team had to eat in under two minutes if they landed on one. If the player finished it in time, the team has to move on to the next leg of the race. After several teams completed the challenge, Maria Ho got her shot at a monstrous wasabi bomb. She started strong but fell a couple of seconds short of swallowing the last of the spicy wrap. She turned to Tiffany Michelle and said with tears in her eyes, “I don’t think I can eat another one”. However, she came through for the poker duo when she was given another chance to eat the wasabi bomb.

Next, Tiffany and Michelle had to lead 20 audience members through busy downtown Tokyo to the next checkpoint. While rushing to keep up they lost two members of the group. After trying unsuccessfully to find their groupies in the congested downtown area, Michelle and Ho decided to go on to the checkpoint. They were obviously resigned to the fact that they would probably be going home. Luckily, for them though, that particular leg of the race was not an elimination round, so they continued.

To continue, they had to complete something called a speed bump, a challenge that had to be completed by their team only. For the challenge Tiffany and Maria had to make a guard some type of soup to his liking. After blazing through that challenge, they moved on to play catch-up against the others.

At that point, the poker girls kicked it up a notch and raced through the next challenge overtaking a couple of other teams. At the end of the day, Tiffany Michelle and Maria Ho survived and one of the other teams went home.

You can catch Tiffany Michelle and Maria Ho on The Amazing Race Sunday’s at 8/7c on CBS.

Written By: PokerGame.org

The World Series of Poker has had a profound effect on poker in recent years, mostly thanks to something called the ‘Moneymaker Effect.’ Named after the winner of the 2003 WSOP, Chris Moneymaker, the Moneymaker Effect describes the awesome impact he had on poker in the United States and around the world.

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The funny thing about Chris is that he didn’t really stand out in any way. He wasn’t a poker professional and he wasn’t rich. He was an accountant, poker hobbyist and what you’d refer to as an extremely average guy. But his painfully dull biography was precisely what made him so important to poker.

It all started because Chris wanted to play in the 2003 WSOP but he didn’t have $10,000 in cash just lying around to pay for the buyin. So instead, he entered an online satellite tournament at PokerStars for $39. He won that satellite which put him into another satellite, for which the prize was airfare and entry to the World Series of Poker. Chris won that satellite as well and was shipped off to the WSOP courtesy of PokerStars.

Amazingly, Chris continued his streak and took down the most prestigious poker tournament in the world: the Main Event of the World Series of Poker. His first place prize money was a (then) record-breaking $2,500,000. After the word got out that Chris Moneymaker was just some average Joe who had only paid $39 to play in an online satellite tournament, interest in poker – particularly online poker – spiked.

The fact that Chris Moneymaker was an average guy who made it big combined with the fact that the entire thing was televised on ESPN brought lots of attention to poker. His success story made all the other average Joes out there feel like they could do the same thing. Millions of people started playing online poker games, and many new success stories have since been created.

Conversely, online poker has in turn had a major effect on the WSOP. After the 2003 WSOP, millions of new poker players got in on the fad and thousands of players won seats online in the same manner that Chris Moneymaker did. To put things in perspective, the 2003 WSOP had 839 entrants and the 2004 WSOP had 2,576 entrants. Since then, it’s grown even larger, with the 2009 WSOP having 6,494 entrants.

With more and more people joining every day, online poker definitely isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. With continued growth in poker worldwide, the future of online poker looks bright indeed. In any case, we have Chris Moneymaker and the WSOP to thank for the poker boom of the 2000’s.


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Heartland Poker Tour - Blackhawk, ColoradoGreat news for Colorado and neighboring poker players! No longer do you have to drive up to Blackhawk with a pocket full of cash in order to qualify for the tournament (called the Mile High Poker Open). With the latest tournament set run from Friday, October 2nd through Sunday the 4th, players can now win a seat by playing in satellite tournaments at Pokerstars.com!

As a guy who’s dumped a good chunk of money into satellite tournaments for the HPT tournaments in Blackhawk I can tell you why you should be excited about this.

First off, if you’ve played in any of the live, casino satellites at the Golden Gates Casino, you know how fast the blinds structures are. They go up so fast that luck overpowers skill, making it difficult to qualify for (unless you have an unlimited amount of funds).

At Pokerstars however, players can qualify for the HPT tournament in Blackhawk, Co. for as little as $4.40 playing in satellite tournaments with decent blind structures. There are a few types of satellites available, here’s more information.

Every day at 7:05 pm ET (5:05 pm Mountain Time), there is a $4.40 rebuy satellite tournament where one player for every $215 in the prize pool wins a seat into the $215 qualifier. In the $215 qualifier, players can win their seat for the Mile High Poker Open at the Golden Gates Casino in Blackhawk. These have a standard blind schedule, with blinds going up every 10 minutes. Players start with 1500 chips, offering a realistic chance for good players to win a seat into the $215 qualifier.

Every day at 5:05 pm ET (3:05 pm Mountain) and 9:05 pm ET (7:05 pm Mountain) there are $8.80 rebuy turbo tournaments that are held. Those who qualify through these satellite tournament also win seats into the $215 qualifier. Being turbo’s, players start with 1000 chips and the blinds go up every 5 minutes.

The $215 qualifier has a great blind structure, with 3000 starting chips and 12 minute blind levels. Every qualifier to the Mile High Poker Open at the Golden Gates Casino will win a $1500+150 seat, plus $350 spending money (hotel & travel expenses). Very cool.

If you’d like to play in the Blackhawk, Co. Heartland Poker Tour satellite tournaments at Pokerstars, follow these simple steps:

1/ Write down Pokerstars bonus code Stars600 and marketing code PSP2175. When you register your new account, you will see a field asking if you have a Pokerstars marketing code. Enter PSP2175 into that field. When you make your first deposit, you will be asked for your bone code. Enter Stars600 into that field. When you use these codes, you will automatically be able to get a Pokerstars bonus equal to the amount you deposit, up to $600. So, if you deposit $100, you can get a $100 bonus. If you deposit $600 or more, you can get a $600 bonus.

2/ Download Pokerstars

3/ Register your new account. After you download Pokerstars, you will be walked through the registration process. This takes about 5 minutes.

4/ Make your first deposit. All of the Pokerstars deposit options are safe & secure. Most allow you to play immediately after your deposit.

5/ Click on the ‘Events’ tab in the Pokerstars lobby. Then click on the ‘Special’ tab. Finally, click on the ‘All’ tab. You will see all of the Heartland Poker Tour Colorado satellite tournaments listed right there.

That’s it! Have fun, and I hope to see you at the Golden Gates Casino in Blackhawk, Co!

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Written By: CardKings.co.uk

Ever since the passing of the UIGEA the online poker market has changed tremendously. US Poker players have had fewer options for sites to play on, and traffic levels have plummeted on sites that pulled out of the US market. Though this has been bad for American poker players, players in other parts of the world have benefited tremendously from this. The UK Based poker sites are fighting for your business and you NEED to take advantage of this.

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UK based sites have been doing tons of great promotions to dominate the European market. They offer huge sign-up bonuses, tournaments with massive overlays and much more in hopes of expanding their product in other markets.

The UK has always been one of the most sought after markets for poker sites, because unlike their American counterparts these players are making their deposits in pounds. This means that instead of depositing 100 US dollars a typical UK player will deposit 100 GBP which is equivalent to approximately $170 US dollars. The more money players deposit usually means the more money they will rake over time since the US dollar is the most commonly used currency for poker sites.

Here are some of the biggest perks for playing on UK Poker Sites:

Sign-up Bonuses: If you have ever looked at some of the sign-up offers for all poker sites you will notice that sites that don’t accept Americans tend to offer WAY MORE! For example I saw that Betfair will give new players sign-up bonuses as much as $1500! US facing rooms will usually only give up to $600. On top of the money bonuses they will give players free tournament tickets, special freerolls, and many other great incentives. Shop around and you will find some great offers. Also, you will see way more things like reload bonuses which many US poker sites do not offer to their players.

Deposit Options: Since there are no issues with processing payments in the UK players have the most options to fund their online wallets. From Neteller (who pulled out of the US and Canadian market after the UIGEA), special prepaid cards to all major credit cards, the options are endless to get money into your account. I have even heard rumours that if you have an account on some sites that operate land based betting shops you can walk into their shop and make your deposit in person! Hell, you can even deposit money using your Paypal account which is UNHEARD OF in North America.

Tournament Overlays: Every day I receive a report of overlays offered by various poker sites. Day after day I have always noticed that the biggest overlays are coming from sites that don’t accept US players. If you are unfamiliar with what an overlay is, it simply means that the poker site is adding additional money to the prize pool to meet a guarantee that the players in the tournament have not generated enough money to meet.

Live Tournament Satellites: With more and more big live tournaments being held in Europe, UK based sites have fewer restrictions on promoting these live events on their sites. These sites are making it very easy to qualify for tournaments like the Irish Poker Open, the Grosvenor UK Poker Tour and many more which are not being promoted on US sites.

Less Competition: No offense to the European players out there, but since the game has only really started to explode in the last few years there are way more new and otherwise horrible players. Online poker has been really popular online in North America for many years and there are a lot more sharks on the US facing sites than the UK ones. Even the best European poker players are playing over on sites like Full Tilt and Pokerstars because there are a lot more games going on and these sites can support their multi-tabling needs. But, if you look at a site like Sky Poker for example, you will see some of the worst poker players in the world just waiting to hand over their money. If you don’t know what I am talking about watch some of the Sky Poker TV shows on YouTube and you will see what I mean.

Safety: Sites licensed by the UK Government are without a doubt the safest places to play online poker. They have strict rules and if a player experiences an issue there is someone you can open a complaint with the Gambling Commission. Unlike some site operating out of Costa Rica or Aruba where you may never see your money again if you experience a problem.

Above are the main reasons why you should look at a UK based poker sites. The downsides of course are that the traffic levels are usually a bit lower, but this is usually made up by the soft games and great promotions that they offer.

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