It looks like the US government might finally be coming to their senses in regard to regulating Online Gambling.

This past week, the US Treasury Department granted a delay in the implementation of the very ambiguous Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act. Several politicians had written a letter to Treasury suggesting that a delay of these rules was needed.

I’m still amazed they can implement the rules at all considering that what is considered ‘Unlawful Internet Gambling’ is not even defined or mentioned within the act! Surely you have to explain what something is before you can legislate against it? Only in America….

Also, Representative Barney Frank announced on Tuesday Washington will begin discussing his proposed legislation that would overturn the UIGEA. After hearing the UIGEA delay announcement, Frank issued a statement saying that he would “continue to work hard to overturn the ill-advised law”.

Another piece of legislation has also been proposed by New Jersey lawmaker Robert Menendez, that would regulate online poker. Over the past couple of years, internet poker has become one of the most popular forms of entertainment for American citizens and the government sorely wants a piece of the action through taxing the online poker companies that are currently located offshore.

The USA may finally be ready to use common sense and shed the nanny state mantra of the previous Bush government. It’s unbelievable to the rest of the world that things like online poker and sports betting are not regulated in the USA. Especially considering that the USA is considered the world’s home to such pursuits via the casinos of Las Vegas & Atlantic City!

The great thing about poker myths is that as soon as one set is debunked, some more spring up. That’s why I like to look for new ones from time to time. Having said that, let’s take a look at some classics for online poker. Join me, won’t you?

Pocket Aces are useless

HAHAHAAHA! LOLOLOLOL! This is utter crap. Apparently, people think that Aces are dealt too often in online poker games compared to live games. It’s not rigged – you’re just playing more hands per unit of time, and thus see more Aces in that same amount of time.

The other issue people have is that pocket Aces lose more online to wild draws. Sure, if you play in the cheap seats with foolhardy loose players, your Aces may not hold up against a 2 to 5 straight when someone held onto a hand of 2/4 in a game of Texas Hold ‘Em for some reason. This is why people who want to play serious poker play in games with an actual element of risk, as the players there are not so inclined to play ridiculously poor hands.

Aggressive players always do better in the long run

Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong times infinity. Aggressive players can indeed win big, but they lose big as well. Some people can handle such massive swings in fortune well. Normal people with flaws, however, will tilt for days or weeks if they suffer a huge loss.

You can’t just play aggressively in the hopes of winning more and staying lucky. If you don’t know how to read the other players and you don’t know how to make appropriately sized bets, then your aggression will see you staying in hands you have no chance of winning just because you’ve already got too much in the pot. There are successful players who are aggressive, but it’s not the aggression alone that makes them successful, though it may make them more noticeable.

The cards aren’t random

Just… Just why? The cards are random. It’s nice to think that patterns will emerge to take advantage of, but they won’t. Yes, it’s technically pseudo-random and patterns should show up eventually, but for the purposes of gambling, trying to find a pattern you could exploit is like trying to find out if Pi starts recurring eventually. We just don’t have the computing power to figure that out for sure, yet. If we did, we’d have the computing power for even better randomization, anyway.

Spending time trying to figure out a pattern is a waste compared to just taking the time to learn to play poker better. Seriously, why do so many people waste time looking for angles like this before they’ve even spent time trying to learn to play the game properly?

Good players can win in the long run, and the best understand that this is not a game were you win on every hand or even every game. This should really be proof enough for people that the cards are random. They’re random!

You can’t beat a table of bad players

I love this one so much, I think I might marry it. The thinking behind this is “how can you expect to win if the other players aren’t playing poker ‘the right way’?” Well, you can do so by remembering that a) even the best players can’t win all the time, and b) there is no single ‘right way’ to play poker all the time. Is the table you are playing at full of loose cannons? Adjust your play to suit the situation. Is everyone too tight? Adjust your play and expectations to suit the situation. You can’t always play the same way and expect to win. A table of bad players can be beat, though not every time. Again, why don’t you just step up to a higher price range of games if you think the people at your usual price level are playing too loosely?

I’ll leave it there for now. I expect the next time I look for myths, some people will believe that the worst players are making the most money from online poker because no one expects them to play like they do. Sometimes you lose a game of poker. When it happens, it’s either bad luck or your own lack of skill. You can’t work on being luckier, so get out there and improve your game at sites like Full Tilt Poker or PokerStars!

Viktor Blom

So over at Full Tilt recently, the biggest cash game pot ever was apparently played. It was between Finnish pro and team Full Tilt member, Patrik Antonius and a relative newcomer to the high stakes poker world, Isildur1.

It’s been  reported that Isildur1 is a Swedish player by the name of Viktor Blom.  Earlier in the year Blom was the talk of poker forums for his meteoric rise up the stakes of the iPoker high stakes games under the username Blom90.

(William Hill Poker is on the iPoker network, which is not available to US players)

He ran so hot at iPoker, that the forum chatter claimed he had turned $2k into $1.4million in a matter of weeks. Since that time he continued to build his bankroll and took on the sky high stakes of the Full Tilt Omaha Tables against the likes of Phil Ivey and Antonius.

ESPN reported that  Isildur1 lost over $3million to Antonius in one session Monday night, with $878,958.50 on the table in a single hand!

This is how it went down;

“Isildur1 opened for $3,000 preflop and Antonius called. The flop came 5h-7h-Qs and Antonius checked. “Isildur1″ bet $5,000 and Antonius raised to $21,000. Isildur1 called and the turn brought the Ad and a ton of action. Antonius bet $48,000 and Isildur1 raised to $192,000. Antonius then moved all-in for $415,479.50 and was called by Isildur1, creating the largest pot in online poker history at $878,958.50.”

That is one big ass poker pot….

Let’s hope Isilduri has enough stashed in his bankroll to make a comeback soon and make sure he’s on the right side of the biggest winners and losers in online poker list.