Sure, there are good poker psychology issues. I’m in agreement on that.
But you can be a very fine rationalist without being good at cards, and vice versa. (I consider myself a fine rationalist, and I am very good at both poker and bridge; over the last 100 hours I’ve played poker (the last three years; I don’t play online because it’s illegal) I’m up about $60 an hour, though that’s likely unsustainable over the long haul. ($40 an hour is surely sustainable.)
But you can be nutty and be great at cards. And if your skill set isn’t this—and you’re not willing to commit to some real time at getting good—you’re going to get crushed. The idea that simple rationalism is going to lead to big wins is just wrong. You need the math and (less, I think) reading the opponents. You also need to develop the skill of being hard to read.
Our hypothesis isn’t that simple rationalism will lead to big wins. It’s that rationalists have an above average chance of becoming a winning player compared to the average fraternity brother that makes it through Calculus II with a B, which I think is about the level of math competency needed to really succeed at poker. It’s also that we can help professional poker players be slightly better players by getting them to read the LW sequences. We want to create new players from rationalists, and turn existing poker players into rationalists.
We are hoping that getting rationalists to try poker will make them more aware of their own emotional irrationality if they turn out to be losing players, and if they turn out to be winning players, so much the better. If we somehow convinced 50% of LW users to devote 10 hours a week to playing poker (yes median LW reader, I know this is unrealistic), I would be surprised if a year later we didn’t have at least one person making in the mid six figures via semi-full time poker playing.
There’s way more to being good at poker than reading the sequences, but it certainly makes for a good base level of understanding.
I don’t think you need any calculus at all to be good at poker. People who are good at poker tend to know calculus, but that’s because the US has made the highly dubious decision to prioritize calculus over statistics for smart high school students.
It’s not going to be emotional irrationality that’s going to derail your target audience. I played poker in my college years—not enough to get great, but enough to get competent. Playing low-level poker is different than higher-level poker. Experience, intelligence, and presence are all helpful.
Mid-six figures? Seriously? Since I’m not playing online, I don’t know except from reports from others… but if you’re talking $300 an hour in profit (which it appears you are) I think you’ve misestimated. I’ve had nice conversations with a couple of poker pros, and I know some electrically smart people, and I don’t personally know anyone who is making $300 an hour. [Edit: I know that such people exist. They are typically devoted to their craft, and have been doing it since a young age.] If you have someone from a standing start (little or no experience outside home games) and give them 10 hours a week for the next year.… well, I’m willing to play any of ’em heads-up for cash.
I personally know many people who have made those figures in the past, although high-stakes online poker has gotten much tougher in the past few years and it takes extremely high skill to make that much now.
I have personally made about $240/hr at online poker ($200 NLH SNGs on Party Poker back before the UIGEA). But I couldn’t make anywhere near that nowadays.
What specifically makes online poker illegal? I thought the popular interpretation of the Wire Act was that it only made the facilitation of gambling as a business enforcably illegal, and the more recent 2006 bill similarly did not apply to individual players.
I agree that the intent of the US government is to make individual gambling illegal, but that doesn’t seem to be what legal precedent has actually established. And under the Obama administration the intent is less clear to me.
Hopefully the WTO gives the USA the slap it deserves in the next five years or so.
Federal authorities say online gambling is illegal, but Internet-gambling advocates say it is a gray legal area. In 2006, Congress passed a law making it illegal for banks to processing (sic) payments for unlawful Internet gambling. Critics say the law is unclear.
So, basically, the government insists it is illegal. They just don’t usually bother to interfere. Although under Obama, the feds have started seizing accounts.
AFAIK playing online poker is NOT illegal in any state except Washington. What is illegal is for US financial institutions to conduct transactions with online gaming companies.
Sure, there are good poker psychology issues. I’m in agreement on that.
But you can be a very fine rationalist without being good at cards, and vice versa. (I consider myself a fine rationalist, and I am very good at both poker and bridge; over the last 100 hours I’ve played poker (the last three years; I don’t play online because it’s illegal) I’m up about $60 an hour, though that’s likely unsustainable over the long haul. ($40 an hour is surely sustainable.)
But you can be nutty and be great at cards. And if your skill set isn’t this—and you’re not willing to commit to some real time at getting good—you’re going to get crushed. The idea that simple rationalism is going to lead to big wins is just wrong. You need the math and (less, I think) reading the opponents. You also need to develop the skill of being hard to read.
--JRM
Our hypothesis isn’t that simple rationalism will lead to big wins. It’s that rationalists have an above average chance of becoming a winning player compared to the average fraternity brother that makes it through Calculus II with a B, which I think is about the level of math competency needed to really succeed at poker. It’s also that we can help professional poker players be slightly better players by getting them to read the LW sequences. We want to create new players from rationalists, and turn existing poker players into rationalists.
We are hoping that getting rationalists to try poker will make them more aware of their own emotional irrationality if they turn out to be losing players, and if they turn out to be winning players, so much the better. If we somehow convinced 50% of LW users to devote 10 hours a week to playing poker (yes median LW reader, I know this is unrealistic), I would be surprised if a year later we didn’t have at least one person making in the mid six figures via semi-full time poker playing.
There’s way more to being good at poker than reading the sequences, but it certainly makes for a good base level of understanding.
I don’t think you need any calculus at all to be good at poker. People who are good at poker tend to know calculus, but that’s because the US has made the highly dubious decision to prioritize calculus over statistics for smart high school students.
It’s not going to be emotional irrationality that’s going to derail your target audience. I played poker in my college years—not enough to get great, but enough to get competent. Playing low-level poker is different than higher-level poker. Experience, intelligence, and presence are all helpful.
Mid-six figures? Seriously? Since I’m not playing online, I don’t know except from reports from others… but if you’re talking $300 an hour in profit (which it appears you are) I think you’ve misestimated. I’ve had nice conversations with a couple of poker pros, and I know some electrically smart people, and I don’t personally know anyone who is making $300 an hour. [Edit: I know that such people exist. They are typically devoted to their craft, and have been doing it since a young age.] If you have someone from a standing start (little or no experience outside home games) and give them 10 hours a week for the next year.… well, I’m willing to play any of ’em heads-up for cash.
I personally know many people who have made those figures in the past, although high-stakes online poker has gotten much tougher in the past few years and it takes extremely high skill to make that much now.
I have personally made about $240/hr at online poker ($200 NLH SNGs on Party Poker back before the UIGEA). But I couldn’t make anywhere near that nowadays.
Might that suggest that we’re beginning to see the system getting saturated with skilled players?
What specifically makes online poker illegal? I thought the popular interpretation of the Wire Act was that it only made the facilitation of gambling as a business enforcably illegal, and the more recent 2006 bill similarly did not apply to individual players.
I agree that the intent of the US government is to make individual gambling illegal, but that doesn’t seem to be what legal precedent has actually established. And under the Obama administration the intent is less clear to me.
Hopefully the WTO gives the USA the slap it deserves in the next five years or so.
According to WSJ:
So, basically, the government insists it is illegal. They just don’t usually bother to interfere. Although under Obama, the feds have started seizing accounts.
AFAIK playing online poker is NOT illegal in any state except Washington. What is illegal is for US financial institutions to conduct transactions with online gaming companies.
For a review see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Online_poker#Legality