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The popular PokerFuse.com website offered up its opinion on the controversy surrounding Bodog Poker’s apparently “not-so-anonymous” tables. It’s no longer poker.
Last week, Bodog Poker launched its new software, proclaiming it can now compete worldwide with the top brands out there while keeping out the so-called “sharks”. Bodog has made it no secret they are seeking a purely recreational player base. As such, they implemented an “anonymous” feature to the new software platform that is primarily geared towards preventing data mining. The company cited Daniel Negreanu as having admitted to utilizing such data mining to gain a huge advantage playing online.
“Taking away a player’s identity at the table, as Bodog has just done, removes an integral part of the game,” Nick Jones of PokerFuse.com notes.
One of the fundamental parts of poker – online or live, casino or home game, tournament or cash – is that it is social. Ask any recreational poker player – be it a Vegas vacationer, an ESPN viewer, an online player or a home game regular – what they enjoy about poker and “There is a reason why poker is one of the most popular games in the world and why there is a multi-billion dollar online industry: Poker is a skill game. Poker has winners.” they will tell you it is the tells, the reads, the psychology and the table banter. It is what makes poker the game it is.
It is why Mike Caro’s Book of Tells is still #3 on the poker bestseller list on Amazon, why Teddy KGB was defeated with his Oreos and why Maverick can offer to lose for the first thirty minutes at the table. And it is why online poker sites strive to replicate this with personality and customization: from chat boxes and smileys to avatars and image uploads, from country flags and color-coding to personalized screen names and note-taking.
And it is why the poker world did a collective “WTF?” when Bodog unveiled their “controversial” new client update this week that removes all player screen names throughout the client.
As if the move to implement the new feature was not controversial enough, another website this week revealed that Bodog Poker’s new software is far from anonymous.
Bodog’s software was broken in under 3 hours, just like PartyPoker’s anonymous tables.
A demonstration video was even published on the Net to show how this was done.
- Ace King, Gambling911.com
