ZepHendrix o Black Friday

Black Friday
Posted on April 18, 2011 by zephendrix

As many of you probably know, this Friday the FBI took over control of the three largest poker sites, Pokerstars, Full Tilt, and Absolute Poker. Coincidentally, these are the three sites I play on, the foremost being Pokerstars.
Also coincidentally, I was in Tampa for my buddy’s bachelor party this weekend. I was basically out of contact from all my stakes and the poker community for the most part which was not good. A lot of people were freaking out, regulars in my game and my stakes included, and I wish I was there to calm a lot of them down. Regardless this news has brought a shock to the online community and it is pretty ridiculous. I will use this blog post to answer a lot of questions that I have been getting lately and give my opinion on the matter.

Did you lose the money in your account?

No, my money is online in my account and in my stakes accounts. My account is a separate entity from that of the assets of the firm, so it is mine and cannot be used to pay the debts of the firm. I should be safe from any punishment that may be placed on the sites. However, currently I cannot withdrawal or transfer funds or sit at any tables, so my operations are basically shut down. For my stakes, the US ones have the same situation as me and the ones outside of the country are able to continue business as usual. I am working on plans with each of them individually. I have advised them all not to freak out and withdrawal their money for the reasons listed above.

How much money do you have online?

I don’t know, how much money do you have in your bank account? It’s kind of funny how social norms are thrown aside when it comes to poker. I mean I played poker about 40 hours a week for the past three years. Call it gambling, it is gambling, but its a job for me. I know what I’m doing, I know I have edge, and I treat it like a job. I would never ask anyone what they make at their job, but people essentially ask what I make at mine all the time. But to somewhat answer this question, I have about half my net worth online. I am not worried about this really at all. I am disappointed at the lost future profits much more than I am worried about the money I have online.

Is online poker illegal?

I have been under the impression that this answer is no. The legal teams of each site have lawyers who know the laws in and out. They have advised US residents that it is indeed not, but they may have just found loopholes in the system for which to operate. However I can only speculate on whether this is true and can offer no real answer to this question.

What do you think about this?

I think its fucking bullshit. The government says we can’t play online because its not regulated and because underage kids play online. Guess what? This industry is done entirely online. It would be one of the easiest things to regulate ever. It leaves a 100% traceable paper trail. As for kids playing online… who cares? They have to get the money from somewhere right? Shouldn’t someone be able to make that decision themselves? After all, the government allows you to make the choice of whether or not to smoke cigarettes, a habbit that will inevitably kill you. “Go ahead and kill yourself, just don’t gamble in your house while you do it.” Oh and kids smoke underage all the time, I don’t have numbers to prove this but I bet there are more underage smokers in the United States alone than there are underage online poker players worldwide. But that’s A-OKAY with the government because they make billions of dollars every year off the sale of cigarettes. And that’s what this comes down to really. If poker was regulated in the US and the government got its cut (a proposition that many organizations have been working on the past couple years) then this would be a moot point and we wouldn’t even be having this discussion. Each and every day I lose a little more faith in this country, and we become more and more of a joke to other countries. I could continue to rant here but I will refrain.

What are you going to do?

I’m going to graduate. I will finish up school this year hopefully if I can take 2 classes this summer. I am going to play the EPT Main Event in Madrid in three weeks and win that obviously, then I’m going to play the Main Event in the WSOP. By then, the future of online poker should be a lot more clear. For the past three years, I have been working full time, going to grad school, and playing poker like a full time job. It has been both insanely stressful and time consuming. All three were such great opportunities that I decided to try to do all three until one of them became the clear choice of which to drop. Well it looks like the government has made this choice for me, so I’m going to put more effort into the other two, hang out more with my girlfriend and friends, get back in shape, and start sleeping more.

I will post some pictures I took recently from the weekend and give some non-depressing trip reports as well when the dust settles a little from this incident.