Saturday, February 25: Die, cheaters
Another major shakeup in the online poker world this past week, with 2 higher-profile players, JJProdigy & Justin Bonomo being caught for playing multiple usernames (sometimes up to 6) in the same multi-table tournament. You can read about their sagas here and here -- JJProdigy offered up an absolutely absurd excuse about his grandma playing the first half of the tournament, and then him finishing up for her...a tall tale to be sure, only to have Justin follow up with what will go down in the annals of gaming history as one of the most absurdly defiant and pathetic explanations / justifications ever proferred for cheating at poker. Read it here if you really want a glimpse into what happens to one's logical reasoning when you eschew college in favor of poker. Stay in school, kids (despite the unfortunately ironic title of this blog.) I've only played in a handful of big-buyin MTTs, but even I feel cheated by these multi-account abusers. I hope Party and Stars cracks the whip in the coming weeks. It's terrible that the only reason they even caught these two guys was because they were reported by other players who had become suspicious. Both of the cheaters also claim that what they did is very widespread among most of the big tourney players; somewhat disconcerting.
In other news, the law firm I summered for last year just announced a pretty sizeable salary-increase for first-years (of which I will not be one, since I summarily rejected their offer): bump from 125K to 145K. After bonus, that means that all of my ex-summer classmates who allowed themselves to be duped into a couple years of mind-numbing servitude will be pocketing in the neighborhood of 175K to 185K (before taxes). And you know what? Not even the tiniest twinge of remorse from my end. For those readers who haven't read my posts from a year ago, or from last summer when I got caught up in the throes of life as a summer associate, you might not understand my animosity toward Big Law, nor why I'm shunning that undeniably lucrative career path despite finishing up my law school degree. I'll have much more to write about that in a post that I've been mulling about for a couple weeks now, but in short, it's just not worth it. Sitting in interviews with lawyers who try and convince you that they really like what they do for a living, when you can see in their eyes that they're dead inside. Sitting in your office from 8:30am until 10pm (on a good night -- ugh, I'm shivering just writing that) 6 days each week spellchecking documents (sorry, future lawyers, that's what you do as a first-year). Dragging your weary ass home every night, so tired that all you're able to do is watch yesterday's episode of the Daily Show that you Tivo'd then go to bed so you can get up and do it all over again the next day. Sorry, just not my idea of enjoying life. I've been fired or disciplined from nearly every single job I've had since I was 14 -- often as a result of a nebulous "attitude problem" that apparently I can't kick. Even last summer, I was on the business end of a couple shit-talks because apparently more senior attorneys don't like to be second-guessed, nor have alternative ideas suggested to them. They just want the work they give you to be done without any questions being asked. I just don't fit the mold, sad to say. But like I said, I've had another post brewing that will address that more thoroughly. Got to run for now.
Oh, just found one post (among the thousands in that stupid ZeeJustin thread) written by Jason Strasser that was pretty illuminating so I thought I'd recopy it here:
This entire JJ Prodigy and ZeeJustin debacle should be shedding light on the overall world of online poker.
I had a realization last year. I had an excellent night at the tables, and stayed up all night in my dorm room. The sun came out, and right as I was thinking about crashing, I went outside my room to get some water. As I walked down the hall, I saw my neighbor heading out of the dorm room. We got in a conversation, and he was waking up to tend the Washington Duke golf courses, where he got paid $9/hour. Then he’d attend class. He is now at NYU Law School, and he’s a very smart kid.
This situation is obviously very generic and frequent, but for some reason this really hit home. I could’ve taken my friend into a room for one day, and taught him how to make way more than his wage. Poker has created unbalance in society. I really should not be able to use my non-exceptional mind to make the money that I am making.
The bottom line is this: making money at poker is far easier than it should be right now. Not to sound arrogant, but the most comforting aspect of poker for me is not the tons of online fish who dump money, but it’s the players who are winning that money. The fact that, in my mind, there are so many players out there raking in huge dollars, who in my opinion, are not very good/talented/smart and who don’t really go through cogent thought processes, is very comforting for me. When I show up at a tournament and see all these ‘pros’ who make over 100K/year and who just don’t impress me, I don’t panic about poker disappearing with the fish.
But off this tangent—poker, as it stands now, is not sustainable. That is blatantly obvious. But the current state of the game has produced many young players who are, for the most part are fairly smart but not exceptional, banking hundreds of thousands of dollars. A lot of these kids did not go to college and severely lack perspective on the world they live in. Majority of their friends are other poker players. They are very isolated from the real world because in the real world, a 16 year old who understands folding equity shouldn’t be able to drag in 6-figures. They obviously have a certain combination of traits which allow them to be successful, but please, if you want to sit here and call ZeeJustin or JJProdigy or myself ‘great minds’ or ‘prodigies’, you are out of your mind.
When I first heard about Justin getting in trouble, I felt terrible. It made me sick to see people on here bashing this young kid. For the most part, these attacks are justified, but I it’s just not my personality to gang up on someone, especially a friend, when he is down. I also, do not come from a totally ‘honest’ background. There are definitely things I have done in online poker that are on the borderline, especially when you start talking about ‘one player to a hand.’ I have never Multi-accounted, though, because that struck me as being fairly obviously immoral.
ZeeJustin’s ‘My Statement’ post was disgusting, but illuminating. If you can’t see the misguided, sheltered, and ignorant way he was writing, that’s unfortunate. I read his post, hoping for an apologetic, ‘I’m sorry and I want to move on,’, and yet got a ‘Party stole XYZ from me and its ridiculous’. He doesn’t get it, but you are ignorant for blaming him for this. I got an aim invitation today to join some sort of ‘Anti-Cheaters Rejoice’ chat. In my opinion, that’s [censored] ridiculous. ZeeJustin is making money for the many of the same reasons I am making money, and for many of the reasons you are making money. And when you have a venue where teenagers get idolized for a simple card game and turn down college and a chance to grasp a hold of fundamental principals by experiencing world experiences, ZeeJustin and JJProdigy are among the things you get.
-Jason Strasser
In other news, the law firm I summered for last year just announced a pretty sizeable salary-increase for first-years (of which I will not be one, since I summarily rejected their offer): bump from 125K to 145K. After bonus, that means that all of my ex-summer classmates who allowed themselves to be duped into a couple years of mind-numbing servitude will be pocketing in the neighborhood of 175K to 185K (before taxes). And you know what? Not even the tiniest twinge of remorse from my end. For those readers who haven't read my posts from a year ago, or from last summer when I got caught up in the throes of life as a summer associate, you might not understand my animosity toward Big Law, nor why I'm shunning that undeniably lucrative career path despite finishing up my law school degree. I'll have much more to write about that in a post that I've been mulling about for a couple weeks now, but in short, it's just not worth it. Sitting in interviews with lawyers who try and convince you that they really like what they do for a living, when you can see in their eyes that they're dead inside. Sitting in your office from 8:30am until 10pm (on a good night -- ugh, I'm shivering just writing that) 6 days each week spellchecking documents (sorry, future lawyers, that's what you do as a first-year). Dragging your weary ass home every night, so tired that all you're able to do is watch yesterday's episode of the Daily Show that you Tivo'd then go to bed so you can get up and do it all over again the next day. Sorry, just not my idea of enjoying life. I've been fired or disciplined from nearly every single job I've had since I was 14 -- often as a result of a nebulous "attitude problem" that apparently I can't kick. Even last summer, I was on the business end of a couple shit-talks because apparently more senior attorneys don't like to be second-guessed, nor have alternative ideas suggested to them. They just want the work they give you to be done without any questions being asked. I just don't fit the mold, sad to say. But like I said, I've had another post brewing that will address that more thoroughly. Got to run for now.
Oh, just found one post (among the thousands in that stupid ZeeJustin thread) written by Jason Strasser that was pretty illuminating so I thought I'd recopy it here:
This entire JJ Prodigy and ZeeJustin debacle should be shedding light on the overall world of online poker.
I had a realization last year. I had an excellent night at the tables, and stayed up all night in my dorm room. The sun came out, and right as I was thinking about crashing, I went outside my room to get some water. As I walked down the hall, I saw my neighbor heading out of the dorm room. We got in a conversation, and he was waking up to tend the Washington Duke golf courses, where he got paid $9/hour. Then he’d attend class. He is now at NYU Law School, and he’s a very smart kid.
This situation is obviously very generic and frequent, but for some reason this really hit home. I could’ve taken my friend into a room for one day, and taught him how to make way more than his wage. Poker has created unbalance in society. I really should not be able to use my non-exceptional mind to make the money that I am making.
The bottom line is this: making money at poker is far easier than it should be right now. Not to sound arrogant, but the most comforting aspect of poker for me is not the tons of online fish who dump money, but it’s the players who are winning that money. The fact that, in my mind, there are so many players out there raking in huge dollars, who in my opinion, are not very good/talented/smart and who don’t really go through cogent thought processes, is very comforting for me. When I show up at a tournament and see all these ‘pros’ who make over 100K/year and who just don’t impress me, I don’t panic about poker disappearing with the fish.
But off this tangent—poker, as it stands now, is not sustainable. That is blatantly obvious. But the current state of the game has produced many young players who are, for the most part are fairly smart but not exceptional, banking hundreds of thousands of dollars. A lot of these kids did not go to college and severely lack perspective on the world they live in. Majority of their friends are other poker players. They are very isolated from the real world because in the real world, a 16 year old who understands folding equity shouldn’t be able to drag in 6-figures. They obviously have a certain combination of traits which allow them to be successful, but please, if you want to sit here and call ZeeJustin or JJProdigy or myself ‘great minds’ or ‘prodigies’, you are out of your mind.
When I first heard about Justin getting in trouble, I felt terrible. It made me sick to see people on here bashing this young kid. For the most part, these attacks are justified, but I it’s just not my personality to gang up on someone, especially a friend, when he is down. I also, do not come from a totally ‘honest’ background. There are definitely things I have done in online poker that are on the borderline, especially when you start talking about ‘one player to a hand.’ I have never Multi-accounted, though, because that struck me as being fairly obviously immoral.
ZeeJustin’s ‘My Statement’ post was disgusting, but illuminating. If you can’t see the misguided, sheltered, and ignorant way he was writing, that’s unfortunate. I read his post, hoping for an apologetic, ‘I’m sorry and I want to move on,’, and yet got a ‘Party stole XYZ from me and its ridiculous’. He doesn’t get it, but you are ignorant for blaming him for this. I got an aim invitation today to join some sort of ‘Anti-Cheaters Rejoice’ chat. In my opinion, that’s [censored] ridiculous. ZeeJustin is making money for the many of the same reasons I am making money, and for many of the reasons you are making money. And when you have a venue where teenagers get idolized for a simple card game and turn down college and a chance to grasp a hold of fundamental principals by experiencing world experiences, ZeeJustin and JJProdigy are among the things you get.
-Jason Strasser
posted by Blog Administrator at 5:59 PM
4 Comments:
Amazing stuff. I had previously thought that Zee Justin was one of the exception to the rule that you shouldn't skip out on college to play poker. Clearly not the case. If for no other reason than him keeping his money in there after the JJProdigy bust. Who couldn't see this coming?!?
I hope Party continues to punish cheaters and as far as I am concerned Party can keep the money, their anti-cheating efforts come with with a high price tag. Although a JJ/Zee free roll for $140K would be pretty sweet.
Datamining is cheating. It gives an adge to the other players that don't datamine and don't have stats on you. It's clearly against the rules, yet widespread.
Should Party empty the accounts of the dataminers?
Ugh - i don't think I want to tackle the datamining issue with a 10-foot pole. There's like a thousand threads on 2p2 if you want to read both sides of the argument I guess.
I agree with everything you said. Multi-accounting needs to be squashed. I'm just somewhat worried that party can take 140k out of someone's account (with no checks and balances or judicial remedies for the players), including amounts that he won legitimately.
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