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Ziigmund Neglects Poker and Loses Huge Sums Betting Instead

Ever since May, Ziigmund has almost completely disappeared from the poker scene: he hasn't logged in at Full Tilt Poker more than two times and he also neglects live tourneys.

According to the Finnish poker pro, he is only having a little summer holiday and will soon return to the poker tables. Because Ziigmund is a serious gambler, he withdrew part of his bankroll and made several deposits at various sports betting sites.

Ziigmund

This year's World Cup has not really been easily predictable, and this might be the reason why Ilari has lost more than half a million dollars. According to him, he is planning to view the grand finale in Johannesburg.

Let's just hope he will still have some money left to cover his travel expenses. Smile

The Nominees for the Women in Poker Hall of Fame Are Here

Seven female poker players have been nominated for the 2010 Women in Poker Hall of Fame this year, two of which will be chosen into the Hall of Fame in September.

Women in Poker

On the list, we can find current well-known poker players along with older celebrities and poker legends. Here they are:

PartyGaming and PokerStars Also Acquire French Gaming Licenses

PartyGaming and PokerStars were donated gaming licenses within the second wave of licence approvals, as published by the French gaming regulator ARJEL on Friday.

ARJEL

PartyGaming has received licenses for five of its sites, including PartyPoker and PartyBets.

PokerStars is from now on also licensed to offer online poker in France on a legal basis, with its subsidiary, Reel Malta acquiring group accreditation from ARJEL. 

The second wave of licence approvals also included the French casino group Partouche, and also Chilipoker.

Phil Laak's Endurance Record Has Unofficially Been Broken

Earlier this month, Phil Laak set a new world record of non-stop poker by playing 115 hours straight.

A few weeks later, an enthusiastic group from Austria decided to break this record.

The group consisted of seven players, led by the German actor, director and screenwriter Max Kruckl. Their aim was to play poker for 150 hours straight.
Having started on Saturday, 19.06.2010, the event was available on the group’s website for everyone to follow and has ended on Thursday, 24.06.2010. 

record breakers

PokerStars Introduces Restrictions on Online Poker in France

On the 24th June, PokerStars ceased to offer its services to French customers. This is another effect of the newly intorduced French regulations on online gambling. 

Earlier this month, gaming licenses have been granted by the French Authority of Regulation of Online Games (ARJEL) to sites like Everest Poker, BetClic and Bwin. In the meantime PokerStars, Microgaming, 888 and Party Gaming were denied licenses, despite the fact that these companies are among the largest ones in the poker industry.

PokerStars

At this moment French players are unable to play poker on PokerStars main site and they can read the following message upon logging in: “All money in PokerStars accounts is 100% safe and is available for withdrawal. You can choose to cash out now if you prefer.” 

Poker Pro and Actress Tiffany Michelle Holds Her 26th Birthday at Crystals

Tiffany Michelle, sponsored by UB, has turned 26 last week and decided it was time to celebrate. She and her buddies headed to the Crystals in Las Vegas, to eat, drink, pose for pictures, dance and have a good time on a Friday night.

Tiffany Michelle birthday party - 1

Michelle was accompanied by other Team UB pros Liv Boeree, Adam Levy, Smantha Ryan, and 2006 WSOP Player of The Year Jeff Madsen, among others. They first had a nice lobster dinner at Eva Longoria’s restaurant to give the night a start. After that, the party kicked off at the Eve nightclub, also at Crystals.
Michelle’s birthday presents included a very fancy cake, made of pink and black fondant, chocolate and edible gold chains.

Michelle probably had a very good time, or at least this is what her Tweets from that night indicate: “Off the hook at @Eve_NightclubLV. Best bday ever, not to mention the SICKEST cake.”

Randy ’Nanonoko’ Lew Shows Fans His Room at the Vdara

As you might know, Nanonoko has his own blog on the Pokernews coaching website, and this time, he used the free space there to tell his followers about his journey to Las Vegas and the accommodation he enjoys there.

In his latest blog entry, Nanonoko starts with recalling the details of his flight, which he almost missed because he wanted to save some money by parking his car in the ’economy’ section, which is a greater distance from the terminal as the ’premium’ parking lot. Realizing how little time he had, though, he finally put down his vote for the premium one.

"Well being the savvy saver that I am, I chose to go to the economy parking but as I was driving there...I realized how far it was and that if I parked here...there's no way I would have a chance to get to my flight. So I had to u-turn and circle around the whole airport and go to the premium parking lot."

After the airport incident (he arrived at 4:45 but luckily his plane got delayed to 4:55), he had some rest at his hotel room, the site of which he is grateful enough to share with the public in the video below.

Nanonoko will now be entering his first WSOP Side Event, with the hope of winning himself a bracelet.

Google and YouTube Opens the Doors for Gambling Ads

Google, a company with a very strict advertising policy, has now decided to allow certain gambling ads to be presented on their sites, including YouTube from now on. Youtube, owned by Google, will allow ’licensed entities located in England, Scotland, Wales, Italy, France or Spain’ to display online gambling advertisements on Youtube. This content, however, will only be viewable by users who can verify they are over 18.

Youtube

The advertising campaigns on Youtube will appear on the homepage of the site, video pages and the advertisers’ own channels. Google has gradually been lifting the restrictions on gambling advertisements, starting in 2008, when they lifted their AdWords ban on Internet gambling advertising in the UK only.

The first company to run a gambling ad on Youtube will be Ladbrokes, presenting their click-to-play advertising campaign booked by TBG Digital.

Phil Ivey Wins His 8th WSOP Bracelet

Phil Ivey, one of the biggest icons in the world of poker, has managed to retrieve his eighth WSOP bracelet by winning Event #37 ($3,000 H.O.R.S.E) after beating Bill Chen in the heads-up. Event #37 was followed by a huge crowd of spectators, as the final table happened to be one of the toughest seen at the WSOP this year. Ivey had to battle Chad Brown, David Baker, Bill Chen, Albert Hahn, Kenneth Aldridge, John Juanda and Jeff Lisandro in order to grab this very valuable 8th bracelet. 

Phil Ivey

With this first place, Phil has won $329,840, plus God knows how much more, with all the side bets going on. According to PokerListings, for example, Ivey and Howard Lederer have an ongoing 5 million dollar bet that Ivey would not win two WSOP bracelets until the end of 2011. Well, Howard can start trembling, as Phil has plenty of time to win another bracelet, and is quite confident about the subject. This is what Phil commented after his victory: “I think I can win 30 gold bracelets.  I think I can reach that if I keep playing and stay healthy.”

Even Phil Hellmuth seems to have respect for Ivey and his tremendous poker skills. Hellmuth reacted to Ivey's win on Twitter, saying: "Amazing win Phil Ivey: bracelet no 8, congrats! Ivey now best all around player in world!"

With this statement, he condradicts his earlier tweets and comments made before the start of the WSOP, all saying that he, Phil Hellmuth, is still the best poker player in the world, and could probably beat anyone.

With eight WSOP bracelets, Phil Ivey is currently at the fifth place (together with Erik Seidel) on the all-time WSOP bracelet list, behind Phil Hellmuth, Johnny Chan, Doyle Brunson and Johnny Moss.

Mangas Gaming Has Broken All Previous Records in France Since the Regulation

Nicholas Beraud, the chief executive of Mangas Gaming (the company that owns BetClic and EverestPoker) made a statement regarding the recently introduced regulations licensing sports betting into the market. According to him, Mangas has now broken all previous records in France since the introduction of the new regulations.

Newly regulated French market

Below you can find his speech on the newly regulated French market, as heard at the CEO Panel at EGR Live:
“On the one side, you pay a huge amount more tax in France, but on the other hand, it’s created a new market, a new business,” he said. “What we see of the French market so far is a boom in terms of new customers that until now didn’t want to play because it was thought that it was illegal to play on the internet.”

Beraud continued: “Now it is legal, we have beaten all our records in the last few days. Of course you include the World Cup effect, but despite that, in terms of conversion and activities, we have seen a huge move in terms of new customers that are joining BetClic to bet on the World Cup.”

He also predicts that the countries to follow suit “after France will probably be in Denmark, then Germany, then Spain. It will create a stable business, and we will have the opportunity to get more customers in these regulated markets.”

H2 Gambling Capital, a gambling data business also shares Bereaud's predictions, stating that regulation can actually increase market size by two, or even three times. These new regulations on the gambling sector also mean that all companies need to acquire a licence in order to provide their services.

The North American Poker Tour Is Set to Continue Next Fall

The PokerStars North American Poker Tour (NAPT) has made an official announcement regarding its next venue this November, which will be the Bicycle Casino, situated in Los Angeles, CA.

NAPT - Las Vegas

The Bicycle Casino is a place with a long history and strong local traditions which makes it a truly suitable venue. This is what Daniel Negreanu thinks about the NAPT at The Bike: “I have played at The Bike before. A strong presence of local players is really important for the success of this tournament. That will entice players from everywhere as they know there will be loads of money on the line. I am eagerly looking forward to this event.”

The Main Event of the NAPT will have a buy-in of $5,000.

PokerStars Mega Satellite Allows Another 252 Players to Enter the WSOP Main Event

I have already informed you about the WSOP Main Event ticket frenzy at PokerStars, which was a $370 buy-in mega satellite, organized last Sunday.

WSOP 2010

After seven hours of play, 281 players still had chips and the line-up included quite a few famous players, such as Team PokerStars Pros Jude "j.thaddeus" Ainsworth, Chris "Money800" Moneymaker, Veronica "Princesa" Dabul, Randy "nanonoko" Lew, Dusty "Leatherass9" Schmidt, Martin AAbenjaminAA" Hruby, Marcello Del Grosso, Grayson "spacegravy" Physioc, Ruben "rubenrtv" Visser, Martin "Goral" Horecki, Thierry "BOWPOWER" van den Berg, Raymond Wu, Julian Thew, Martha "marene" Herrera, Steven Paul, Grzegorz "Da Warsaw" Mikielewicz, Richard Toth, Tom McEvoy, Jorge Arias and Gualter Salles, but none of them managed to satellite their way to the Main Event.

280th place was the first one to provide some money back, $160, to be precise. 279th to 253th managed to get their buy-in back for eight hours of play, while 252nd to 1st were left praising God and starting packing for Vegas.

Congratulations to all the winners!

A Record Number of Participants at the WSOP Seniors’ Event

The WSOP Event #34 – ($1,000 Seniors’ No-Limit Hold’em) has broken all previous records concerning the number of participants. An astonishing 3,148 players took part in this tournament. This might prove all the players that prophesize the end of live poker wrong.

It is funny that Russ Hamilton was found in the form of a $5 memorandum chip from Palace Station 'The Seniors' Poker Player Hall of Fame, eventually won in a splash pot by Jack Ward:

Russ<br />
Hamilton

Russ Hamilton allegedly played quite an important role in the UB cheating scandal. Russ Hamilton pulled the strings to develop a super-user 'tool' that cheated friends, associates, and UltimateBet customers out of millions of dollars.

The Godfather of Online Poker (Part III)

Eponymus’s hilarious photoshop comic strip continues with the third part, in which the online poker community continues to diminish. In other words, it is not only Jimmy ’Gobboboy’ Fricke who plays with the fish. Enjoy!

New MasterCard Targeted at Poker Players

The MyPokerCard is a prepaid gold MasterCard created by CashPlus specifically for the UK poker player. This new card which requires no credit checks offers applicants an easy way to manage their poker bankroll.

MasterCard, MyPokerCard

The MyPokerCard also offers its holders complete privacy, with no need to link it to their bank account. Being a prepaid card, card holders can top up their poker account by cash in over 12,500 participating stores located over the UK. The card can also be used for online purchases, paying bills and is the first debit card to be on offer in the UK with purchase protection.

Of course the card can also be used worldwide wherever you see the MasterCard acceptance mark, so it is easy to spend your winnings the next time you are on holiday.

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