Notes

The 9 Worst INTERNET POKER Sites ever sold.Identifying Your Key Defense Mechanisms as a Poker Player
Many internet poker rooms have operated in a legal grey area at one time or another. Not surprisingly, a few of these same operations have proven to be completely scandalous.

Luckily, more regulated internet poker sites are available today. Sites operating in the united kingdom, Denmark, France, Italy, and certain US states, for instance, are generally reputable.

But during the game?s Wild West days, some sites got away with fraud, cheating, and theft. Below, you can see the worst of the worst among poker sites.

1 ? UB Poker
Launched in 2001, UB Poker quickly established itself because the premier spot for high-stakes play. A few of poker?s biggest names competed against each other at UB.

Patrik Antonius, Brad Booth, Freddy Deeb, Prahlad Friedman, Phil Hellmuth, and Mike Matusow were a number of the biggest names who played here. UB-sponsored players Hellmuth and Annie Duke also heavily promoted the website.

UB Poker seemingly had the world before them due to online poker?s newness and their popularity. However, investor Russ Hamilton quickly undid their reputation. Hamilton used a superuser account, a program that let him see opponents? whole hands, to win an estimated $22.1 million from opponents.

He made most of his profits against the aforementioned high-stakes players. Friedman alone lost around $3 million to Hamilton.

The poker community eventually uncovered the cheating. The Kahnawake Gaming Commission, which licensed UB, later fined the website $1.5 million and forced them to settle most affected victims.

Hamilton walked away unscathed. UB Poker eventually sold to Absolute Poker (discussed later) and became part of the Cereus Network.

2 ? Absolute Poker
Absolute Poker LogoIn 2003, a group of University of Montana fraternity brothers launched Absolute Poker. Scott Tom was at the forefront of the effort.

The site opened at the right time thanks to the poker boom. Absolute made big profits during its first couple of years of operation. But just like UB, Absolute Poker suffered an enormous superuser scandal. An in-office account named ?POTRIPPER? won at least $1.6 million from the site?s customers.

Once again, a poker community effort uncovered the cheating. Players noted the improbability that POTRIPPER would win at this type of higher rate and always make correct plays.

Absolute Poker finally admitted a ?high-ranking trusted consultant? created a superuser account. Also licensed by the KGC, these were forced to refund $1.6 million to affected players.

They later purchased UB Poker in 2008 and rebranded the operation because the Cereus Network. Supposedly, both sites were now being run by different management. The ploy worked as much players trusted and deposited at both Absolute and UB again. In actuality, Tom and his frat brothers were still behind the operation.

Black Friday forced the Cereus Network out from the US market. The site shut down in-may 2012 because of insolvency and failed to repay $50 million worth of customer funds.

The US Attorney?s Office in Southern New York, which served the Black Friday indictments, eventually made sure that most Cereus players were repaid.

For Tom, he received an indictment during Black Friday and fled to Antigua. He later settled with the united states Department of Justice for $300,000.

3 ? Full Tilt Poker (Under Old Management)
Launched in 2004, Full Tilt Poker grabbed players attention through the slogan: ?Learn, Chat, and Play with the professionals.?

Many casual players rushed to the website to railbird famed pros like Antonius, Jennifer Harman, Chris ?Jesus? Ferguson, Howard Lederer, Erick Lindgren, and Phil Ivy.

Apart from their large roster of pros, Full Tilt also had the very best software at that time. Their tables featured crisp graphics and many customizable features. This site also featured a corporate-style board. Ray Bitar, Ferguson, Lederer, and Rafe Furst made many of the decisions as board members.

Life was good for Full Tilt?s management before Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA) in 2006. This law forced Full Tilt and several other poker sites to stop using American banks and payment processors. They resorted to shady processors to work around the UIGEA.

Intabill, in particular, stole or lost millions of dollars in Full Tilt funds. David Tzvetkoff, Intabill?s founder, later turned state?s witness and helped US Attorneys prosecute Full Tilt during Black Friday.

The US Attorney?s Office in Southern New York indicted all board members. Bitar, Ferguson, Lederer, and Furst were accused of taking players? funds and paying themselves $444 million. The latter three settled with the US DoJ out of court. Bitar, who was simply facing serious prison time, avoided jail only because he needed a heart transplant.

PokerStars, that was also caught up in the Black Friday mess, made a deal with the US DoJ. They paid $731 million to get Full Tilt and prevent admitting any wrongdoing in violating the UIGEA. The $731 million fine helped repay many ex-Full Tilt players.

4 ? CardSpike
After opening in 2008, CardSpike was suffering from troubles from the beginning. Just months into operation, that they had trouble processing withdrawal requests. Another danger sign came if they quit paying affiliates. Not surprisingly, the site stopped paying players aswell.

The site shut down altogether in '09 2009, just one single year after launching. Management only repaid a little portion of customers. This operation featured red flags right from the start. Players began complaining that they couldn?t look for a parent company behind CardSpike.

The consensus became that Casino Affiliate Programs owned the website. After all, Casino Affiliate Programs moderators began deleting users and posts that bashed CardSpike.

5 ? Choice Poker
Choice Poker LogoChoice Poker seemingly opened at the proper amount of time in 2004. They entered the game when internet poker was booming.

However, Choice blew this opportunity and featured the most incompetent management groups in gaming history. They lasted just one single year and were notoriously slow on payouts.

Somehow, this same group thought that it was capable of owning a large US-friendly network with multiple skins. They weren?t. Some skins had the foresight to jump ship and join Doyle?s Room (now Americas Cardroom). Others went down with Choice Poker.

The network didn't repay players after it went down. Owners blamed payment processors for the losses. Luckily, Doyle?s Room purchased the company?s remaining assets and bailed out former Choice Poker players.

6 ? Everleaf Gaming
Everleaf Gaming LogoEverleaf Gaming opened in 2004 and had trouble competing in the crowded US market. They didn't grab players from giants like Full Tilt, Partypoker, PokerStars, and UB.

This struggling operation started a network and developed software for skins. Their new business model worked better, and they eventually began attracting players.

Everleaf became a more impressive name when they continued serving US players following Black Friday. However, they received a cease-and-desist letter from the American government in 2012. Everleaf responded by banning American players.

The network continued generating traffic because of their heavy Italian player base. They also created a loophole that required US players with an offshore bank account and e-wallet (e.g. Neteller) to obtain repaid.

Most Americans couldn?t fly to another country just to open a bank-account. So, they didn't get their money following the ban. Everleaf eventually ran out of funds and was forced to close down in 2013. Network executives Jean Pavili and Michael Zwi Oros were arrested in Malta for his or her role in misappropriating player funds rather than paying Maltese licensing fees.

7 ? Full Flush Poker
No relation to Full Tilt, Full Flush Poker was the flagship site of the Equity Poker Network. This operation, which ran from 2013 to 2016, included other notable skins like 5Dimes and Poker Host.

Full Flush/Equity began a unique policy of banning winning players. Their goal was to make sure that Full Flush and other skins were recreational-friendly.

They immediately caught bad press for crushing the complete dream of poker?to win profits. Both skins and players exited the network at rapid pace afterward.

Full Flush and Heritage Sports were the only real sites on the network by 2016. The former shut down and failed to repay players. Luckily, Heritage Sports did cover its customers? balances.

8 ? Lock Poker
Lock Poker jumped into the gaming industry in 2008. However, they didn?t gain much traction until after Black Friday.

Lock used the void left by Cereus, Full Tilt, and PokerStars to grab a large share folks players. The website aggressively marketed high rakeback deals to draw attention.

The Merge Gaming network gave Lock Poker the boot for violating their rakeback policies. Lock Poker jumped back again to the Cake Poker network, where they originally started.

In 2012, the initial complaints involving Lock?s slow payouts arose. Some players waited months to get their money at this time. The following year, Lock Poker failed to process cashouts at all. However, they continued advertising big rakeback deals and accepting new deposits.

The site finally turn off in the spring of 2015. They didn't repay an estimated $15 million to their players.

Insider forum posts later revealed that Lock Poker CEO Jen Larson spent an excessive amount of on marketing. She also lived an extravagant lifestyle that include luxury hotels, fine dining, and expensive wine bottles.

9 ? Pitbull Poker
Pitbull Poker LogoAfter launching in 2004, Pitbull Poker quickly became the poster child for terrible internet poker software. They offered a Flash-based product that frequently crashed in the center of hands and tournaments.

Like Absolute and UB, Pitbull also suffered a superuser scandal. Their scandal evaded almost all of the poker public, though, due to their smaller stature. Pitbull Poker used a $10 no-deposit bonus to attract some players. However, they still failed to draw any measurable quantity of traffic.

The majority of their tables were filled with prop players, or those who receive a salary to start out and keep cash games going.

Pitbull?s final act involved the owners taking computer equipment out of these Costa Rica-based office and leaving for good. Not surprisingly, the site shut down without repaying customer funds.

Real money online poker has unfortunately had too many scandalous sites in its past. The good thing, though, is that every failure discussed here is truly previously.

Full Flush Poker (Equity Network) may be the last notable failing poker site to exit without repaying players. They shut down in 2016.

Lock Poker is the last operation with significant traffic to stiff customers. They finally closed in 2015 after overspending on marketing and the CEO?s high lifestyle.

Most of the other failures came soon after Black Friday. Absolute Poker, Full Tilt, and UB were all casualties of this legal event, although they may have all failed regardless anyways.

Others folded because they were simply terrible sites from the beginning. Pitbull Poker, CardSpike, and Choice Poker were part of this crowd. The latter two operations only lasted a year before shutting down.

These likely won?t function as only poker sites to fail. But with regulated markets emerging, we won?t see too many future online poker scandals.It wouldn?t be an easy task to come up with a card game that resembles the game of life as much as poker. In both cases, one is definitely tempted to avoid responsibility for undesired events. And, in both cases, one?s success depends a lot on what much responsibility he/she is ready to take.

It doesn?t matter the way you choose to define the word success. Because, some way, you?ll still need to know how to deal with your defense mechanisms.

1 ? WHAT EXACTLY ARE Defense Mechanisms
Let?s talk a bit about Sigmund Freud.

As it?s popular, he made some remarkable contributions to the analysis of the unconscious more than 100 years ago. Needlessly to say, a lot of those contributions have been disputed. But, even if none of his theories could have stood the test of time, we?d still need to acknowledge his efforts.

Because he, a lot more than anyone else, made our inner struggles something of relevance to science. And something thing he knew quite a lot about was the length between reality and something?s ideal self-image. In the late 19th century, he wrote for the first time about what will be known as ?body's defence mechanism?.

According to psychologist Saul McLeod, ?body's defence mechanism are psychological strategies which are unconsciously used to safeguard an individual from anxiety due to unacceptable thoughts or feelings.?

Freud developed 10 of those strategies. Nowadays, most people who study them tend to agree that there are even more. Regardless, it seems that each individual tends to favor some mechanisms over others.

In this posting, I?ll discuss 6 of these. Not because they?re pretty much important compared to the rest. Since they seem to be more frequent at a poker table.

2 ? Repression
I chose to start with this one because, to Freud, repression was mom of all body's defence mechanism.

You?ve heard about the Oedipus complex, haven?t you?
The basis of that theory is that the son really wants to marry his mother. The problem is that there?s that other guy, who happens to be his father. If the boy could, he would kill his father. But he feels that he can?t. So, what can he do? He can do many things, once we?ll see.

But one of the first strategies utilized by him will be to repress his desires. (There?s also the Elektra complex, incidentally. That?s concerning the daughter attempting to marry her father.) In accordance with Freud, we've these inner conflicts on a regular basis in our daily lives.

How do we have the ability to get by, then?
Well, you may even have heard that Freud saw the brain as being divided between id, ego and super-ego. In accordance with him, that?s how exactly we?re in a position to function in society. The id is that part which feels the impulse towards the satisfaction of a desire. The super-ego considers the punishments which could arise from there. And the ego tries to get some balance between them both.

So, what makes a person repress his/her feelings? You?re right: a strong super-ego.

Now, bringing it all to the poker table, we can note that repression happens often. It?s hard for a player to possess a bad session rather than feel annoyed by that. And, to be able never to show that frustration, he/she will probably repress it. Such a player can do so for different reasons.

Maybe he doesn?t desire to show weakness to others. Maybe he doesn?t want to be impolite. (Usually, it?s a little of both.)

In any case, such a strategy tends to work better in the short run than over time. That leads poker players to resort to other body's defence mechanism.

3 ? Acting Out
Acting out is whenever a person gives him/herself permission to perform destructive behaviors. This is often done either to oneself or others. (Or, of course, both to oneself among others.)

Let?s take the id, ego and super-ego into account once more. Acting out is like throwing the super-ego out of your picture.

So, Why Is It Even Classified as a Defense Mechanism?
Because there?s still repression, but in a less obvious way. In accordance with Freud, what?s being repressed here is the memory of past troubles. Then, somebody who is unable to deal with the past may bring it to the present. Again and again.

At poker, this lack of reflectiveness tends to be disastrous. Players who are unable to keep their composure tend to not go too much. There are exceptions, of course. Especially in live poker tournaments. But even those exceptions would admit that acting out does more harm than best for their game.

4 ? Displacement
The term displacement isn?t so well-known, but it describes a standard occurrence. It begins whenever a person has an unpleasant feeling towards something or someone. But then, that person doesn?t confront that issue directly. Instead, he/she directs that strong feeling towards people or objects he/she sees as less threatening.

(If you?ve watched Analyze This, that?s the ?hit the pillow? scene):


Now, let?s bring this to poker.

Let?s suppose a player can?t accept how lousy he played a certain hand. He may know that he screwed things up. Instead of accepting this, however, he may hit the table. (Hopefully not with a gun.) Or he may even be impolite with the dealer. In any case, he?ll do not confront the real way to obtain his emotions.

5 ? Denial
The best thing about denial is that I don?t even have to explain what it means. It?s easy to see this in everyone but ourselves. But how often are we in total denial at poker?

The overall game is tricky because, even though you?ve had a series of losing sessions, it is possible to always blame them on the deck.

Needless to say, it?s hard to deny that you?re losing profits (although some people manage to do this).

But it?s easy to deny that this has already established too much to do with your performance.

In fact, denial is a big part of why is poker so appealing to so many people. When they lose, they are able to talk for hours about how unlucky they?ve been. If that?s what they want to do, fine. But if you want to take your game seriously, you must exceed this tendency. For a few, it takes a more impressive effort. Nonetheless it?s well worth it, for sure.

6 ? Rationalization
Rationalization is the type of defense mechanisms that want at least a certain degree of self-awareness. That?s when a person gives a somewhat reasonable excuse for something he/she hasn?t been able to deal with.

That excuse could be given both to oneself and others. An example of this can be a Aesop?s fable about the fox and the grapes. The fox tries to catch some grapes, but is unable to. After that, that fox rationalizes the whole thing saying that the grapes didn?t seem that good to begin with.

At poker, rationalization happens quite frequently. And not always after a loss.

For Example:
Sometimes a player can do the best play for the wrong reasons. He could have named an all-in bet thinking he was beat, relying on pot odds. But, his opponent may turn his/her cards up and show a bluff. That player, if he?s susceptible to rationalization, might say he knew everything along.

In the end, defense mechanisms are about vanity.

Rationalization just makes this clearer.

7 ? Projection
In our day-to-day lives, projection is a lot more common than most people give it credit for. It happens when you attribute your personal unpleasant tendencies to someone else. Obviously, it takes a certain lack of self-awareness for a person to use it often.

Still, That?s What LOTS OF PEOPLE Do Routinely
For example, they could say that someone is afraid in an effort to avoid facing their very own fear. It is possible to substitute fear for any other unpleasant tendency: anger, rudeness, egotism, etc.

In real cash poker, this may lead a player to show some paranoid tendencies. Maybe he/she is looking to bust a particular opponent from a tournament. Then, he/she may think that is that other person who?s out to get him/her. I guess we all feel the need to get some nemesis every once in awhile.

But, if we don?t pay enough attention to our projections, our biggest nemesis eventually ends up becoming ourselves. It sounds clich�, I know. But that?s the way it is. If you don't happen to be mostly of the who know how to use projection without burning yourself along the way.

But that?s another story.

It should be said that body's defence mechanism aren?t bad per see. In the event that you read once more that definition from Saul McLeod, you?ll see that they?re ?psychological strategies? which are ?unconsciously used?.

Some of those strategies are in fact considered mature ones, such as humor and sublimation. So, if we learn to be familiar with our most harmful body's defence mechanism, that?s already something to feel grateful for.

From there, more and more we?ll be able to grow into self-realized beings. Needless to say, a big portion of the challenge involves learning how exactly to leave the past behind.

But that?s what psychiatry is for, isn?t it?
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