Anyone want to play poker?

May 22, 2005 1:42 AM

Anyone want to play poker? (mi, natch)
posted by ODiV to MetaFilter Gatherings at 1:42 AM (44 comments total)

I've been playing a bit of online poker recently, and I imagine I haven't been the only one. I think it'd be neat to have a friendly little Metafilter tournament. I know of a good site we could have it on as they have a fairly good tourny set-up.

A major barrier, however is that the minimum deposit there is $50! This means we'll have to find some sort of work around or we can have a free tournament (basically on donations... I'd donate).

If enough of you are interested and this is fine by no. 1 I can start working towards setting this up.
posted by ODiV at 1:43 AM on May 22, 2005

I'm in if it can be worked out.
posted by HSWilson at 3:04 AM on May 22, 2005

Are we claiming that there's no FREE card-playing engine online? I find that unlikely (though I must admit, I don't know of one). Maybe an AskMe question would help.
posted by grumblebee at 6:58 AM on May 22, 2005

I'd be up for it...
posted by still at 10:25 AM on May 22, 2005

Sounds cool. I'm rubbish at poker, but the intarwebs gives me a heck of a poker face.
posted by veedubya at 10:47 AM on May 22, 2005

I'm game as long as it's for some amount of money, anything over $0.

If you want to have it at stars, I have the ability to run private tourneys there (though not free ones... I think the smallest available buy-in is $10+1) Stars also supports player to player transfers of arbitrarily small amounts, so myself or another regular online player could trade $11 on stars for $11 on paypal or whatever.
posted by mosch at 10:50 AM on May 22, 2005

btw: my reason for wanting money involved is that people try harder if they've invested even a trivial bit of cash... and it's not fun when people aren't trying.
posted by mosch at 10:56 AM on May 22, 2005

I would be interested in a poker tourney.
posted by philcliff at 11:07 AM on May 22, 2005

I can set-up one table tourneys at Absolute Poker... minimum buy-in is $1.10

Absolute has a number of ways to deposit... most of them are a minnimum of $25. Here is a link to Absolute's banking page...

http://www.absolutepoker.com/realMoneyBanking.asp

(On Preview the link didn't come out... so I removed the html)
posted by Duncan at 12:02 PM on May 22, 2005

I'm in, but I agree with mosch that there would have to be some money involved so players take it seriously.
posted by Penks at 3:32 PM on May 22, 2005

Yahoo is still free right? You could set up private invite-only rooms.
posted by Saucy Intruder at 3:36 PM on May 22, 2005

oh, BRING IT. let's do it.
posted by RJ Reynolds at 4:14 PM on May 22, 2005

I'm in.
posted by hootch at 6:06 PM on May 22, 2005

I'd be more comfortable with money being transferred by paypal and the honor system than through an online poker consortium.
posted by Saucy Intruder at 6:19 PM on May 22, 2005

I'm all in.
posted by SeizeTheDay at 6:37 PM on May 22, 2005

The site I was thinking of is Full Tilt Poker. A $5 + $.50 sounds about the right level. (For those new to tournaments, each person would pay $5.50. $5 would go to the prize pool and 50 cents to the host site).

I haven't looked into absolute poker or poker stars though $10 + $1 seems a little steep.

We're still stuck with the problem of getting money onto it. Most credit cards, while listed as supported by the site, will outright deny any transaction from them. Also, there are those pesky minimums.

Also, the problem with paypal is that they don't like to be associated with gambling and will shut down your account if you transfer at all with them. Other sites have fuzzily gotten around this by not talking about poker in the transaction comments and keeping their mouths shut otherwise.

If anyone has any particular insights into this, I can be reached at [e-mail]. Maybe we can set up some sort of work around. I'd still like to hear something from Matt as well before we go ahead, because it's entirely possible he wouldn't approve.
posted by ODiV at 7:15 PM on May 22, 2005

PokerRoom.com is Mac compatible.
posted by SeizeTheDay at 7:39 PM on May 22, 2005

If we can get a work around for the money issue I'm in. Unfortunately, I can't give money directly TO a site since I have family in federal law enforcement and hey what do ya know, online poker is technically illegal in my jurisdication. But a "gift" to someone via paypal and they put up money for me too? Perfectly legal! And I am happy to contribute whatever the buy in is to get in.
posted by karmaville at 7:42 PM on May 22, 2005

Check.
posted by thatweirdguy2 at 8:54 PM on May 22, 2005

I'd be in too, if someone's taking names. I think there should also be some sort of trophy involved.
posted by loquax at 9:55 PM on May 22, 2005

Count me in on this one as well.
posted by lloyder at 3:38 AM on May 23, 2005

Great, now there's poker spam on MetaFilter?
posted by monju_bosatsu at 7:20 AM on May 23, 2005

Yeah, so long as a Mac can play.
posted by klangklangston at 7:52 AM on May 23, 2005

I'm interested.
posted by cortex at 9:15 AM on May 23, 2005

I'm interested. When?
posted by papercake at 10:05 AM on May 23, 2005

I'm in!
I just added this page to the wiki so we can keep track of all the details when this thread scrolls off the front page.
posted by fjom at 11:34 AM on May 23, 2005

Any of these sites let you play if you run Linux? (all in-browser, java client or some such?)
posted by kenko at 12:23 PM on May 23, 2005

count me as interested.
posted by jmackin at 1:23 PM on May 23, 2005

I would love to give my money - real or illusory - to someone else. Hell, yes, I'm in!
posted by absalom at 2:08 PM on May 23, 2005

My other nickname is Big Slick.
posted by mudpuppie at 10:00 PM on May 23, 2005

That wiki page is a great idea fjom, thanks! I suggest that everyone add their availability next to their names so that we can find a time to play.

If you'd rather not add it to the wiki, just post it here and I'm sure someone will tack it on for you.

As for cross-platform compatibility, these programs aren't too heavy on the requirements, so are usable under emulation. If anyone on a Mac has Virtual PC it would give us a lot more options as to picking a site. I'm not too familliar with Linux, but there's some sort of windows emulation for that too, isn't there?

Starting today I will have more time to devote to this. I'll be looking into the thread several times a day and I'll start taking a look at the different sites. Hopefully we can find one which will meet our needs.

As far as transfers go, I might be able to handle a few, but not too many. Could we maybe also put a note next to our name if we are in need of or can provide a transfer?
posted by ODiV at 4:25 AM on May 24, 2005

I'm definitely in...however I'm on dial-up. Does this eliminate me from playing?
posted by vito90 at 11:24 AM on May 24, 2005

Dial-up is fine as long as you can maintain a connection. Connection speed is not an issue that would slow us down.
posted by Duncan at 12:43 PM on May 24, 2005

I can play just about any time
posted by HSWilson at 9:45 PM on May 24, 2005

Okay. I think I'll just declare a site and time and then if anyone has any major problems with it, we can work from there.

It will be a $5 + $.50 at Full Tilt on Saturday, June 4th at 9pm EST.

I think this covers (or is close to covering) everyone. This should give people some time to get used to the software (or even hold em tournaments in general). I know for a fact Full Tilt runs well on Virtual PC. If it's slow, try turning off animation.

If you want to transfer funds in via Neteller, but don't want to spoil a possible first deposit bonus for the site, email me at [e-mail] and I should be able to transfer you the money for the tournament.

If you would prefer to transfer from another source, email me and we can work it out. mosch has also volunteered to transfer to other players.

Please put your address in full tilt when you are signing up. Otherwise, you will not be able to accept transfers.

Sound good, everyone? I'll add this all to the wiki page when I have a moment.
posted by ODiV at 4:09 AM on May 26, 2005

ODiV: Have you verified that it's possible to do a player to player transfer on FTP, if the other player has never played real money? It's not entirely clear if that's allowed or not from the cashier warning page.
posted by mosch at 10:45 PM on May 26, 2005

mosch: I'm certain that you can. Another group that I'm a member of have tournaments like this and they do transfers as well. We can test it out though in the next couple of days, if you'd like.
posted by ODiV at 2:14 PM on May 28, 2005

ODiV: is this thing go? Right now I don't see the tournament listed at the specified time or anything, and I don't want to make the official 'signup and start transferring money' post until we actually know that it's a go.... and it's already really last minute....
posted by mosch at 4:25 PM on May 31, 2005

mosch: Yeah, I wasn't sure when the optimal time to make that post would be... I thought maybe I'd have a reminder thread on Thursday? I didn't want to have more than one more thread, just to avoid annoying people.

About it being last minute, does that not give us enough time to transfer? I can handle up to five people and all transfers should happen within minutes.

Apologies for the slacking of the set up. I'll take care of that when I'm home tonight.

I'll post again when it's up.
posted by ODiV at 5:14 PM on May 31, 2005

I'm just having a back-and-forth with the Full Tilt team about setting the tournament up so that the rake all comes from my account. It'd be much cooler if we only had to pay $5 each. If that's not possible, I might just throw an extra $20 into the prize pool.
posted by ODiV at 6:04 AM on June 1, 2005

The tournament is now set up and should be easy to find. It's just a normal $5 + $.50 as I couldn't get them to deduct the tournament fees from my account or add an extra amount to the pot.

The password for the tournament is the word before "at" in the email address in my profile.

My icq# is 5159963, my MSN is saforum at odiv dot net, and you can email me about this tournament @odiv.net as well. I can transfer $5.50 for buy-ins to ten people.

(I haven't double checked the tournament as I'm at work and can't access full tilt)

SATURDAY JULY 4th, 21:00 EST.

When should we make a reminder + sign up for full tilt + hey transfer your money thread?
posted by ODiV at 12:58 PM on June 1, 2005

Just got home and verified that the tournament is set up. It can be found in the "Private" section and the number is 756160.

Remember to fill in your address so you can accept transfers.
posted by ODiV at 5:25 PM on June 1, 2005

odiv: sounds great... i'd say we make the new thread ASAP.
posted by mosch at 11:20 PM on June 1, 2005

New thread is up, in case anyone missed it.
posted by ODiV at 9:52 AM on June 2, 2005