What about the poker players?

Ah yes, I nearly forgot the most important people in all of this…

I’ve heard numerous “the sky is falling on our heads” comments since Saturday, and at first I confess I was tempted to join them. But looking at all of this now, I don’t see there’s much of a problem. For a while now, the bonuses offered to regular players have been getting less lucrative, smaller, or harder to earn. This could and should have been a sign that something was up in the market. And of course, the fact that the online poker market is so young, and has grown so quickly, should alert anyone thinking of going full-time to taking a lot of time and putting a lot of thought into that decision. For those of us who play regularly as a hobby and supplement to our regular income, the field has changed, but not horribly. There are still plenty of other sites to play at, and this might be the ideal time to investigate signing up at sites we haven’t had time for up until now.

The hardest immediate hit is to anyone currently playing full time on Empire or another Party skin. For these players, suddenly their bread and butter games have gone, and it’s not really for me to suggest what they should do. However, PokerStars can probably service their needs, or a combination of sites could service their needs. If they can find good rakeback offers away from Party, now looks like a great time to be exploring that avenue.

But all in all, this isn’t the end, or the beginning of the end. It’s maybe the end of the beginning (cliché alert!), and what happens next is anyone’s guess, but while online poker might have slowed, it is not yet in reverse. There are still good games to be found, but maybe now you have to do a bit more work and put in a bit more research to find them.

Further reading: PartyGaming move points to peak in online gambling Online poker deals punters a bad hand The growing allure of online poker PartyGaming move hits Empire stock PartyGaming press release, 8 October 2005 Empire Online buys Noble Poker

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Tags: Poker, Party Poker, Empire Poker