Casino Buzz

The world famous video game and film adventure property Tomb Raider™ makes an exciting debut in online gambling this week, elevating the concept to a highly entertaining video slot with features aplenty.

The unique and instantly recognizable Lara Croft and Tomb Raider™ have been licensed by Microgaming and skillfully crafted into a brand new 5 reel, 15 payline, multiple coin video slot, with a Wild and Scatter Symbol, Bonus Feature and Free Spins. Tomb Raider™ is the first Microgaming video slot where the player can win entry into the Bonus Feature from the Free Spins.

Players can bet up to 5 coins on each of the 15 paylines, taking the maximum wager per spin to 75 coins in a range of denominations from a cent right through to a dollar.

The razor sharp, richly coloured graphics carry an adventurous lost treasure theme full of mysterious golden idols, magnificent tigers, the familiar Tomb Raider™ logos and of course the inimitable Lara Croft™ herself. With the right combinations, a wide variety of entertaining bonuses, scatters, free spins and wild symbol rewards are possible, most contributing to the end payline.

With a maximum bet, winnings of up to $37 500 are achievable, and with the free spin x3 multiplier feature that reward can soar to $112 500.

Just one of the features of the game is a hidden underground tomb containing 12 gift-bearing idols. When 3, 4 or 5 golden bonus idols appear on the active payline, it triggers this Tomb Bonus where rewards are added to payline wins. This can be triggered during Free Spins too, and the player can choose 3, 4 or 5 of the golden treasure idols.

This ingenious and highly entertaining adaptation of the world famous Tomb Raider™ brand is sure to take the online gambling community by storm and keep players coming back for more.

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Championship Poker Tournament - Poker is the hottest game going and the Peppermill’s smoke-free Poker Room is playing host to some the game’s top players this November 13-21 for the prestigious Peppermill Reno Fall Poker Tournament, which has a total prize pool of over $350,000.

(PRWE October 28, 2004 -- A field of 1,500 players is expected to take part in the eight days of heated poker action that will include Limit Hold’em, No Limit Texas Hold ‘em and Omaha Hi-Low Split.

Each day will feature two new tournaments, one at noon the other 7 pm, and there will be an 8 am Satellite tournament every day for players wishing to win their way into the afternoon tourneys.

The action begins on Saturday, Nov. 13th with a warm up Satellite Day tournament with a $60 buy-in followed by the First Chance tourney with a $220 buy-in and no re-buys.

The serious competition begins with No Limit Hold ‘em on Sunday, November 14th at noon. There is a $225 buy in with a $200 re-buy.

Here is the daily schedule:
•Saturday, Nov. 13 – “Satellite Day”
10am: $60 buy-in, Limit and No Limit Hold ‘em satellites
•Sunday, Nov. 14 – Noon: No Limit Hold ‘em $225 buy-in, $200 rebuy, 7pm: Limit Hold ‘em, $120 buy-in
•Monday, Nov. 15 – Noon: Limit Hold ’em, $225 buy-in, $200 re-buy
7pm: No Limit Hold ‘em, $120 buy-in
•Tuesday, Nov. 16 – Noon: No Limit Hold ’em, $220 buy-in,
no re-buy
7pm: Omaha Hi/Lo Split, $120 buy-in
•Wednesday, Nov. 17 – Noon: Omaha Hi/Lo Split, $120 buy-in, $100 re-buy
7pm: No Limit Hold ‘em, $120 buy-in
•Thursday, Nov. 18 – “Terminator Event”
Noon: No limit hold’em, $120 buy-in, $100 re-buy
7pm: Limit Hold ‘em, $120 buy-in
•Friday, Nov. 19 – Noon: Limit hold’em, $120 buy-in, $100 re-buy
7pm: No Limit Hold ‘em, $120 buy-in
•Saturday, Nov. 20 – “Championship Event”
Noon: Limit Hold ’em $535 buy-in, no re-buy
7pm: No Limit Hold ‘em $120 buy-in
•Sunday, Nov. 21- “Championship Event”
Noon: No Limit Hold ‘em $535 buy-in

Tournament players will enjoy playing in our smoke-free environment; there is also food service available, and there are several plasma screen televisions throughout the room.

Special room rates are available for tournament players, based on availability.

For further information please call 800-648-6992 or 689-7275.

King Solomon’s Online Casino, one of the Internet’s most respected online casinos has spoken out on their view of the UK’s relaxation of gambling laws and the recent statement by Cultural Secretary Tessa Jowell.

(PRWeb) October 27, 2004 -- King Solomon’s Online Casino, one of the Internet’s most respected online casinos has spoken out on their view of the UK’s relaxation of gambling laws and the recent statement by Cultural Secretary Tessa Jowell.

“Online casinos are of course pleased with the plans of the UK government to relax UK gambling laws” says Shelley Shayler, marketing manager for King Solomon’s Online Casino. “It is now however, the duty of online casinos to act in the interests of the public and promote responsible gaming. This, in the knowledge that the revisions in the laws will likely drive even more gamblers online as casino games become more popular, and the laws make it easier for legitimate and trustworthy online casinos like King Solomon’s to operate”.

“King Solomon’s online casino has been at the forefront of responsible gambling for 6 years now and we intend to show our gratitude for the predicted rise in casino game popularity by continuing to lead the way and pushing for all online casinos to adhere to the same code of conduct”.

King Solomon’s also believes that Ms Jowell’s plans to limit the number of new casinos and introduce big jackpot slot machines while limiting the slot machine licenses of non-casino premises are a positive move. “We do not wish there to be a gambling epidemic in the UK or the immergence of unsavoury casinos that will ultimately damage the reputation of the casino industry. Responsible members wishing to play on slot machines without travelling to a regional casino can still do so at an online casino where we have 6 years of experience managing slot machine jackpots of up to £3,000,000”.

Visit KING SOLOMONS

TWO of the world’s biggest internet gambling companies are considering initial public offerings (IPOs) in London, the larger of which could go straight into the blue-chip FTSE 100 index.

Both companies — iGlobalMedia and Cassava Enterprises — are based in the same building in Gibraltar, but there is no connection between them. They have, however, previously held informal merger talks.

IGlobalMedia, which is best known for its PartyPoker website, is controlled by a small number of private shareholders, including Ruth Parasol, its head of international business development. The company is estimated to achieve earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (Ebitda) of about $350 million (£190 million).

Given the company’s rapid rate of growth, it should be able to command a valutaion of well over £2 billion in an IPO, giving it automatic entry to the FTSE 100. The appointment during the summer of Richard Segal, the former Odeon Cinemas boss, as chief executive has heightened speculation of an IPO.

Vikrant Bhargava, iGlobalMedia’s director of marketing, said: “We’re always talking to various people about various things, but we haven’t appointed any advisers. But if we were to float in London there is a good chance that we would be a FTSE (100) company.”

Cassava, whose 888.com website sponsors Middlesbrough football club, is headed by John Anderson, who also runs Burford, the property firm. The company, which has Ebitda of between $80 million and $100 million, is controlled by two pairs of Israeli brothers. The majority shareholders are the Shaked brothers.

Mr Anderson last night said: “We are looking at our options, but we haven’t appointed advisers.

“Nothing’s firm at all, although (an IPO) is something we’re considering. If we do it, it would take six to nine months.”

Analysts said that a London listing would add to the credibility of such companies, helping them to attract new punters. Andrew Burnett, gaming analyst for Numis Securities, said: “The industry is still growing at a fantastic rate.”

The biggest existing quoted operator is Sportingbet, which is close to acquiring Paradisepoker.com, for about £170 million.

LAS VEGAS, Oct. 25 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- For 35 years, the World
Series of Poker has been an all-Las Vegas affair. But in 2005, the road to
poker's ultimate championship begins in Atlantic City.

From January 7-18, 2005, Harrah's Atlantic City will host the premiere
event of the 2005 World Series of Poker Tournament Circuit, a series of five
poker tournaments hosted by Harrah's Entertainment, Inc. (NYSE: HET). The
tournaments will precede the 36th Annual World Series of Poker at the Rio
All-Suite Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas.
"In 2005, the World Series of Poker begins its evolution from a month-long
special event into a year-round sport," said Ginny Shanks, senior vice
president of acquisition marketing for Harrah's. "The road to the World
Series of Poker Championship will be a challenging and arduous one. But
unlike professional football, basketball, golf or auto racing, even the
greenest of amateurs can mount a challenge for the title."
Players will earn points based on their performance in the circuit
tournaments and the World Series of Poker. The top 100 point-earners will
receive a free invitation to the 2005 World Series of Poker Tournament of
Champions, where a single winner will take home a top prize of $2 million.
Following the January tournament in Atlantic City, the Tournament Circuit
will make stops at Harrah's Rincon near San Diego (February 20-March 1), the
Rio (March 12-22), Harveys Lake Tahoe (April 26-May 10) and Harrah's New
Orleans (May 21-30). Each of the events will be taped and aired on ESPN.
The 36th Annual World Series of Poker is scheduled to begin June 2, and
will run through July 15. An estimated 5,000 players are expected to
participate in the $10,000 buy-in, no-limit Texas hold 'em Championship,
double the number that competed in 2004.
To accommodate the large expected field of participants, most of the 2005
World Series of Poker will be held at the Rio, though the final two days of
the championship tournament will be held at Binion's Horseshoe in downtown Las
Vegas. The 2005 Tournament of Champions will take place soon after the
conclusion of the World Series of Poker Championship event, and will be held
at the Rio.
For additional information, call 1-877-367-9767, or visit
http://www.worldseriesofpoker.com.

Various subsidiaries of Harrah's Entertainment, Inc. own or manage
28 casinos in the United States, primarily under the Harrah's and Horseshoe
brand names. Founded 66 years ago, Harrah's Entertainment is focused on
building loyalty and value with its valued customers through a unique
combination of great service, excellent products, unsurpassed distribution,
operational excellence and technology leadership.
Additional information about Harrah's Entertainment is available at
http://www.harrahs.com.

2005 World Series of Poker Schedule of Events

Date Event # Tournament Buy-In

June 2, Thursday 1 Casino Employee No-limit Hold'em $500

June 3, Friday 2 No-limit Hold'em $1,500

June 4, Saturday 3 Pot-limit Hold'em $1,500

June 5, Sunday 4 Limit Hold'em $1,500

June 6, Monday 5 Omaha Hi-low Split $1,500

June 7, Tuesday 6 Short Handed (6/table)
No-limit Hold'em $2,500

June 8, Wednesday 7 No-limit Hold'em w/rebuys $1,000

June 9, Thursday 8 Seven Card Stud $1,500

June 10, Friday 9 No-limit Hold'em $2,000

June 11, Saturday 10 Limit Hold'em $2,000

June 12, Sunday 11 Pot-limit Hold'em $2,000

June 13, Monday 12 Pot-limit Omaha w/re-buys $2,000

June 14, Tuesday 13 No-limit Hold'em $5,000

June 15, Wednesday 14 Seven Card Stud Hi-low Split $1,000

June 16, Thursday 15 Limit Hold'em Shootout $1,500

June 17, Friday 16 No-limit Hold'em Shootout $1,500

June 18, Saturday 17 Limit Hold'em $2,500

June 19, Sunday 18 Seven Card Stud Hi-low Split $2,000

June 19, Sunday 19 Pot Limit Omaha $1,500

June 20, Monday 20 Pot-limit Hold'em $5,000

June 21, Tuesday 21 Omaha Hi-low Split $2,500

June 22, Wednesday 22 No-limit Hold'em $1,500

June 23, Thursday 23 Seven Card Stud $5,000

June 24, Friday 24 No-Limit Hold'em $2,500

June 25, Saturday 25 Pot-limit Hold'em $2,500

June 26, Sunday 26 Ladies No-limit Hold'em $1,000

June 26, Sunday 27 Pot-limit Omaha w/re-buys $5,000

June 27, Monday 28 Limit Hold'em $5,000

June 28, Tuesday 29 No-limit Hold'em $2,000

June 29, Wednesday 30 Seven Card Razz $1,500

June 29, Wednesday 31 Short handed (6/table)
No-limit Hold'em $5,000

June 30, Thursday 32 Omaha hi-low split $5,000

July 1, Friday 33 No-limit Hold'em $3,000

July 2, Saturday 34 Seniors No-Limit Hold'em $1,000

July 2, Saturday 35 Pot-limit Omaha $10,000

July 3, Sunday 36 Limit Hold'em $3,000

July 4, Monday 37 No-limit Hold'em w/re-buys $1,000

July 5, Tuesday 38 Super satellite day
(10a.m./3p.m./8p.m.) $1,000

July 5, Tuesday 39 No-limit 2 to 7 Draw
Lowball w/re-buys $5,000

July 6, Wednesday 40 Super satellite day
(9a.m./2p.m./9p.m.)

July 6, Wednesday 41 Media/Celebrity Charity Event

No Limit Texas Hold'em World Championship:

Date Event # Tournament Buy-In

July 7, Thursday 42 Day 1A, First 1,000 - 2,200
play to 500-650 $10,000

July 8, Friday Day 1B, Second 1,000 - 2,200
play to 500-650

July 9, Saturday Day 1C, Third 1,000 - 2,200
play to 500-650

July 10, Sunday Day 2, Play down to 500-1,000

July 11, Monday Day 3, Play down to 200-400

July 11, Monday 43 No-limit Hold'em 1-day event $1,500

July 12, Tuesday Day 4, Play down to 100-150

July 12, Tuesday 44 No-limit Hold'em 1-day event $1,000

July 13, Wednesday Day 5, Play down to 27

July 13, Wednesday 45 No-limit Hold'em 1-day event $1,000

July 14, Thursday Day 6, Play down to 9
(Binion's Horseshoe)

July 15, Friday Day 7, Final table
(Binion's Horseshoe)

Poker might well be the new bingo among the young fund-raising set.

Ever since it hit the airwaves on the Travel Channel's ``World Poker Tour'' in 2002, the riverboat-era game has attracted legions of followers, from teenagers to grandpas.

``World Poker Tour'' CEO Steve Lipscomb puts the number of regular players at a whopping ``50 to 80 million'' - between home, online and casino games. Last week in Massachusetts alone, 100 home games were listed on Homepokergames.com, a site connecting players with local games. And nearby Foxwoods Resort Casino, in Mashantucket, Conn., reports a poker-revenue leap of 60 percent over last year, with ``almost half the table under 30 (years old),'' according to poker-operations director Kathy Raymond.

But now there's a new twist to the trend: Charity poker tournaments, run by 20- and 30-somethings, champion everything from high school track teams to religious groups to foundations for diabetes and multiple sclerosis.

``My dad does a lot of charity work, and I see that it's very fulfilling for him,'' said Dracut's Craig Chemaly, 25, a legislative assistant who plays Texas Hold 'Em five times a week, mostly online. ``I wondered: How can I combine that (feeling) on a constant basis with something that I love?''

The answer was simple: Start a company that plans and runs charity poker tournaments.

Chemaly, who hopes someday to earn his living from the concept, could handle the business side. But he needed a seasoned pro to host the games. So through the Internet newsgroup rec.gambling.poker, he contacted Roslindale's Ashley Adams, author of the 2003 book ``Winning 7-Card Stud.'' Adams is the ``poker guru of Boston,'' according to a north-of-Boston player named Justin, 30, who's been running a home game for five-plus years and rakes in just more than $10 an hour on average when he visits Foxwoods.

Chemaly and Adams' month-old business, called Raise It Up, already has four clients, including the Ayer Rotary Club, which plans a $75 buy-in event for 144 people next month to benefit the Loaves & Fishes food pantry, according to ex-Rotary Club president Christopher Lilly, 38. That and other calls came after Adams served as emcee at a tournament that raised $17,000 to benefit a Connecticut chapter of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.

``I'm not playing, but I'm winning,'' said Jason Daloia, 32, of Stamford, Conn., a ``huge fan of poker'' who organized the MS event.

``If people who play poker on a regular basis gave even one-tenth of 1 percent of what they wager - a tithe of a tithe of a tithe - that would be at least $10 million a year,'' said Adams, 47, who's raised as much as $3,000 at poker soirees at his West Roxbury temple, Hillel B'nai Torah. ``It would be good for the game and good for the world.''

Watertown's Michael Zildjian, 30, would agree. Zildjian, like many poker converts, is an avid watcher of ESPN's ``World Series of Poker'' and Bravo's ``Celebrity Poker Showdown'' as well as Lipscomb's ``World Poker Tour.'' He plays a few times a month with friends, at casinos and often online to hone his skills - mostly at partypoker.com and pokerstars.com.

With his brother-in-law, Zildjian recently launched the Waltham-based poker-apparel business GMY Co. The partners are trying to persuade the cultural center connected to their church, St. Stephen's Armenian Apostolic in Watertown, to hold regular Texas Hold 'Em charity tournaments, with a portion of the entrance fees going directly to the facility. GMY would sell its T-shirts and hats at the games and donate a portion of sales to the center.

``Today Poker is the hottest emerging sport in the country,'' Lipscomb said. ``The people standing around the rail watching the event (used to be) that no-spring-chicken crowd. Now it's the hippest, coolest crowd you can possibly imagine: male and female - gorgeous.''

NASHUA He was sitting quietly among the other poker players, but the glasses gave away Greg "The Fossilman" Raymer.
The 2004 World Series of Poker champion was unmistakable at the Elks Lodge on Friday night in those google-eyed, hypno-swirl goggles seen on repeat showings of the tournament on ESPN.

The victory left the former patent attorney from Connecticut about $5 million richer and famous, but not as much fame as some would suspect.

"When people do recognize me, it's amazing how often they ask, 'Where are the glasses?'" he said between sessions. "I mean, do they really think I'm going to wear the glasses to Stop & Shop?"

Raymer said his luck had everthing to do with his win, in a field of 2,575 players. "I'm an above-average player, but by no means do I consider myself the best player in the world," he said. "Let's say we could go back in time with that same field of nearly 2,600 players and replay that same World Series tournament a million times. I would probably only win one time out of a thousand."

He bought his wife a new BMW X-5 with the winnings, and splurged on a fairly expensive looking watch at a poker tournament on the Champs-Elyses, "a whole $80, U.S."

Luck also played a role in Raymer's appearance in Nashua. One of Raymer's backers and good friends, Michael Damphousse, plays in tournaments at the club regularly. Raymer had a paid appearance in the area, so Damphousse suggested the champion sit down in Nashua.

Most amateurs would be impressed. But Mike Breault, owner of Shooters Sports Bar in Billerica played in the World Series last year, winning free entry, room and board in an online tournament.

"They put me on (an ESPN) TV table the first day," said Breault, "which was nerve-racking. I'd only really been playing poker for six months at that time. I made it into the third day of the tournament, made a bluff, and got caught. I placed 95th. Hopefully I'll be back."

The game played this night, and on television, is Texas Hold'em. Each player receives two cards. Then the dealer turns up five cards, three, then one, then one, which all players may use to make the best five-card hand. Betting requires a mix of skill and bravado.

The field dwindled as players succumbed to poor skill or bad breaks. Finally, it was down to 10 players, Raymer and nine non-professionals. Raymer's stack of chips looked no bigger than anyone else's.

The last player standing in Nashua would win $5,000, or a trip to Las Vegas. Joe Ross of Nashua, owner of tournament organizer New England FUNdraising, then sweetened the pot: There was "a bounty" on Raymer's head. The player than knocked him out also would win a free trip to Vegas.

Within seconds, Raymer pushed all of his chips to the middle of the table, daring someone to challenge him.

Devin Cordeiro, 36, of Dracut, flipped both of his cards face-up on the table. They were queens, the third-strongest starting hand.

Cordeiro leaped to his feet, saying, "I'm goin' to Vegas, baby! I'm goin' to Vegas!"

Raymer had a pair of nines, strong but not strong enough.

The three-card flop produced another queen, and even a miracle couldn't save the poker king from defeat.

Raymer collected his things and moved to another table to sign autographs. Cordeiro sat down again quickly, and waited for the next hand to be dealt. There was still $5,000 to be won.

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Eddie Cibrian and Chris Bauer have been tapped as the first actors to join the ensemble cast of ESPN's upcoming drama series "Tilt," which centers on the fictitious World Poker Championships in Las Vegas.

Cibrian will play a gritty, hot-shot poker player out for revenge, while Bauer will portray a Midwestern sheriff trying to bring his brother's killer to justice. The show premieres Jan. 13.

Cibrian's TV credits include five seasons on NBC's "Third Watch." Bauer starred in the HBO movie "61*" and has appeared on "Third Watch" and HBO's "The Wire."

Yevgeny Kafelnikov, former No 1 tennis player in the world, had his first major win at his new game of choice — poker — at the Russian Open in Moscow last week, The Independent writes.

His prize for outlasting a field of 52 in the $300 Omaha hi-lo competition was just over $10,000.

The winnings are not much compared to the fortune he has earned as one of the world’s top tennis players over the last decade, but he reacted as though he had won Wimbledon, the British newspaper writes.

The Independent goes on to explain how Kafelnikov got interested in poker. He apparently began having a flutter on the roulette tables when there was a casino near one of the tennis tournaments he happened to be taking part in.

Then he saw poker being played and, being a sensible kind of guy, the paper says, he realized there was more to the game than pure luck.

First he tried his hand at seven-card-stud in German casinos, then learned hold’em and Omaha.

Now, however, his preferred game is the more complex Omaha hi-lo, a form of poker that is popular with many professionals as there is a lot of “dead money” in the game: “dead money” being poker-speak for players with plenty of cash who are very unlikely to win.

LAS VEGAS, Oct 20, 2004 (BUSINESS WIRE) --
In a show of respect for all-time poker great Doyle Brunson, hundreds of players made an appointment with the WORLD POKER TOUR(TM) and its new tournament honoring the man who memorialized the 10-2 poker hand. The inaugural event started Tuesday at Bellagio, Las Vegas. One of the most venerable names in poker, Brunson captured his first of nine World Champion bracelets in 1976 and his first WORLD POKER TOUR win less than two months ago. The Doyle Brunson North American Poker Championship attracted 312 players, driving the total prize pool to $3,026,400 on the sixth stop of the acclaimed WORLD POKER TOUR. The WORLD POKER TOUR is the highest rated series in the history of the Travel Channel, airing Wednesday nights at 9 p.m. ET/PT.

The winner of this year's $10,000 buy-in event will take home $1 million and join Brunson at the WPT Championship when the Tour returns to Bellagio in April 2005. The WORLD POKER TOUR continues to average a "poker millionaire a month" in its 16-tournament season and in Season Three the total prize money has already reached $18,220,970, a $6,613,240 increase over Season Two stops to date. The high stakes action is attracting increasing numbers of players vying for the prize money and fans eager to witness the minting of a millionaire at the WPT Final Table. Projected to reach a total of $70 million, Season Three's prize pool is rising with every stop on the tour.

The public is invited to be part of the WPT Final Table television audience, when the Doyle Brunson North American Poker Championship concludes on Friday, October 22nd. Admission is free and seating for the filming begins at 6:30 pm in the Bellagio Sports Book. Fans are already turning out in record numbers to watch the tournament that has attracted amateur and professional players alike. Some of the most recognizable faces playing at Tuesday's tables included Gus Hansen, Phil Laak, Phil Ivey, Howard Lederer, Annie Duke, Antonio Esfandiari, Daniel Negreanu, and the star of his namesake tournament -- Doyle Brunson.

The seventh stop of the WORLD POKER TOUR'S 16-tournament season is the World Poker Finals from November 13-17 at Foxwoods Resort Casino in CT, where the PROFESSIONAL POKER TOUR(TM) (PPT) will also debut. For complete WPT and PPT tournament schedules and casino contacts, please visit www.worldpokertour.com.

ABOUT WPT ENTERPRISES, INC.

WPT Enterprises, Inc. (Nasdaq:WPTE) is a media and entertainment company engaged in the creation of branded entertainment through the development, production and marketing of televised programming based on poker and other gaming themes. To date, operations have principally revolved around the creation of the World Poker Tour brand through the production and licensing of a reality television series exhibited on the Travel Channel that is based on a circuit of previously-established high-stakes poker tournaments that has been affiliated under the "World Poker Tour" brand. WPT Enterprises, Inc. is a majority owned subsidiary of Lakes Entertainment, Inc. (Nasdaq:LACO).

The Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 provides a "safe harbor" for forward-looking statements. Certain information included in this press release (as well as information included in oral statements or other written statements made or to be made by WPT Enterprises, Inc.) contains statements that are forward-looking, such as statements relating to the expansion of WPT's brand licensing, the development of new television and film projects, the development of WPT corporate sponsors and other business development activities, as well as statements regarding other capital spending, financing sources and the effects of competition. Such forward-looking information involves important risks and uncertainties that could significantly affect anticipated results in the future and, accordingly, such results may differ from those expressed in any forward-looking statements made by or on behalf of WPT. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, WPT's significant dependence on the Travel Channel as a source of revenue; the potential that our television programming will fail to maintain a sufficient audience; the risk that competitors with greater financial resources or marketplace presence might develop television programming that would directly compete with WPT's television programming; the risk that WPT may not be able to protect its entertainment concepts, current and future brands and other intellectual property rights; risks associated with future expansion into new or complementary businesses; the termination or impairment of WPT's relationships with key licensing and strategic partners; and WPT's dependence on its senior management team. For more information, review WPT's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

HONG KONG, Oct 20 (Reuters) - Forget the toys with bells, whistles and flashing lights this Christmas.

Traditional games and hobbies are set to make a comeback with yo-yo's and poker chips expected to be in large supply on Santa's sleigh thanks to the influence of television and lean economic times.

"There's definitely a shift toward more traditional toys," said Kenneth Levinsohn, a U.S. toy retailer on the sidelines of a Hong Kong gifts and toy fair on Wednesday.

Poker chips and dart boards were hot favourites among buyers visiting hundreds of booths displaying toys ranging from dolls to plastic at the fair. The show is the largest of its kind in Asia, with over 4,500 exhibitors wooing buyers from around the globe.

Christmas-related buying tends to take place earlier in the year, but retailers are on the lookout for last minute buys and new hot items mostly manufactured in Asia.

Large exhibits of flashing toys and battery operated dolls were largely absent, although a few Chinese-made yapping dogs and singing plastic Christmas trees were on display.

Growing in presence were booths selling a wide variety of poker chips ranging from cheap plastic coins to heavy jade-like chips encased in felt-lined leather boxes.

"The poker chip is huge. They are, like, replacing baseball in popularity," said Dan Sackett, an exporter of toys to the United States.

A growing U.S. poker rage thanks to TV's broad reach has spawned a wide variety of games on view, including dartboards and roulette tables ranging in size from several feet to plastic purse-size versions.

The 2004 World Series of Poker on Walt Disney-owned ESPN channel reportedly gave the sports network its highest-rated and most-watched telecast ever, with more than 2.5 million households tuning in for the last hour of the finals.

Further poker championships are planned for the coming year with Las Vegas gambling company Harrah's Entertainment Inc. beginning a series of high profile tournaments across the U.S. in 2005.

Buyers expect the poker chip buying rage to last another year and a half targetting consumers starting at 12 years of age.

Hours in front of the computer and a good understanding of probability may yield more than an A in statistics for Harvard students willing to try their luck in internet casinos.
Online gambling, the easy-access phenomenon that allows internet users to place bets in games such as roulette, poker and blackjack, has become a job substitute and even an addiction for some students.

“I’d say on average I play 10 to 15 hours a week, max 30,” said Jason J. Wen ’05, an economics concentrator who plays at a $100 dollar buy-in.

Wen would not disclose the specifics of his profits or losses, but said he makes enough money playing poker that he does not need a campus job.

Last year, the internet gambling industry grossed $4 billion. Young people are particularly susceptible to developing an online gambling addiction, said gambling expert and Whittier Law School Professor I. Nelson Rose.

“It’s in the privacy of your own home or dorm room so you can get away with more,” Rose said. “And unlike, say, drinking, there’s no smell of alcohol on your breath. And of course, younger people are more comfortable with using computers.”

He added that gambling laws aren’t up-to-date enough to restrict the online activity, which is operated by offshore companies.

Some students, like social studies concentrator Jonathan S. Chavez ’05, said the risk of an online gambling addiction is not worth the payoff.

“I’m not doing it during the school year,” Chavez said. “Because if I started doing it I wouldn’t stop.”

In what he called a “dehumanizing” experience, Chavez said he gambled for three weeks last summer for around 10 hours a day, and made enough money to sustain himself this semester.

Alex J. Lee ’06, an applied math and economics concentrator who plays at $100 dollar buy-ins, said that he didn’t need a campus job last year because of his online poker winnings. Lee said he has scaled down his online poker commitment this school year.

“Even though you may win a good amount of money online there’s no reason not to get a job, because you may lose it all,” Lee said.

Economics concentrator Daniel L. Goodkin ’06 said it’s difficult to balance the risky life of a gambler and the demanding life of a student.

“It’s hard to keep focused on the rest of life when you’ve just lost a couple of thousand dollars,” he said.

Goodkin, who used to play 10 to 15 hours a week, said he now wants to spend his time improving his GPA for law school admissions and hanging out with friends.

“I kind of wrestled with the question of whether I’m addicted to playing. I don’t think I am,” Goodkin said.

Most of the gamblers interviewed for this story declined to comment on exactly how much money they’ve made or lost online, but most said they have kept detailed logs of their bets.

A junior in Mather House who shared his net winnings on condition of anonymity said he started gambling online last December and made $4,000 within one month. He said he has profited about $7,000 total from online poker alone.

“I don’t like telling people how much money I make online because other people will think they can, too,” the junior, who is trying to quit gambling, said. “If you don’t have the bankroll to lose $1,500 then you shouldn’t do it.”

But Goodkin, who took a class at Harvard on the modeling of statistical situations, said that Harvard students generally have the upper hand in online poker.

“The average college poker player at Harvard is better than the average player online,” Goodkin said.

Many of the gamblers said that a knowledge of mathematical probability from college courses has come in handy.

“I’m not sure everyone who does online gambling are math people but many of them definitely are,” said David K. Hammer ’06, a computer science concentrator and former online gambler. “Harvard students have an advantage because they’re good at strategic thinking.”

Rudi G. Patitucci ’04 said online gambling has become much more popular since he started internet gambling as a freshman in 2001.

“The most exciting part about doing it at the beginning was that it was something that seemed pretty edgy, but by the time I got out of [Harvard] it seemed like about 60 percent of college males wanted to get into it,” he said.

Patitucci said he spent about 50 hours a week gambling online while he attended the College. He said he has scaled back to 20 hours per week in order to accommodate his job in financial services.

Wen, who said he has lost as much as $1,000 and won up to $2,000 in single sittings, plans to scale back later this month.

“I’m not going to play the week before midterms,” Wen said.

The Poker Millionaire Challenge has announced that it will host the first ever reality based television Poker tournament. The Tournament will be held in August of 2005 in Las Vegas. “This unique tournament is cross between the World Series of Poker and Survivor” states Ron Snodgrass, President of PMC.

There will be 52 Wild Card participants that are selected through an on line application available HERE . “We are looking for a unique cross section of people to participate our first event. Any one who plays poker should apply, you just never know we might choose you” Snodgrass stated. He also added, “with an estimated price pool of over $3,000,000 we expect to have a lot of excitement circulating around the Poker Millionaire Challenge”

For those who are not invited as a “Free Wild Card”, there will be a variety of online and regional satellite tournaments. These satellites with have a maximum buy in of $20.00. This is very different from most TV poker tournaments, like the World Series of Poker where participants pay between $5,000-$10,000 for the right to participate. “We believe that the excitement of players having the opportunity to win the Over a Million Dollars first place with a maximum of $20 invested will create a new kind of Poker Experience in front of a nationally televised audience.”

For more information:
See

Approximately 200 Poker Champs and Money Winners Make the Elite All-Star Roster; Qualifying Players are Eligible to Play Inaugural PPT Event at Foxwoods Starting Nov. 9

When the PROFESSIONAL POKER TOUR(TM) (PPT) kicks off at Foxwoods Resort Casino on Nov. 9, the field will include poker's All-Stars -- champions from WORLD POKER TOUR(TM) (WPT), World Series of Poker and European Poker competitions. More than 200 players qualified when the PPT announced its list of eligible players, based on input from the PPT Advisory Committee.

A host of top players ranging from veterans (Doyle Brunson) to young lions (24-year-old Antonio Esfandiari) made the cut, earning the right to play in the elite sports league. Launched by WPT Enterprises, Inc. (Nasdaq:WPTE), the creator of the WORLD POKER TOUR(TM), the PROFESSIONAL POKER TOUR reflects the evolution of poker as a sport. A sponsored prize pool totaling $2.5 million is at stake throughout the 5-tournament inaugural 2004-2005 season.

Whereas anyone can play on the WPT, only the game's professional elite that qualify will compete on the PPT. To be eligible to play on the PROFESSIONAL POKER TOUR, players must have proven themselves in past poker competition: by winning or making a Final Table at a WPT event or a WPT Championship; by scoring as a top 10 point leader in WPT Player-of-the-Year rankings; by winning or placing highly in the $10K buy-in event at the World Series of Poker; by securing a spot on either CardPlayer Magazine's Card Player of the Year Top 10 list or Poker Europa's Top 10; or by being a member of the Poker Hall of Fame. At the time of the announcement, the PROFESSIONAL POKER TOUR revealed PPT eligibility rules for future years based on recommendations from the PPT Advisory Committee.

"This qualifying process ensures that the television audience will have a chance to consistently see the most exciting, skilled poker played by the sport's All-Stars," said Steve Lipscomb, President of WPT Enterprises. "The PPT will be a league of poker Titans."

Among the players on the PPT roster whose names will be recognizable to poker fans are: Doyle Brunson, Howard Lederer, Phil Ivey, Johnny Chan, Annie Duke, Phil Hellmuth, Gus Hansen, Phil Gordon, Men "The Master" Nguyen, Chris Moneymaker, Antonio Esfandiari, Bobby Baldwin, Daniel Negreanu, Chris "Jesus" Ferguson, Jennifer Harman, David "Devilfish" Ulliott, Samy Farah, Mel Judah, Scotty Nguyen, Erick Lindgren, Phil "The Unabomber" Laak, Huck Seed, Tom McEvoy, Layne Flack, Carlos Mortensen, Chip Reese, Erick Seidel, Lyle Berman, Kathy Liebert, T. J. Cloutier, Ted Forrest and Linda Johnson. A complete list along with qualifying criteria can be found on the WPT website, www.worldpokertour.com/media. More than a dozen of the PPT qualifiers are women.

In its first year, the PROFESSIONAL POKER TOUR will encompass five $500,000 free-roll tournaments with a total $2.5 million prize pool. After its debut at Foxwoods in November, the PPT will move on to Bellagio (Las Vegas) with subsequent tournaments at the Goldstrike Casino (Tunica, Miss.), Commerce Casino (Commerce, Calif.), and The Mirage (Las Vegas). WPT Enterprises will reveal more information on the PPT, including potential television partners, at a future date. Meanwhile, viewers can continue to enjoy the WORLD POKER TOUR on Travel Channel Wednesday nights at 9 p.m.

For more information on the PROFESSIONAL POKER TOUR or WPTE, please visit www.worldpokertour.com.

About WPT Enterprises, Inc.

WPT Enterprises, Inc. (Nasdaq:WPTE) is a media and entertainment company engaged in the creation of branded entertainment through the development, production and marketing of televised programming based on poker and other gaming themes. To date, operations have principally revolved around the creation of the World Poker Tour brand through the production and licensing of a television series exhibited on the Travel Channel that is based on a circuit of previously established high-stakes poker tournaments that we have affiliated under the "World Poker Tour" brand. WPT Enterprises, Inc. is a majority owned subsidiary of Lakes Entertainment, Inc. (Nasdaq:LACO). Photos and media information can be found online at: www.worldpokertour.com.

The Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 provides a "safe harbor" for forward-looking statements. Certain information included in this press release (as well as information included in oral statements or other written statements made or to be made by WPT Enterprises, Inc.) contains statements that are forward-looking, such as statements relating to the expansion of WPT's brand licensing, the development of new television and film projects, the development of WPT corporate sponsors and other business development activities, as well as statements regarding other capital spending, financing sources and the effects of competition. Such forward-looking information involves important risks and uncertainties that could significantly affect anticipated results in the future and, accordingly, such results may differ from those expressed in any forward-looking statements made by or on behalf of WPT. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, WPT's significant dependence on the Travel Channel as a source of revenue; the potential that our television programming will fail to maintain a sufficient audience; the risk that competitors with greater financial resources or marketplace presence might develop television programming that would directly compete with WPT's television programming; the risk that WPT may not be able to protect its entertainment concepts, current and future brands and other intellectual property rights; risks associated with future expansion into new or complementary businesses; the termination or impairment of WPT's relationships with key licensing and strategic partners; and WPT's dependence on its senior management team. For more information, review WPT's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Group taps into new media space in casino setting. Adult targeted branding right on the tables, chips, cards & slot machines.

NEW YORK, NY (PRWE October 14, 2004 -- Casino Media Group has launched a new media network that places advertising directly inside the Casino on gambling table felts, on poker chips, on playing cards and in surrounding POS, the company announced today. Casino Media is in discussions with major beer, spirits, pharmaceutical and lifestyle brands to launch the first wave of media in Q1 2005.

Casino Media Group has negotiated exclusive arrangements with more then 150 casinos around the US giving them unprecedented access to the casino floor and to 60 million adult consumers who made almost 300 million casino trips last year.

“Casinos are an untapped adult media landscape,” said Walter Marcinowski, Marketing Director at CMG. “The audience is more affluent, they are predisposed to enjoying, to traveling, to spending and to trying new things.”

CMG data describes a vibrant adult experiential setting with a higher than average median income, a very desirable advertising target. Women comprise 54% of the market. Demographic gaming preferences also allow the advertiser to target specific groups such as 21 to 34 yr old males who prefer poker. Females in the same group will play Slots or Black Jack.

“Of course, the opportunity extends beyond the Casino. With all the media interest in Poker as spectator sport, there are all kinds of marketing tie-ins we can create,” said Marcinowski, “including night club and hotel cross promotions, as well as sampling and events.”

Even the commemorative chips are a hot item, because they have an impact on the consumers for years after the promotion is over.”

ATLANTIC CITY -- At the Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa, dealers like Linda Lombardo don't have to do "the wave" when smoke gets in their eyes. A table does it for them.

The casino, which opened last year with a slew of gambler-friendly touches, has 120 custom-built table games equipped with nozzles that blow fresh air up, creating an invisible barrier between smoking players and the dealers.

Each of the Air Rail System machines developed by Paul-Son Gaming Supplies contains four small slots on the table felt, just in front of the chip float.

Connected to duct work beneath the surface, they subtly clear the air in front of the dealer, who can turn them on or off or rotate the nozzles to adapt to conditions at the moment.

The tables, which were introduced on blackjack, Pai Gow, Caribbean Stud poker and mini baccarat games last year, cost about $400 more per unit than standard table games. They are the only ones of their kind in Atlantic City, although some casinos in Nevada, Connecticut and California also have them.

"It sets up an air curtain in front of the dealer," said Ron Coiro, East Coast sales manager for Gaming Partners International, the manufacturer's parent company. "It's not 100 percent, but nothing is."

So far, the tables are a winner, Borgata officials say.

"When you're dealing and the smoker is right in front of you, like on a blackjack table, that's when you need it," said ex-dealer Paul Mollo, director of casino administration at Borgata. "In the beginning, I had dealers coming up to me every day thanking me, saying it really works."

If there's a game brewing -- even if it's on the high seas -- poker players will find it.

Cruising might not seem to mix with stuffy cardrooms, but poker cruises have been popular for more than a decade. Card Player Cruises, based in Henderson, Nev., books as many as six each year to Mexico, Alaska and the Caribbean.

Most players, though, aren't interested in sightseeing or sunsets. Even on a cruise ship, they still prefer cardrooms to staterooms.

``We get some people who come on board and play a couple of hours during the week or don't play at all,'' said Linda Johnson, who is part owner of Card Player Cruises (www.cardplayercruises.com). ``And we get some who just want to play poker, like a lot of husbands who play and the wives go to the pool. We have both extremes.''

Johnson took her first cruise in 1992, when she booked a seven-day sailing from Los Angeles to the Mexican Riviera. She enjoyed it so much, she said, that she and several partners bought both the cruise business and Card Player magazine, a biweekly publication for poker players. Eventually, she sold her interest in the magazine but kept the poker cruise portion.

Although poker pros such as Howard Lederer, Phil Hellmuth and Jennifer Harman have sailed on the cruises, Johnson -- who won a World Series of Poker title in 1997 -- said most games are low-limit. Beginner lessons and free seminars are offered, and there are also tournaments for no-limit Texas hold 'em.

An eight-day cruise to the western Caribbean and Panama in November is already sold out. In December, players will board Holland America's Ryndam for an eight-day trip from San Diego to Cabo San Lucas. Prices start at $549 per person.

Johnson said most cruises accommodate 250 to 500 poker-playing passengers, who make up about 25 percent of the ship's total passenger list. However, each year an entire ship is chartered for the PartyPoker.com Million cruise. That voyage, which sails in March 2005 aboard Holland America's Oosterdam, will carry about 2,000 passengers and include a no-limit hold 'em tournament with a prize pool estimated at $7.5 million. The final table will be televised by the Travel Channel for its ``World Poker Tour'' show.

Players can qualify for the tournament by winning a seat online at www.partypoker.com.

``Last year, we had a guy win what we call a lucky-buck tournament for $1,'' Johnson said. ``He made the final table and turned his $1 into $195,000.''

Poker is about cards and chips, right?

Wrong, royal-flush breath.

It's about people. It's about the way they sit, act, bet, pick up hole cards, break chips, everything.

It's about image at the table, and this includes you. While you're looking for tells in opponents, they're doing the same to you, believe me. So you'd better be ready to change, even when the greatest title in the poker world is at stake.

You'll read that a lot here. In fact, you'll read that right now.

Take the final table of the main event of the 2000 World Series of Poker, a wonderful clash of styles among the pokerati: the burly, gruff-voiced poker legend T.J. Cloutier, a former Canadian Football League tight end, against Chris Ferguson, the soft-spoken Ph.D. known as "Jesus" for the long brown locks flowing from under his trademark black cowboy hat.

Cloutier's stack was about $1.7 million. Ferguson's was about $2.3 when he picked up A-9 unsuited. Cloutier made it $200,000 to go. Ferguson re-raised $600,000. Cloutier moved all-in for the rest of his $1.7 million.

Decision, Ferguson.

"The way I figured it," said Ferguson, who will play against you online at Full Tilt Poker, "it's very likely he had ace with a high kicker or a pair greater than nines, and I'm a pretty big dog. I remember doing the math at the table, and I figured I was giving up about $500,000 in equity.

"But if it's not the case - if he has an undercard or maybe ace with a lower kicker - I'm OK."

Ferguson does all the math, it doesn't make sense - and then he calls Cloutier's bet? What the ...

"I didn't mind gambling with him," Ferguson said. "He'd been playing well against me, so I didn't mind gambling. He turns over the ace-queen, so I know I'm in bad shape."

The flop came 2 of hearts, K of hearts, 4 of clubs.

"My odds are getting worse," the math guy said. "To start out, it was about 28 percent. Now it's closer to 10 percent."

The turn came another K. Now there's a pair on board. If the board pairs again, they would split the pot.

Ferguson has three outs - the three 9s left in the deck.

The river came a 9.

"I got very lucky," Ferguson said. "That's a bad lesson to teach people."

But Ferguson also felt like he was being outplayed, which meant Cloutier was reading him very well, which meant Ferguson had to change his play.

"I was willing to gamble at that point," Ferguson said. "I knew T.J. was a great player and he was probably used to playing with people who weren't used to gambling. That figured into my calculations."

Poker is about people. One of those people is yourself. Even math guys can find a way to calculate the human aspect.

LAS VEGAS, Oct. 14 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- In 1970, Jack Binion hosted the first World Series of Poker at the Horseshoe Casino in downtown Las Vegas, establishing the world's foremost gambling tournament and laying the foundation for the poker craze that took hold decades later.

Now, Harrah's Entertainment, Inc. is expanding this world-famous tournament beyond its traditional Las Vegas home with the World Series of Poker Tournament Circuit, a nationwide series of poker events culminating in the 2005 World Series of Poker next summer. And Binion, who created the original tournament while President and COO of Binion's Horseshoe, is back to serve as host.

"It is difficult to imagine the World Series of Poker without a Binion," said Ginny Shanks, senior vice president of acquisition marketing for Harrah's. "Like his legendary father Benny, Jack has built a reputation as one of the best-known and most respected figures in the gaming industry. Most of the world's elite poker players have known him for years, and consider him a good friend. We're honored he's agreed to join us as we turn the tournament he created into a national circuit."

"At Horseshoe, we were proud of the innovations we brought to the industry, including the World Series of Poker," said Binion, who later introduced the Horseshoe style of gaming to the South and Midwest as founder of Horseshoe Gaming Holding Corp. "In that same spirit, this is very exciting for me to be a part of this new poker circuit."

The inaugural World Series of Poker Tournament Circuit will kick off January 7, 2005, with a 12-day tournament at Harrah's Atlantic City. The five-event circuit will continue through May, with tournaments scheduled for Harrah's Rincon (located near San Diego), the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, Harveys Lake Tahoe, and Harrah's New Orleans. Each of the five tournaments will be taped and aired on ESPN.

Players will earn points based on their performance in these tournaments and the 2005 World Series of Poker, scheduled for June 3-July 15 at the Rio in Las Vegas. The top 100 point-earners will receive a berth in the 2005 World Series of Poker Tournament of Champions.

For additional information, call 1-877-367-9767, or visit www.worldseriesofpoker.com.

Various subsidiaries of Harrah's Entertainment, Inc. own or manage 28 casinos in the United States, primarily under the Harrah's and Horseshoe brand names. Founded 66 years ago, Harrah's Entertainment is focused on building loyalty and value with its valued customers through a unique combination of great service, excellent products, unsurpassed distribution, operational excellence and technology leadership.

Additional information about Harrah's Entertainment is available at www.harrahs.com.

American gamblers tend to earn more per year than nongamblers and tend to be more involved in their local communities, according to a survey from Harrah's Entertainment Inc.

Gamblers also tend to be somewhat more politically active than nongamblers, according to the survey. Twenty-six percent of gamblers said they contributed money to a political candidate or cause compared with 19 percent of nongamblers. Fifty-one percent of gamblers said they have signed a petition in support of a political candidate or cause in the past four years compared with 42 percent of nongamblers. Slightly more gamblers identified themselves as "mostly Democratic" than "mostly Republican."

The company's annual Profile of the American Casino Gambler has grown into more than just a one-time publicity gig for Harrah's, the most geographically diverse casino company in the nation. Casino companies say it is also cited by competitors and pitched as a reliable source of information for elected officials considering whether to legalize gambling in their state.

"Casino gambling is a central feature of political debates in our country and abroad, yet these debates are surprisingly uninformed by facts about casino guests," Harrah's Chief Executive Gary Loveman writes in the survey's introduction. "The preferences, choices and aspirations of American's more than 50 million casino customers are under-reported and misunderstood."

The company added politically tinged questions to this year's survey because of the election year buzz.

"We've known that gamblers are more active vacationers, investors and restaurant and movie-goers" than nongamblers, Loveman said. "With this year's survey we now know that gamblers also are enthusiastic participants in politics and a significant political constituency."

The survey, conducted by Connecticut-based market research firm TNS NFO, is based on questionnaires sent to 3,475 adults nationwide in April.

The median household income of U.S. casino gamblers was $53,204, 16 percent higher than that of nongamblers, the survey found. Seventy-eight percent of casino players own their own homes compared with 71 percent of nongamblers.

Of gamblers, 36 percent said they were connected to religious or spiritual groups compared with 44 percent of nongamblers. Thirty percent of gamblers said they were in volunteer groups compared with 27 percent of nongamblers. Seven percent of gamblers said they were affiliated with political community groups compared with 4 percent of nongamblers.

Casino gamblers are just as likely to attend church at least once a week as nongamblers but nongamblers are more likely report going to church at least twice a week, the survey found. However, 18 percent of gamblers and 19 percent of nongamblers said they never went to church.

The study is similar in scope to an annual survey conducted by Peter D. Hart Research Associates and the Luntz Research Cos. for the American Gaming Association.

The AGA survey has concluded in recent years that about 80 percent of Americans view casino gambling as an acceptable activity for themselves or others and more than 50 million people visit casinos each year.

At the Global Gaming Expo, the premier industry trade show and convention held in Las Vegas last week, executives said casinos can expect to confront at least 30 percent of the population who are opposed to casinos on religious or moral grounds and who sometimes spread "misinformation" about casinos.

The industry still suffers under the perception that gamblers are people who succumb to their addictions and aren't productive members of society, convention speakers said.

Casinos have had difficulty establishing a downside to opposing gambling, even among politicians who depend on donations from casinos, said Terry Wade, a Washington, D.C.-based consultant for the American Gaming Association as well as a variety of industries and nonprofits.

"We've always been the carrot. We've never been able to establish the stick," he said.

The Rev. Tom Grey, a United Methodist and executive director of the National Coalition Against Legalized Gambling, said he expects Harrah's and other companies to use the survey in future attempts to legalize casinos in Maryland, one of several key states nationwide.

Grey, who is addressing a Methodist group in Las Vegas today, said he doesn't think the study will be effective in expanding gambling.

Pennsylvania was the only state to legalize slot machines in the past year in spite of efforts in other states, he said.

He said the studies are proof that the industry "still has an image problem" and that Harrah's is "upset that they're not embraced in the community" like a nongambling business.

"Most politicians don't want to be identified with casinos even still," Grey said. "That's not a vote-getter."

Harrah's spokesman David Strow said a "vast majority of Americans have agreed with us that gaming is a perfectly acceptable activity for themselves or for others."

"Tom Grey just doesn't want to accept that," he said. "We have facts and Tom has rhetoric."

Strow said the company intends to share the information with state lawmakers because it is "a very valid and very solid report."

"Ultimately the decision (to legalize casinos) lies with state lawmakers and we will respect their decision," he said. "However, we will share whatever relevant information we have on the subject."

About 649,000 Nevada residents, or about 40 percent of the gambling-age population, gambled in a casino last year making an average of 24 trips, the survey found. That participation rate was similar to rates in Arizona, California, Connecticut, New Jersey and Rhode Island. Each of those states save for Rhode Island had hundreds of thousands more gamblers but those gamblers made many fewer trips per year. TNS NFO extrapolated the totals from 67,575 respondents to a survey mailed in 2003.

The Harrah's study also included a separate survey of players polled during the World Series of Poker tournament at Binion's Horseshoe in May, the first year Harrah's has owned the tournament. Ninety-five percent of professional poker players are men and 98 percent of amateur players are men, according to the poll. Sixty-six percent of professional players said a nonsmoking environment makes a great poker room compared with 76 percent of amateurs.

More than half of World Series of Poker players gamble at other casino table games. About a quarter of players also play slots and make sports bets.

The pros said they have played poker for an average of 24 years while amateurs have been playing for an average of 23 years.

Online poker sites are mushrooming and more and more converts – women as well as men – are being drawn into the game. Matt Born reports

I'm sitting at a table on a tropical island (location unknown) playing poker with seven strangers. We're a pretty cosmopolitan bunch - two Swedes, a Scot, someone from the Philippines and three Yanks.

A club sandwich is sitting uneaten on the cocktail table beside me and, although I don't smoke, I have a cigarette burning in my ashtray - the same one, I should point out, that I lit two hours ago.

As a rule, I don't touch alcohol when gambling. But having just been raised $30 by WherWulf8 from Stockholm (not, I suspect, his real name), I click open the menu, order a margarita (which appears instantly) and sit back to contemplate what to do.

Why has he bet so much? Was that a hesitation I noticed? Is he bluffing?

Finally, after 18 seconds, still gripped with indecision but with an ever more insistent beeping indicating that I'm almost out of time, I announce: "Raise." And pray.

As if by magic, WherWulf8 mucks his cards. And as the pile of chips is shoved in my direction, to the heartwarming sound of a cashier's till ringing, a crowd I wasn't aware of breaks into spontaneous applause. What a player! The letters "NH" appear in a voice box above WherWulf8's head and then fade into the ether. He means, I think: "Nice hand."

If this sounds a bit dream-like, I can explain. None of it - not the cocktail, the cigarette, the applause of the railbirds - is real. None of it, that is, apart from the money.

For this is online poker, the country's fastest growing "leisure pursuit". Five years ago, online poker barely existed; now it's a global industry that turned over £15 billion last year - a sevenfold increase on the previous year. What's more, of the £40 million being staked on poker sites every day, almost 10 per cent is being placed by Britons - a fact that has helped make the British gaming industry the third biggest in the world behind America and Japan. That, in turn, has persuaded the Government to push through a sweeping liberalisation of Britain's gaming laws, which will bring some of the big Las Vegas casino chains to Britain - and those of the online operations that want to be based here, rather than offshore.

This week, the owners of Caesars Palace, Las Vegas, announced plans for a £320 million hotel and casino complex at Wembley, while plans are also being drawn up for similar mega-casinos in Blackpool and the Greenwich Dome.

The boom in online poker has been helped by television shows such as the World Poker Tour, Celebrity Poker Club and Late Night Poker, which have drawn thousands of new players into the game. Even Radio 4 had a programme this week hosted by amateurs Simon Singh and Raj Persaud, trying to discover the psychological prowess and flair for numbers that make a top poker player.

But the biggest single advantage of playing online is the sheer convenience of it. When I started playing poker 15 years ago, it required dedication and a thick skin. First, you had to find a casino with a card room - the Victoria Sporting Club, near Marble Arch was one of the few - and negotiate the "24-hour rule", the law designed to stop impulse gamblers by requiring newcomers to the club to register as members at least a day before they were let inside.

An evening at "the Vic" meant putting on a suit and driving across town - often to find you had to wait an hour for a seat to become available. I was often the only person under 50, and it was hard not to be intimidated by the chain-smoking car dealers, Middle-Eastern jewellers and "businessmen" for whom "the Vic" was home.

Online is immediate (there are thousands of games to choose from), anonymous (you make up your own on-screen ID) and you don't have to dress up. The cards are never misdealt, there are more hands per hour, and it's social, too (there are "chat boxes").

Women – a rarity in real-life poker rooms – have taken to the online version. Estimates are that they account for 20 per cent of the 350,000 people who play on its site every hour - a 100 per cent increase on last year.

"Online poker is a great thing for women who wouldn't necessarily like live poker - which is quite a tough, male-dominated environment and where games tend to happen at night," says journalist Victoria Coren, who is one of the country's most accomplished female players and a creative consultant to ParadisePoker.com. "The internet allows you to play from the comfort of your own home and you can't be intimidated by aggressive language or staring. There's also the freedom of being able to express aggression or competitiveness, which women are often reluctant to do face to face."

Yet while it may be less daunting, the secluded nature of what was once a social activity - coupled with the ease of access - is causing concern among experts. Mark Griffiths of Nottingham University, Europe's only professor of gambling studies, recently warned that the number of adult gambling addicts in Britain - currently estimated at 300,000 - could double in the coming years, thanks largely to the internet.

It is an issue the online poker rooms take seriously. Gaming, they say, should only ever be a bit of fun, and 97 per cent of those who gamble do so within their means. For the three per cent who don't, the websites say they do what they can to help them help themselves. Customer support staff at PokerRoom.com, one of Europe's biggest online card rooms, spend almost a week a year being trained on how to deal with problem gamblers. "So if the wife calls up, we take it seriously and shut down the husband's account," says Patrik Selin, the chief executive. Other websites, such as Paradise and PacificPoker, limit the value of chips a player can buy in any 24 hours to around $600.

Yet others say poker online is less dangerous than the real thing. "If all you're after is the thrill of gambling, internet poker allows you to play very cheaply, with $1 tournaments that can last hours," says Coren. "Go to any casino and it may cost £50 to sit down in the cheapest game."

If playing poker is a high-risk game, the same can't be true for running an online game. The online "rake" (the small percentage of each pot that poker rooms charge as commission for hosting the site) is expected to increase to $1bn this year from about $100m in 2001. Ladbrokes recently announced a 45 per cent increase in profits, thanks largely to the rise of e-gaming. Little wonder, then, that sites are proliferating almost as quickly as players. According to PokerPulse, an independent website which monitors the online industry, there are now 209 sites worldwide.

Poker is in.

Turn on ESPN and you'll hear advertisements for telecasts covering poker tournaments. The Travel Channel and Fox Sports Net also have shows dedicated to the game/sport/addiction.

It's caught on enough that campus organizations have taken to poker tournaments as fundraisers, having everyone throw in some money to play and rewarding prizes to the winners.

There is something about the money, the aura and the characters that has turned poker into a nationwide sensation. Poker is more popular than the NHL - as if that's really even a compliment.

I'll be the first to admit to jumping on the poker bandwagon. It doesn't take much to get hooked -- winning a little money playing with your buddies on a Tuesday night, watching "Rounders" one too many times. Pretty soon you think you're ready to be the next Phil Ivey, and you even have the retro jersey collection ready.

See, poker isn't gambling in the purist sense. You aren't rolling a dice, spinning a wheel or pulling a slot machine. It takes skill to be good at poker, and luck gets thrown into the mix just to make it interesting.

This fall break, I decided I was ready to test my skills for real, see if I was any good or if the competition at State was just that bad. So I gassed up the '94 Camry and set off with a few buddies to Atlantic City, or as one local accurately described it - "the cess pool that is Atlantic City."

The town on an island in New Jersey is possibly the most bizarre place I have ever been. It's comprised of towering, glittering casinos inviting patrons in to come blow their hard-earned money. But around these casinos are a myriad of dirty, run-down buildings and streets that explain where Jersey got its reputation. The hotel where I stayed had two burnt-out buildings on its street -- and at least one of those buildings was occupied. Five minutes away was the Trump Taj Mahal Hotel and Casino.

Now, at this point I wish I could tell you that I blew all my money and learned a valuable lesson about the dangers of gambling. But I can't.

Before we left, I decided I would stick to poker, and specifically, poker tournaments. The first tournament I entered couldn't have gone any worse. I was out in about an hour and may have been the first person eliminated.

I refrained from pulling my best Phil Hellmuth impersonation and slunk away from the table. At this point, I'm starting to reconsider the entire trip, and wondering how I could be dumb enough to think it was a good idea.

Later that night, I decided to try my luck again and entered another tournament. This time, things turned around for me. Time flew by as I slowly built up the stack of chips in front of me and people dropped out one by one. Before I knew it, the field of 170 people had shrunk to just a few tables, and then, to just a single table (I ended up making enough to cover the earlier loss).

Maybe I'm good; maybe I just hit some dumb luck for one night. After all, I'm just part of a line of people jumping on the bandwagon, right?

Like most things, the poker fad will wear out and everyone will move on to something else. Who knows, it might even be NHL hockey.

A million-dollar pot looks impressive on television, but the real money in the poker craze is being made away from the cameras.

Spurred by the popularity of televised tournaments, retailers are betting that consumers will ante up for poker gear this Christmas. Casinos and card clubs are scrapping blackjack in favor of poker tables, while TV producers scramble to add more poker shows to an increasingly crowded lineup.

"This is clearly a trend -- you see it everywhere," said Heidi Weaver, a spokeswoman for Marshall Field's, which is boosting its selection of poker-related holiday gift items.

At Canterbury Racetrack & Card Club near Minneapolis, cards bring in more revenue than horse racing; poker income is up 50 percent from last year.

Canterbury takes a "rake" of as much as $4 from each poker pot in the card club. Those $4 chunks added up to $7.65 million in the six months ended June 30, with 15 percent of that sum going into the track's purse fund and a breeders' trust fund.

" Our focus is always going to be horse racing," said Randy Sampson, Canterbury's president. "But (poker) has been a tremendously helpful vehicle in subsidizing and improving the racing operation."

"I think the appeal is going to stay," said Matt Mahal, 21, a bartender who comes to play once a month and often stays at the table for 24 hours at a time. "It's a cultural thing; it's a blend of different people. Everyone's there to have a good time."

Young players such as Mahal are the reason the poker craze won't fold any time soon, said Sebastian Sinclair, president of Christiansen Capital Advisers, a Maine-based consulting and research firm that serves the gambling industry.

"I think a lot of what you're seeing in the rising popularity of poker is Generation X," he said. "They're getting into their 30s, they have discretionary income, and poker has become a spectator sport."

While blackjack and slot machines still rank as the most popular games in Las Vegas, casinos are replacing blackjack tables with poker tables, Sinclair said.

WPT Enterprises Inc., which is credited with creating the poker boom with its "World Poker Tour" show on the Travel Channel, went public last month with a $32 million stock offering.

It's popping up everywhere. It's in bars, movies, television, online and your neighbors garage and, now, it's in your newspaper. The game of poker is a form of gambling that's been catching on faster than the flu.
There are currently several shows dedicated to the game, including the televised World Poker Tour, Celebrity Poker, and The World Series of Poker, which gave former champion Chris Moneymaker his fame. The shows give amateur poker players the chance to pick up new skills and techniques by featuring the worlds top professional players. The shows have also raised more interest in the game.

There are multiple versions of poker that are available. There's always the infamous "strip poker," but the game can also be played with or without limits on bets, or lowball style, where the lowest hand wins. Texas Holdem' is the most popular version of the game, and the style that is played in most tournaments. One of the great things about poker is anyone can play, just about anywhere. Many college students are developing their own weekly poker nights to spend time with friends and make some money while they're at it.

Sacramento State junior, Jason Boggs, has been playing poker for a while, and started weekly poker nights with his friends over a year ago.

"I started playing poker, like, three years ago," Boggs said, "but recently it has gotten big." Their games draw anywhere between five and 20 people, usually guys, but anyone is welcome to join.

Rick Mizuno, a Sac State senior, attends the poker nights regularly. The great thing about poker is that anyone can play," Mizuno said. "You don't have to be athletic or even have a college degree, you just need 10 bucks to buy in."

Former TKE, Andy Strahl, is a card dealer at the popular bar, The Limelight which hosts open tables Tuesday through Saturday from 8 p.m. to 2 a.m. "In the last five months, the turnout for poker has tripled," Strahl said. The Limelight features three card tables, which each seat about nine players, plus the dealer.

Poker continues to be more popular among men than women, although the ladies' interest is on the rise. The Limelight sees an average ratio of ten guys to every one girl that plays.

Heather Gwinup, a relatively new poker enthusiast, has no problem with this. "Men play more hands against me because they think I can't play. They keep a hand they would normally throw out to see what my skill level is," Gwinup said. She and her husband play poker two to three times a week and, in the last two months, she's won over $1500 from the table game.

"I started to play because I realized that if I didn't, I would be a poker widow," Gwinup said, joking about losing her husband to the game. She goes to The Limelight to make money and spend time with her husband.

"Men get distracted when a woman is at the table," Gwinup said, and, by the numbers, it works to her advantage.

"[I think] poker has become popular because it's easy to learn and you can always find a game," Strahl said.

It's also a relatively friendly game. At The Limelight, the list of rules to play is posted on the wall next to the entrance of the back room. Only graceful English (that means no cussing), only one person per hand, no criticizing other players, and no exposing cards are allowed while the game is in progress. Also, no throwing cards, no passing chips, and many more, meant to make the whole experience safe, fun and in order. For beginners, The Limelight offers no bet poker on Tuesday and Wednesday nights.

The bottom line according to Andy Strahl: "Poker is a gambling game you have control over. If you don't have a good hand, you don't have to play. You can play aggressively if it suits you, or you can just be passive and let the cards do the work."

Mashantucket— If you've got it, flaunt it.

Foxwoods Resort Casino today will launch a six-month television advertising campaign that maximizes its poker prowess. Foxwoods has a monopoly on poker in New England since Mohegan Sun closed its card room last year. With 80 tables, it has the largest poker room on the East Coast. The inaugural broadcast of the World Poker Tour was filmed there two years ago, and many others have since copied the WPT format.

“Poker is hot,” said Marty Kramer, director of advertising. “Poker is red hot, and we're a major player in the poker world. We want to leverage our strength in poker.”

The first 30-second spot, “Royal Flush,” debuts on the Fox Sports Network tonight during the Boston Celtics' pre-season basketball game. It will air during the New York Knicks game on Thursday and on NESN.

“After viewing this once, nobody will ever forget that the royal flush is a winning hand,” said Linda Kaplan Thaler, chief executive officer of Foxwoods' new ad agency, New York-based Kaplan Thaler Group.

The spot uses what Kramer unabashedly calls “potty humor.”

“Royal Flush” opens with a shot of a bathroom door followed by the sound of a toilet flushing. A jovial king — draped in gown and crown — walks out with a newspaper under his arm. His sigh and wide grin say he's clearly satisfied following a productive session on the “throne.”

“Nothing beats a royal flush,” flashes on the screen, and the scene cuts to poker tables at Foxwoods. The voiceover says, “Over 80 poker tables and a charter member of the World Poker Tour.”

Two more “Royal Flush” spots and others called “Two Pair” and “Bluff Stud” will follow, each running for three or four weeks before the next is introduced.

“When you're using humor, you've got to have a lot of spots,” Kramer said. “It works well for a while, but can get old quickly.”

The poker series is not a successor to the “Wonder of It All” campaign that caught the world's attention with its catchy jingle and glamorous scenes of the massive casino in the woods. Kramer said the successor campaign would launch some time in early 2005. “Royal Flush” is more like a transitional promotion, a brief interlude of ads that targets young adults, but should elicit chuckles from all ages. Poker still draws middle-aged and older cardsharps into casinos, but young adults have been entering tournaments in larger numbers, many of them learning the game on the Internet before venturing into casinos to play live.

“Our core market tends be 45-plus,” Kramer said. “We want to attract new people and younger people, and poker is certainly a way of calling attention to that.”

Both of Connecticut's mega-resort casinos are working with new advertising agencies to refresh their images and further imprint their brands, or identities, in the public mind. In Foxwoods' case, Kramer admits a new approach has been a long time coming.

“What we've done in the past has run its course,” Kramer said.

Working in an industry that constantly reinvents itself, Foxwoods executives are aware of the need to stay fresh. This year, they have something tangible to promote, since the Mashantucket Pequots have invested $300 million for renovation and expansion of the 12-year-old facility, adding a Hard Rock Café, new gaming, retail and restaurants and a much-needed parking garage. The Lake of Isles Golf Resort will open there next year.

So far, the experience with Kaplan Thaler Group has been a positive one, Kramer said.

Under contract with Foxwoods since this spring for an estimated $25 million, Kaplan Thaler is the agency behind the Toys ‘R Us jingle (“I don't want to grow up!”), the AFLAC duck and the rebirth of Herbal Essence shampoo as the “total organic experience.”

Royal Flush” is KTG's first creative work on behalf of Foxwoods to hit the media. The agency uses the “big bang” theory of advertising, which “is about doing disruptive, unexpected advertising that people talk about,” according to Kaplan Thaler.

“When I first saw this spot, I loved it,” Kramer said of “Royal Flush.” Using humor can be risky, but Foxwoods' senior management team agreed these spots were worth the gamble.

“I understand some people might call this potty humor, but it's pretty funny, and frankly, it's pretty benign,” he said.

Looking forward, Kramer said singer John Pizarelli and the “Wonder of It All” jingle would not disappear from future ads, but the ads would be noticeably different.

“Visually, the way we are going to portray Foxwoods will be different,” he said. “We need to. If we don't, it will seem like same old, same old.”

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 10, 2004--The Royal Oasis Grand Bahama Poker Tournament held in late August proved to be a success that called for more. Comments Pro Player Ted Lawson, winner of this year's Las Vegas Omaha World Poker Series ($500,000) and CEO of Federated National Insurance Company comments, "This tournament was the best value for the money with most of it going into the pot. The best man won, he played beautifully."

Lawson was so pleased, he joined the production team including producer Steve Kates of Driftwood Ventures and director Burt Kravette. Together, they've set plans in motion for the second tournament of the Poker Tour International bimonthly series, the Costa Rica Classic scheduled for December 1, 2004. Local satellite tournaments will run November 29-30 in San Jose.

Comments Kates, "It won't be a tournament, it will be an adventure." Prices for the Costa Rica Classic start at $2599 and include Texas Hold 'em buy-in, airfare from Fort Lauderdale, accommodations at Holiday Inn Aurala in San Jose, opening/closing receptions, and refreshments. One re-buy will be available for $400. Winnings include seats in upcoming tournaments and $500,000 based on entries. Events will include pro players and will be televised.

Upcoming tournaments in the Poker Tour International are scheduled for Puerto Rico and St. Kitts. For more information, contact 1-800-432-2294 ext. 127.

Carmen Media, owner of the Belle Rock Gaming Group, has spoken out against the wave of media hysteria that followed the publishing of the recent GBGC on gaming. The press, particularly in the UK, responded with alarm at the report’s suggestion that gambling revenue had grown fivefold in the last three years fuelling fears of a ‘gambling frenzy’.

Carmen Media CEO, Tim Johnson, commented: 'We always find GBGC's annual report makes interesting reading. The media response is naturally sensationalist: We can certainly confirm that there is increased interest in online gaming as an entertaining leisure pastime, and that many of our customers - and interestingly our most successful winners - are women.

'What was not highlighted by the media, and in my view needs emphasizing, is how this report makes clear that clever online gaming operations are facing a very rosy future indeed. Companies like Carmen Media are leading the industry in developing ever more watertight security. We take our position with regard to responsible gaming very seriously, and believe that we offer adults across the world a new, fun and highly entertaining leisure option.

'As the report underlines: those companies that are likely to be winners in the future are those possessing a combination of best marketing and cost effective technology. It just so happens that my company, Carmen Media, is centred on both these skills.'

The report also stated that while the world’s economy is slowing, gambling is continuing to grow as economies begin to regulate gambling in order to raise taxes.

Playing poker for cash is the latest craze in schools across New York, with kids blowing up to $300 a day playing games such as Texas hold 'em.
Teens told The Post this week that they gamble during lunch and after school, hoping to one day grow up to be successful high rollers like their TV idols playing in the World Series of Poker.

"That's my aspiration. It's like somebody wanting to get in the NBA," said 17-year-old Max, a senior at Stuyvesant HS in downtown Manhattan.

"I'm going to earn a living and have a stable lifestyle and hopefully win a couple of tournaments, then get into the World Series," said Max, who wouldn't reveal his last name.

Max, who lives in Manhattan and has played for cash since he was 11, said about 100 out of the 700 kids in his grade play poker.

He said other students are joining the craze after watching televised poker matches such as the World Series on ESPN, Bravo's "Celebrity Poker Showdown" and the Travel Channel's "World Poker Tour."

Fellow senior Zach Chaltiel, 17, said lunchtime "buy-ins" can go as high as $20.

"After school, we all get together at Burritoville and play for higher stakes than in school," he said.

Several teachers and cafeteria staff at Lafayette HS in the Bensonhurst section of Brooklyn told The Post that many of their senior students ignore state law as well as the city's Department of Education discipline code — both of which prohibit gambling — and play poker for money at school.

"Students play with dice and with chips, always for money," said a 22-year Lafayette teaching veteran who did not wish to be identified.

"More and more students have started playing poker over the last two years, and now it's really a concern for us."

Experts say the number of teenage gambling addicts has risen to alarming levels, in part due to the recent airing of Texas and Omaha hold 'em tournaments on TV.

More than half of those surveyed between the ages of 14 and 22 said they gambled at some stage during an average month, according to the Adolescent Risk Communications Institute.

"And for a certain percentage of these kids, it becomes a serious issue," said Steve Block, a counselor at St. Vincent's Gamblers Treatment Center in Manhattan.

Alex, 17, also a Stuyvesant senior, admits poker is addicting.

"We are hooked, but it's about knowing your limits," said Alex, who didn't want his last name published.

"I've seen people at school win $300 and lose $300 in one day, so you have to be smart about it. I've read a lot of books on the subject."

LACONIA, N.H. ­ American lore is steeped in it - from legendary games dealt in parlors in the Wild West to smoky backrooms in New York City.
Now, with reality TV, televised tournaments that draw millions of viewers, and an explosion of websites, poker has become America's latest craze, with an estimated 50 million people checking their cards and tossing their chips.

Indeed, a game once viewed as roguish has permeated the most unlikely pockets of society, from games squeezed in before the school bell rings to families hunched over computers after dinner. Now historical societies, Rotary clubs, youth sports leagues, and high school boosters are all betting on its faddish popularity, hosting poker nights in lieu of the traditional crafts show or car wash.
The trend is not without critics. Some say that poker night at the local community center glorifies the game - in a way that could lead to gambling addictions, especially among the youngest and most impressionable.
Yet for many others, it's just one more sign that gambling has become part of the fabric of daily life. An overwhelming majority of Americans have stuffed coins into slot machines or rolled dice at least once in their lives. And when it comes to poker, supporters say the game is unfairly demonized, given that it requires patience, concentration, and cunning.
"The reputation used to be [one of] backroom cheaters, of a dirty game," says Bill Thompson, a professor of public administration at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. But over the years, with the exposure it has gotten in mainstream society, "it's been sanitized a bit."
A man's ritual - now for charity
At a bingo hall in Laconia, N.H., one recent evening, 49 players gathered for a game of Texas Hold 'Em, the form of poker most popular on TV. Some players covered their eyes (and bluffs) with sunglasses. Proceeds were for the American Classic Arcade Museum, to build a new space for restoration work and seminars.
While gambling is generally illegal in New Hampshire, aside from the state lottery, nonprofits can hold up to 10 poker games per year, says Art Phillips, the event's organizer. Laws on poker and charity gambling vary from state to state.
Mr. Phillips has owned Casino Game Rental since 2001 and says demand has tripled in the past three years. He sets up about three events a week in New Hampshire and Vermont.
The game is still a man's ritual to some degree, he says - 90 percent of participants are male - but women are increasingly joining the craze.
Ed Batchelder, dressed in jeans and crocodile boots, folded his hands over his chest and growled during a tense moment in the game. But he explained later that he'd come to relax. Growing up on his family's farm - with 10 siblings and little money - the kids played cards for fun. His first game of poker was at age 10.
Before charities began hosting poker nights he'd play weekly games with his friends and family. "I like playing strangers. Strangers can't read you," he says. Besides, he adds, this is all for a good cause.
Profits, skill, and the dirty 'g' word
To some, charities' acceptance of profits from games of chance raises philosophical questions about role modeling. "Parents and sponsors seem to be unaware that there is a health risk here," says Keith Whyte, executive director of the National Council on Problem Gambling.
But the appeal is clear: Proceeds for nonprofits can range from $6,000 to $12,000, says Phillips. "That's a lot better than selling candy bars," he says. "You have to wash a lot of cars for that kind of money."
Brendan Smith, who volunteered for the American Classic Arcade Museum event, also helped the Lake Winnipesauke Historical Society run ten tournaments earlier this summer to raise funds for a new roof. He doesn't play poker. "Personally it's not really my cup of tea," he says. And he admits that "some people shy away from the "gambling" word.
In the time of kings and queens
Poker's origins are believed to be in Persia, Germany, and France, with the first playing cards coming to the New World via Christopher Columbus. In the US, it drifted its way along the Mississippi River in various forms and reached the West Coast with the onset of the Gold Rush.
Movies have glorified the game, from "The Sting" to "Rounders." Poker received a new burst of attention with reality shows like the Travel Channel's "World Poker Tour." Chris Moneymaker's win of $2.5 million at the "World Series of Poker" on ESPN last year added to the popularity.
Technology has also played a role: On television, cameras are often set at each table, allowing viewers to see the cards players are holding, adding to the drama of the game.
"Now everyone wants to win," says Stanley Sludikoff, editor and publisher of Poker Player newspaper in California. Participation in the "World Series of Poker" tripled between 2003 to 2004, to over 2,500 players.
If the market for poker on TV has grown, it's not at the expense of other games, says Mr. Thompson. Slot machines and Black Jack still reign in the casino. But in American homes - with the number of online poker rooms exceeding 200, according to pokerpulse.com - poker is leading a trend.
Part of the allure of the game, say many players, is that it demands practice and skill, from reading others' faces and gestures to tests of strategy.
But that's exactly what gambling critics point to when speaking out against poker: The quest for mastery leads to compulsive playing, says Mr. Whyte. They also voice concern about the number of teens gambling today. According to a 2003 survey by the University of Pennsylvania's Annenberg Public Policy Center, more than 50 percent of young people from age 14 to 22 gamble at least once a month.
Thompson sees gambling as a fine recreational activity, but not in excess. He says charity nights for gambling are acceptable in moderation, but may send a mixed message. Advocates claim the money goes to good causes, like education - yet to Thompson, "they are introducing a value very much against education: that to get ahead in life, you roll the dice."

Excitement spread quickly a few weeks ago when players in the poker room at Derby Lane greyhound track in St. Petersburg realized royalty was in their midst.

Chris Moneymaker, a 28-year-old ex-accountant and 2003 World Series of Poker champion who was in the area visiting friends, probably felt like a rock star - with a bull's-eye on his back.

Moneymaker normally avoids small-stakes games, but he wasn't at Derby Lane to watch thoroughbreds simulcast from Delaware Park. He put up a $45 entry fee to join the action, along with 119 other Texas Hold 'Em tournament players.

"Everyone wanted to get a piece of him," said Vera Filipelli, Derby Lane's director of media relations. Many were suitably dressed for the occasion, wearing black shirts, dark sunglasses and caps turned backward.

Since Derby Lane bought out Tampa Greyhound Track's poker permit this past summer, lines form daily outside the St. Petersburg track's 27-table room for its noon opening.

Derby Lane began its live greyhound season Monday, and the track has added a 12:30 Sunday matinee to its schedule because Florida law requires tracks to conduct live performances to open their card rooms.

You name it, Derby Lane has it, seven days a week: Texas Hold 'Em, 7-Card Stud, Omaha, Omaha Hi-Lo. Pots can exceed $2,000 (a Palm Harbor restaurant owner won $1,400 when she defeated Moneymaker, who didn't even reach the finals).

Tampa's Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino reports long waits for a seat in the casino's 32-table poker room. Tampa Bay Downs' Silks Card Room proved wildly popular during its 2003-04 thoroughbred racing season.

Filipelli said the coverage of poker on ESPN and The Travel Channel, along with the Legislature's lifting of the $10 pot limit, has spurred the card craze.

"I think a big part of the allure is testing your skill against other players," Filipelli said. "Myself, I can't watch every day. I have to watch the dogs. They're more exciting to me."

For greyhound breeders, owners and kennel operators, therein lies the rub. It's fair to ask if dog racing matters to folks trying to imitate the Chris Moneymakers and Amarillo Slims of the world.

Or, to put it bluntly: What happens when track owners lobby Tallahassee for the right to operate card games in a greyhound-free environment?

"I don't think interest is dying down per se with us in Florida," said Filipelli, whose husband John operates the Brumage/Filipelli Kennel.

When Jan. 1 rolls around, Derby Lane will celebrate its 80th year of continuous operation as a greyhound track. Despite its glorious tradition (Babe Ruth and Pete Rose were frequent customers), many dog owners and trainers struggle to make a decent living.

Although kennels receive 4 percent of the house take from card action, John Filipelli estimates no more than 25-30 percent of active kennels make a substantial profit.

The 80th annual Inaugural Stakes will be run tonight. There still is something magical about watching these sleek, eager-to-please animals compete, even if it's hard to push yourself back from the table.

LAS VEGAS -- Talk about the power of poker.

Phil Helmuth, bona fide poker royalty, can't make it away from the felt table without being mobbed for autographs and posing for pictures with buxom models and middle-aged men with big bellies.

"Poker is crazy. It's unbelievable," said Helmuth, who won his first World Series of Poker in 1989 at age 24. "I have two commercials starting next week on ESPN," he said late Wednesday as he tried, unsuccessfully, to make his way from a celebrity game at the Global Gaming Expo.

Poker is fueling a gambling revival that is attracting young people to casinos, delighting industry executives and giving rise to everything from a planned poker reality show to countless Internet sites and low-stakes kitchen-table games across the land.

"The peak hasn't even come yet. You can't go anywhere now without talking to somebody about poker," said Eric Morris, publisher of Bluff, a new poker magazine. "This is the only form of gambling I know that's so widely accepted."

The big players are taking notice. Major casinos are reopening or expanding their poker rooms. Online poker has quickly become the most popular and lucrative Internet gambling option - while also grooming a fresh crop of young customers who flock to casinos and card rooms to try their hand in real games.

"You can't go in a college dorm without finding a poker game," said Gary Loveman, president and CEO of Harrah's Entertainment. "It is the third most highly viewed sport, if you want to call it that."

Some worry that all this hype amounts to more than just sport.

"The only thing we are concerned about is seeing these young folks, college students, get a little crazy about poker," said Ernie Stevens, chairman of the National Indian Gaming Association.

The future is certain to bring more poker, more poker TV shows and more technology to the tables, said Mark L. Yoseloff, a former Coleco Industries executive in Connecticut who is now chairman and CEO of ShuffleMaster Inc., which manufactures automatic card shufflers, table games and products that help casinos electronically track card play.

The spread of faster automated shufflers will speed up play, bringing 15 percent more poker hands per hour to the table - pleasing both players and casino owners. Player tracking will give casinos unprecedented information about their players and how much they wager, Yoseloff said.

"You will be able to [track] every hand, every card played and every bet," said Yoseloff, a mathematician by training.

Helmuth, who will play at Foxwoods Resort Casino next month, said the game's appeal is simple and egalitarian.

"It's because men and women of all races and nationalities can play poker," said Helmuth, who dropped out of college to become a poker champion. "Unlike the PGA Tour, anybody can play."

The WORLD POKER TOUR(TM) (WPT) and Travel Channel will once again break new ground, this time by launching the first televised "poker analysis show." The entertainment companies that transformed poker into a riveting spectator sport and spawned a wave of imitators will debut the inaugural episode of WPT Poker Corner on Wednesday, October 13th. WPT Poker Corner will air immediately following the broadcast of the Season Two WPT Championship. The evening's lineup on Travel Channel will start at an earlier time than usual--8 p.m. ET / 5 p.m. PT--to accommodate WPT Poker Corner's debut at 10 p.m. ET / 7 p.m. PT.

Filled with tips from the pros and heated debate, WPT Poker Corner breaks down the WPT Championship hand-by-hand, in an unrehearsed and dynamic hour of analysis. WPT Commentator Mike Sexton is joined by world famous poker pros Daniel Negreanu, Annie Duke and Phil Hellmuth, who dissect the Final Table play where the stakes-- $8.3 million dollars--were the highest in history to that point. Peek through the poker keyhole and get the insiders' view on tells, reads, and strategies for improving your own game.

"The addition of WPT Poker Corner to the WORLD POKER TOUR's Wednesday nights on Travel Channel makes for a full night of poker entertainment, perfect for both die-hards and newcomers alike," said Steve Lipscomb, President of WPT Enterprises and creator of the show. Show host Mike Sexton added, "Players who are serious students of the game will enhance their own play with what they learn on WPT Poker Corner. Furthermore, watching WPT Poker Corner will offer viewers a completely different perspective into the WPT Championship."

The evening begins with the 8 - 10 p.m. ET / 5 - 7 p.m. PT airing of the Season Two WPT Championship. WPT Poker Corner premieres immediately after from 10 - 11 p.m. ET / 7 - 8 p.m. PT. The cycle then repeats for six hours of non-stop poker entertainment, with a second airing of the Season Two WPT Championship from 11 p.m. - 1 a.m. ET / 8 -10 p.m. PT followed by a second airing of WPT Poker Corner from 1 - 2 a.m. ET / 10 - 11 p.m. PT.

The WORLD POKER TOUR, which was the first show on U.S. television to reveal the players' hole cards, will broadcast 16 new tournaments filmed at leading casinos and exotic locales from Las Vegas to Paris, beginning with the launch of its third season in March 2005.

About WPT Enterprises, Inc.

WPT Enterprises, Inc. (Nasdaq:WPTE) is a media and entertainment company engaged in the creation of branded entertainment through the development, production and marketing of televised programming based on poker and other gaming themes. To date, operations have principally revolved around the creation of the World Poker Tour brand through the production and licensing of a television series exhibited on the Travel Channel that is based on a circuit of previously established high-stakes poker tournaments that we have affiliated under the "World Poker Tour" brand. WPT Enterprises, Inc. is a majority owned subsidiary of Lakes Entertainment, Inc. (Nasdaq:LACO). Photos and media information can be found online at: www.worldpokertour.com.

The Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 provides a "safe harbor" for forward-looking statements. Certain information included in this press release (as well as information included in oral statements or other written statements made or to be made by WPT Enterprises, Inc.) contains statements that are forward-looking, such as statements relating to the expansion of WPT's brand licensing, the development of new television and film projects, the development of WPT corporate sponsors and other business development activities, as well as statements regarding other capital spending, financing sources and the effects of competition. Such forward-looking information involves important risks and uncertainties that could significantly affect anticipated results in the future and, accordingly, such results may differ from those expressed in any forward-looking statements made by or on behalf of WPT. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, WPT's significant dependence on the Travel Channel as a source of revenue; the potential that our television programming will fail to maintain a sufficient audience; the risk that competitors with greater financial resources or marketplace presence might develop television programming that would directly compete with WPT's television programming; the risk that WPT may not be able to protect its entertainment concepts, current and future brands and other intellectual property rights; risks associated with future expansion into new or complementary businesses; the termination or impairment of WPT's relationships with key licensing and strategic partners; and WPT's dependence on its senior management team. For more information, review WPT's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Poker isn't allowed in school, so eighth grade would-be card sharks ditch telltale chips, gather at lunch and use push-ups as currency: ''I see your five push-ups and raise you 15.'' Faced with the same dilemma, high schoolers bet bags of potato chips and cookies from their lunches, or toothpicks that they can quickly stuff into their pockets if the principal happens along.

Ask any teens or tweens and they'll tell you poker is in. Ask their parents, and they'll marvel that TVs and video game consoles are gathering dust. Over the last two years, poker has increasingly become the centerpiece of family game nights, birthday parties, bar mitzvahs, post-prom bashes, even weddings.

Within the party industry, ''casinos are the big thing,'' says Tracy Nguyen, director of sales and marketing for the Sterling, Va.-based Entertainment Connection. ''There are a lot of companies that do nothing but.'' About half the customers booking high school-sponsored parties ask for poker, says Nguyen. Or they ask for ''you know, that game they play on ESPN.''

''Most of my friends play poker,'' says Mark Glicksteen, an eighth-grader at Medea Creek Middle School in Oak Park, in Ventura County north of Los Angeles. For his 12th birthday, Mark had a ''casino party'' -- guests played poker, blackjack and roulette. During the school year, Mark and buddies host weekly poker games at their houses, usually betting chips, but sometimes, he says, they have $1 buy-ins.

Poker experts and middle school kids say the trend is pushed along by television shows that feature the game and aided by a renewed interest in person-to-person interaction. (Board game sales are also up 6 percent over last year, according to the marketing research firm NDP Group.)

The youthful penchant for poker is winning praise from parents such as Carrie Glicksteen, Mark's mother, who says cards have supplanted another pastime with its own downside -- shoot-'em-up video games -- as Mark and friends' favorite activity. ''They actually sit down with real people and socialize with each other,'' says Glicksteen. ''The whole idea of playing games across the table is a really nice thing -- an opportunity to interact again.''

Yet some parents are bothered by poker's popularity, even as they accede to their children's wishes. One Southern California mother who let her son have a poker party for his 16th birthday would not allow him to discuss it with a reporter. ''We're not into gambling, and I wouldn't want to give the impression that our family is,'' she says. Gambling ''has become almost an illness with some of our older son's friends. It's something you have to watch.''

The gambling helpline at the nonprofit National Council on Problem Gaming has received an influx of calls this year from people in their late teens and 20s, says Keith Whyte, executive director of the organization. ''Kids have got to be aware that it's a health hazard.... The earlier you expose your kids to gambling, the more likely they are to develop a gambling problem.'' Just as parents might allow children a sip of wine at the dinner table but wouldn't let them guzzle, children should be taught to play poker in moderation, he says.

Mark learned to play Texas hold 'em -- the card game that has stormed casinos and at-home tables since the advent of TV poker -- by watching the World Series of Poker on ESPN. The Travel Channel's World Poker Tour started the trend in March 2003, and since then Bravo, the Fox Sports Network and other channels have aired their own versions.

Internet poker kindled the TV poker phenomenon, says David G. Schwartz, coordinator of the Gaming Studies Research Center at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. The Web's poker landscape is ever expanding; between January 2001 and August 2004, the number of Internet tournament players increased by 2,500 percent to 21,930 per hour, according to Pokerpulse.com.

''America has always been a nation of gamblers... of risk takers,'' and kids are no exception, Whyte says. Research indicates that gambling is often the earliest of the addictive behaviors. In studies of kids younger than 17, ''gambling precedes almost all other risky behaviors: smoking, substance abuse, fighting and promiscuous sex. It may be the gateway behavior that we believed marijuana was,'' he adds.

In a study last year by the Adolescent Risk Communications Institute, more than half of young people age 14 to 22 reported gambling in an average month. The study found that those younger than 18 favored card games, sports betting and bingo.

This is the first year that the University of California, Los Angeles, has offered poker at orientation, and it was a major hit, says Matthew Ontell, a senior political science major who helped organize the event. Nearly everyone, young men and women, knew how to play. Throughout orientation, ''they were all playing among themselves.'' Poker is much bigger this year than last year, he says.

The freshmen 'will have a lot of dorm games,' says Ontell, and fuel the poker playing that's taken off at UCLA in recent years. ''Before, everybody sat around and played Counterstrike,'' says Ontell of the video game. Now people play poker.

THEY say gambling is a mug’s game, but try telling that to a Hertford man who sets sail this weekend on a $10,000 luxury cruise he won in an online poker game.

As well as relaxing on board the 86,000-ton liner Mediterranea with his wife Reena, Kalpesh Patel will be playing for high stakes on the high seas as he competes to win $250,000 (£140,000) in Europe’s biggest ever floating poker tournament.

Best of all, he will not be gambling with a penny of his own money. Kalpesh scooped the prize after a marathon session on his computer, in a tournament he paid just $20 (£11.20) to enter.

“It took me five-and-a-half hours of solid play to qualify, but amazingly every hand I decided to bet on I won. It was an incredible run,” he said.

Takeaway owner Kalpesh will be swapping pizza for chips as he tries to bluff his way to the jackpot at the expense of some of the top poker faces around.

His opponents will include Britain’s greatest ever player, Dave ‘The Devilfish’ Ulliott, and Sweden’s Erik ‘The Salmon’ Sagstrom, the biggest ever online poker winner, but no-nonsense Kalpesh said he will not be adopting a ridiculous nickname in a bid to gain notoriety — not even the Pizza Parlour Poker Player.

“I try never to be too confident, because you can go out of the tournament at any time, but I have as good a chance as anyone else,” he said. “I will play conservatively early on, then get more aggressive as the tournament goes on.

“The big players don’t worry that much. I won’t have a care in the world.”

Cool customer Kalpesh, 33, owns the Hertford branch of pizza chain Domino’s. But poker has proved to be the game for him, as this is not the first holiday he has won in the five years he has been playing.

Damian Walker, a spokesman for Ladbrokes, the bookmaker behind the online poker tournament, said: “Kalpesh has done really well just to get this far, but he’s now got to navigate through some stormy waters at the poker table if he is to get close to walking off with the $250,000 first prize.

“The 200-player field will be split into four groups by random draw and during the week will be whittled down to just six players at the final table.”

Competitors will be playing the No Limit Texas Hold ’Em form of poker during their seven-night Mediterranean cruise, and despite the risk of losing all his chips in one go, Kalpesh said this suits him just fine.

NEW YORK, Oct. 6 /PRNewswire/ -- Add another magazine cover for Ben Affleck. Only this time the cover is based on something other than Affleck's personal life or upcoming movie. ALL IN, the world's leading poker magazine put Affleck on the cover of its most recent issue for his first place finish at the California State Championship.

Affleck is an iconic figure in the poker world primarily due to the glamour that he has brought to the game. The victory clearly established Affleck as the best player among the poker-playing Hollywood set that includes Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon, Ed Norton, Tobey McGuire, and James Woods.

"Everyone knows about Ben Affleck's commitment to the game of poker," said Bhu Srinivasan, publisher of ALL IN Magazine. "We wanted to be careful not to put him on the cover purely because of his celebrity, but when he won a major event, it became a no-brainer."

With amateur victories such as Affleck's fueling poker's ever-growing popularity, ALL IN Magazine has become one of the fastest growing magazines in the country. Over the past four months, subscriptions to ALL IN Magazine have grown by over 450%. The growth of poker media isn't limited to print alone; televised poker continues to draw the ratings usually reserved for major athletic events. ESPN, FOX Sports, NBC, Travel Channel, and Bravo all carry a variety of poker shows.

Estimates suggest that up to 50 million people watch or play poker in the United States alone. With an audience this size, marketers are paying close attention to the poker phenomenon to see if there are branding opportunities in poker.

"We were surprised at how receptive the advertising community was to an upscale poker magazine," said Srinivasan. "Advertisers are finding that ALL IN Magazine is a great way to capitalize on poker."

Brands that have made marketing investments in poker include Oakley, Belvedere Vodka, ESPN, Anheuser-Busch, Jim Beam Brands, Miramax, NBC, Discovery Networks, Diageo, Altadis, Toyota, Levitra, Samuel Adams, and Fairmont Hotels. Several major advertisers in electronics, automotive, travel, and apparel are currently negotiating category exclusive deals with the publication as well major sponsorships with the television networks.

www.allinmagazine.com

Call 212-880-6493 for media inquiries or requests.

TOLEDO, OHIO - With poker's popularity growing because of televised tournaments, retailers are betting that playing cards and chips will be among the must-have items during the holiday shopping season.

Stores are showcasing displays of casino-quality chips and gaming tables with holders for drinks and betting chips.

"I'm not a big poker player, but I know a lot about it because it's such a hot item," Kmart spokeswoman Caryn Klebba said. "It seems like the teenagers are in love with it."

Wal-Mart spokeswoman Karen Burk said the renewed interest in poker may make a deck of cards the top stocking stuffer of the holidays this year.

Poker, which was introduced to much of the country by riverboats on the Mississippi and Ohio rivers in the 1800s, is now seeing another surge thanks to tournaments being televised on cable networks.

The World Series of Poker on ESPN, along with Bravo's Celebrity Poker Showdown and the World Poker Tour on the Travel Channel are among hit shows.

Few networks were interested in poker until the World Poker Tour turned into an overnight success a year ago.

PokerStars.com, which offers poker online, estimates that based on anecdotal research that from 50 million to 60 million people play poker at least once a month.

Games range from high school students gathering in basements on weekend nights to organized tournaments.

Noah Campbell, 25, started a weekend tournament in Toledo this year that draws a combined 80 players on Friday and Saturday nights, with the money going to charities.

He spent at least $2,000 buying tables, cards and chips. Campbell said many of his friends are buying their own supplies too — including high-end chips and cards.

Crate & Barrel spokeswoman Bette Kahn said poker's elevation is a testament to the power of television.

It's hard to say whether card playing will stick around, she said. "It may not be a fad. They've played poker for years and years," Kahn added.

Maybe it's just his near-constant poker face, but Ashok Surapaneni seems like an unassuming, albeit highly confident, Wharton junior. He certainly doesn't look the part of an Exeter boy -- which he is -- and with $10,000 worth of chips stacked in front of him at the Atlantic City Trump Taj Mahal's poker room, and $13,000 cash backing that, he's dressed not as a high-roller but as your average 21-year-old -- black Oakleys, a faded yellow Borgata casino hat, cargo khakis and a long navy blue windbreaker.

It's not exactly the uniform of a gambler, but then again, Surapaneni doesn't much consider himself a gambler.

"I wouldn't say we're any more gamblers than day traders are," he says, underscoring his calculated, business-style approach to the game.

For example, he's read nearly 40 poker books, and analyzes every hand he plays at the end of each day.

And he plays poker like it's his job. Last summer, the 4.0 student -- save that one A-minus -- moved to Atlantic City, N.J., where he shared an apartment with another aficionado and played every day, averaging 70 hours a week.

"There were some days when I didn't want to play, but I made myself," he says. "It's like work."

But he seems to be doing OK. Despite the fact that he once lost $27,000 in one night, he says, "I haven't gone broke, I pay all my bills and I have money to spare."

He has become the reluctant poster boy for the Penn Poker Club, not to mention the inspiration for any Quaker serious about poker. And lately, that number has been increasing daily.

ª

Poker -- it's so hot right now.

The Poker Club now boasts a listserv of over 500 and, since the beginning of the semester, Dan Kline estimates that three to five new members join daily. Surapaneni says that his e-mail box is clogged with freshmen that want to get on the listserv, and they're no ordinary enthusiasts, either -- they offer Surapaneni paragraphs about their own poker history, and use words like "poker fanatic" and "serious poker player."

This sudden upsurge in the game is a far cry from the club's humble beginnings. Back in fall 2002, in a second-floor Butcher dorm room, Kline, Ari Paul and a handful of their hallmates gathered to socialize and play cards.

"Freshman year, there'd be a game three to four nights a week, [and] it'd be the same three or four people playing," Kline says. "We all sucked at that point, but we started getting better."

As their skill level heightened, so did the dollar signs.

"We became more and more serious about it, and started raising the stakes," Paul says. "Instead of a $20 buy-in, we started playing with a $100 buy-in."

Then came the Student Activities Council funding, cementing their status as a Penn club. Next came the PokerRoom.com-sponsored spring tournament, complete with a $1,000 prize -- within 20 minutes the club received 500 responses for 200 slots. And now, the 500-plus listserv.

In fact, aside from organizing tournaments and bi-semester strategy sessions, the club is just a glorified listserv, where interested students e-mail out to organize nightly games or a trip to Atlantic City.

"Poker on campus has really exploded, partly because of the listserv and partly because of online poker," Paul says.

Indeed, poker is hotter than the cocktail waitresses at the Borgata these days, and ESPN's World Series of Poker deserves much of the credit.

First aired in 1994, the WSOP benefited from the 2003 advent of the "lipstick camera" -- a small camera that allows the audience to see each player's pocket cards. Now, the at-home viewer can tell when a player is bluffing, or if a player is about to make a potentially game-determining move. This type of real-time excitement has generated unprecedented enthusiasm for both poker and poker shows like the WSOP.

That's what 10 Poker Club members were talking about on a recent Wednesday night -- Penn alumna Annie Duke just won $2 million in the Tournament of Champions -- as they trickled into a Harnwell College House lounge for a casual game of Hold 'Em that came together through the listserv several hours earlier.

At times, all you can hear is the clank of chips, a satisfying plastic-on-plastic tinkle, and when the players do speak, it's the language of poker. They talk strategy, and recall past hands like sports statistics -- he had bullets and the flop came ace, king, 2; he caught a runner, runner flush; he went all in on Big Slick.

But if the tone is casual, the game is not. The chips are real, the money is certainly real -- on average, each player buys in for $100 -- and even the faux-wood table now boasts a felt surface, courtesy of a baby-blue fleece blanket one of the organizers has stripped from his bed.

And then, an interruption: "Can I buy in?" asks a newcomer, hovering by the door. "No, not now," comes the reply. There are too many people. The student turns to leave as someone calls out, "Are you gonna come back?"

"If I don't lose too much online in the meantime," he says, smirking.

"Basically, on my hall and on campus, there just aren't high enough stakes games ... and I felt to make more money, I needed to start playing higher-stakes games," he says of his decision to play online. "Also, online games are much faster. You can play three tables at once, and the games pass" more quickly.

But by the end of October, Paul says he hopes to be done playing online. Instead, he'll have 20 computers playing for him.

Paul wears glasses and has a dry voice that borders on pedantry -- many of his offhand comments become mini-instructional lessons on poker. He's the type of kid you might expect to program a computer to play poker.

"If my computer program works, that should make $200 grand a year," he says. "The goal is to have it at every [online] low-limit table," where the bets are small and newbies go to hone their skills.

And the program is a simple one -- literally.

"It's not going to be a very smart program," Paul says. "It's going to play low-limit poker where the players are pretty much terrible, it's only going to play the best cards and it's going to play them aggressively. At low limits, that's enough to win."

So win he will, or so he hopes. True to the poker world, Paul is taking a risk.

Steve Jacobs knows what it's like to win -- $65,000, to be exact.

He is, after all, a bit of gambler.

With his eager brown eyes and lanky 6'2" frame, Jacobs is half little boy, half gambler. He wears braces, doesn't look a day over 18 and dashes out of the Taj Mahal's poker room to buy a Mrs. Fields cookie.

But he has arranged his schedule so he has no Friday classes, "so I can play in Friday tournaments" in Atlantic City, talks about his girlfriend in gambling terms -- "she sees me as a long-term investment" -- and once bet a guy in his dorm $50 that he wasn't going to gamble until winter break. He lost within an hour.

Always an entrepreneur, Jacobs got his unofficial start in high school, scalping his family's extra 76ers tickets, and his official start during freshman year, with online blackjack. Jacobs says that many sites offer a promotion, wherein if players deposit at least $100, the site will match them with a $100 bonus, provided they use the money to gamble. So he developed a plan: Deposit $100. Receive $100 bonus. Gamble using initial deposit only. Cash out with said bonus. Repeat.

It was a perfect plan except that, as with any perfect plan, there was just one flaw.

"The problem was, I was too addicted to actually cash out," he says.

He says all this in a $100 cab ride back from Atlantic City -- "If I win, I take a cab. If I lose, I take the train," he says, grinning -- in mile-a-minute spurts and exclamations, alternately rejecting and embracing gambling.

"But I'm definitely going to law school next year," he says.

Pause.

"Unless I win one of those tournaments for a million or something. Then I can't make any promises."

And moments before: "There is nothing more pathetic than coming to [Atlantic City] with your last $100, losing it all and going back on the train, unshaven, unshowered."

And on the surrealism of poker: "If I thought of a hand in terms of a dinner at Morton's, it'd probably be tougher," he says.

Surapaneni agrees.

"You kinda lose perspective on money," he says. "Here, if I lose $1,000, I don't think about it."

"I bought in for $10,000 and then sold" the chips, Surapaneni adds.

That's because he wants the other players to have chips, not cash, in front of them -- it's easier to bet your next car payment when it's in the form of six black-and-green checkered chips, and Surapaneni is more than happy to pick up the pieces.

He plays a tight style, meaning that he plays only the best hands, and plays them aggressively, calling and raising and betting. In an hour at the Taj's high-rollers' table, Surapaneni only plays three hands -- ace-queen, king-jack, ace-king -- and wins two of them.

"Ashok is more of a success story," Jacobs says, and then he's off again, eating his cookie, reflecting on Atlantic City and thinking about all the hands to come.

Oct. 4 /PRNewswire/ -- Hollywood Poker Club
(http://www.hollywoodpoker.com) is inviting everyone to a sneak-preview
celebration with a huge free celebrity tournament! This exciting new online
poker destination is a place where everyday people and big celebrities can get
together and share their passion for poker. Join James Woods, Vince Van
Patten and other Hollywood celebrities in an online Championship where you
have the exclusive opportunity to play against the stars and could become the
World Poker Tour's next millionaire. Reserve your seat before October 15th at
HollywoodPoker.com to guarantee your free entry.
Hollywood star James Woods comments, "It's a wonderful mix when you get
celebrities interacting with their public. So I thought here's a website
where I can interact with my fans and at the same time play, and hopefully
beat, all my celebrity friends. For our fans it's great. How good would it
be to have a tournament online, and if win now you're playing in a tournament
with celebrities and you have a chance to bust them out!"
World Poker Tour commentator Vince Van Patten is also getting in on the
action. "Poker is taking Hollywood by storm!" Vince announces. "I've been
playing big Hollywood home games for years, and there isn't an 'A List'
celebrity that I haven't taken down. Hollywood Poker Club allows us all to
play online together -- whether I'm on location filming the World Poker Tour
or stars are shooting movies on sets around the world. I invite everyone to
join us, because there's nothing better than bluffing a major actor."

About Hollywood Poker Club
Hollywood Poker Club is a licensed poker room offering great online games
against celebrities and real people around the world. Easy, safe and secure,
Hollywood Poker Club provides players with the ultimate free and real money
poker experience. Play Texas Hold'em, Omaha, 7-Card Stud and exciting
tournaments 24/7. No download required!

About James Woods
Known for his intelligent, edgy performances, James Woods is now bringing
the studied passion of his film roles to the poker table. His reputation as
one of the America's most explosive actors have earned him three Emmys, a
Golden Globe, and two Oscar nominations for his performances in "Salvador" and
"Ghosts Of Mississippi." Some of his most memorable film roles include his
work in "Once Upon A Time In America," "Against All Odds," "Videodrome,"
"Casino," "True Believer" and "The Onion Field." His skill in bringing
wrenching reality to any role is reflected in the fact that he has brought
more real-life characters to the screen than any top star, running the gamut
from Roy Cohn to Rudy Gulianni.

About Vince Van Patten
Vince Van Patten has been an actor in Hollywood for many years. He has
starred in numerous film and TV series. Along with that, Vince was a top
tennis professional ranked in the top 25 in the world. He has also been
nicknamed the "King of the Hollywood Home Games" and has played in some of the
biggest cash games and tournaments in the world. Visit us today at
HollywoodPoker.com

When Ben Affleck went looking for a personal poker tutor he didn't pick some cigar-smoking casino tough guy. He wanted one of the best, so he called on Annie Duke — a mother of four and one of the top poker players in the world.

Poker was once thought of as a game exclusively played by men, but today there are a growing number of professional poker-playing moms. Duke is one of the best of them.

When the World Series of Poker invited the top 10 players in the world to compete in their Tournament of Champions at the Rio Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Duke was the only woman asked to participate.

The 39-year-old Las Vegas mom faced off against some of poker's greatest players, including poker legend Johnny Chan.

For Duke, the tournament was bittersweet. During one of the day's more dramatic moments, she knocked out the very man who taught her how to play the game — her brother Howard.

But in the end, he would be proud. The last man standing that day wasn't a man at all.

Duke took home a $2 million pot — the largest single jackpot ever won by a woman.

Ladies Touch

"Being a woman, in general, is an advantage, because the men, mainly the young guys, don't give you the respect at the table," says Clonie Gowen, a mother of two from Dallas who made a name for herself when she won the World Poker Tour's Ladies Night.

Gowen says many of the young, male players don't take women seriously, and that's a big mistake.

"They don't seem to respect women and they just want to overpower you at the table," says Gowen. "Usually when they're trying to overpower you, they should be folding their hands."

As women continue to make their way on the professional poker circuit, there will undoubtedly be more Dukes and Gowens — making the colorful world of professional poker a bit more colorful.