Poker on TV has been the catalyst that allows millions of people to view real poker being played by today’s young guns and poker legends. A day does not go by without advertising for another Texas Hold’Em TV poker scheduled event for cable or television. It is becoming the basis for corporate investment in a growing industry and a motivation for players to enter numerous tournaments that offer millions of dollars. Software is being developed for hand held devices and cell phones to play poker. Deals are being made to broadcast live tournaments over the Internet from land based casinos. And if that’s not enough, then there are a growing number of television shows based on poker. Even charity events are bringing in money for those who need it behind the affection started by televised tournament events. Plus women are coming to the tables in droves, along with magazines on different versions of the game like Texas Hold’Em marketed especially to women. And the end is not in sight for this trend as more people learn to enjoy and watch the game of poker.
With an estimated 50,000,000 people in the United States alone who play the game, corporations began scrambling to capitalize for all the money that could be made when tournament event ratings showed reflection of the public’s appetite. ESPN’s poker audience went from 408,000 viewers in 2003 to 1,300,000 per broadcast in 2004. The 2005 World Series of Poker broadcasts will have over 2,000,000 people watching each televised episode when ESPN starts showing them in June. World Poker Tour episodes will be shown in 60 countries and if Steve Lipscomb has his way this will increase to 200 countries. And others are close behind with programs like Celebrity Poker and Poker at the Plaza which are pulling in big ratings. Online poker rooms are now becoming a billion dollar industry. They provide many satellite tournaments that anyone can play in to get a chance to be a television star competing for big bucks. Even states within America such as North Dakota, Illinois and Georgia are competing to pass legislation to legalize poker over the Internet for a piece of the revenue pie, despite the direction of the federal government. Outside of the U.S., England is at the threshold of permitting its land-based casinos to take bets online from U.S. citizens.
Proponents of the game state that the effects of the televised tournaments toward society are positive. Enough to where a person can find “family nights” for playing being offered by organizations promoting the game. Many of the present day champions have stated that they learned how to play from ages as young as 5 from their parents or relatives at home. Kids and teenagers with guidance can learn how to plan strategy, manage money, solve complex problems and understand the psychology of human beings. But every coin has two sides. A concerned number of people are voicing the opinion that the creation of gambling addicts is taking place. More and more land-based and online casinos are taking this seriously by offering help for gambling addiction and the creation of new programs for assistance for those who have problem issues. Having help available for players will become increasingly important as the enthusiasm of the game goes forward.
Is there a limit to the “all in” attitude for Texas Hold’Em tournaments being watched by the public? With retail sales, record ratings for television and cable plus big business pouring millions into it, the trend is still clearly reflecting the upswing. And if state legislation moves in favor of regulation of the online gambling industry for the tax revenue, it might not go away anytime soon. Because no one sits down at a table looking to bust out early, they sit down to win.
About the Author
Tom Howze is a webmaster for 9 sites that relate to 2005 World Series of Poker and World Poker Tour events, updates and resources for poker on tv .
Our Universe, A Speculation
By Kenneth J. McCormick
Http://aboutfacts.net
Here I am discussing the formation of the universe again. It’s a subject that is fascinating because of all its implications. Tied deeply into this is the age of the universe. But there may be even a bigger question and that is, does age have any relevance when speaking about the universe? You may wonder why I would say something like this. It is astronomical blasphemy. Every astronomer worth his salt talks about seeing back to the beginning of the formation of the universe with telescopes and how we may someday be able to see back to the exact beginning and here I am, mister nobody, saying that they may all be wrong.
Lets look at why I am saying this. We, as mere mortals, really have no idea if the universe has formed before, or for that matter, if it has, how many times. There is a theory that states that we live in an osculating universe. That there was a big bang and matter that was blown out created the stars and galaxies along with the other bodies. It goes on to state further that someday these bodies, which it says are speeding away from each other at a great rate of speed, will begin to slow down and then they will begin to fall back in on themselves until they become one huge mass and then explode again, causing the process to start over. If this goes on over and over, does time have any relevance when we talk of the age of the universe? If this theory is correct then how could we possibly ever know how many times this expansion has occurred or the true age of the universe? The best we could hope for would be to know the time that has passed since the last big bang.
It may turn out that what we think of as the universe is only a tiny piece of a much larger object. I once saw a story on TV about a scientist finding out that we were really living in a gigantic cell in a creature that was made up of billions of these cells. Hey I know this was only a story, but you never really know. Wouldn’t it be something if we reached the end of what we thought of as our universe and found another one, then another and so forth? That may not be so far fetched. If that is the case then we may not be able to tell how the universe was formed, only our little part of it.
Some scientists today believe that there was a big bang but the expansion of the universe will go on forever. Every object will speed away from the next until the universe is a dark and cold place. They think this because they believe that there is not enough matter to slow down the expansion. But most scientists believe in dark matter and they believe that most of the universe is composed of it. The theory goes on to say that it will be the dark matter that will eventually get the expansion to slow down, stop and reverse.
Astronomers believe that they have discovered ripples in space that precede any creation of matter. They state that this discovery proves that there was a big bang. Astronomers used to believe that space all had the same temperature. I am not talking about space right next to a sun but deep space. It wasn’t until COBE, the Cosmic Background Explorer was launched in the 1990s that they found out that they were wrong. There were variations in temperature detected. But not all discoveries have been good for theorists. For many years scientists have believed in the red shift. Simply stated, as objects speed further away their light shifts to the red end of the spectrum. This is used to also judge their distance. Here is where the monkey wrench comes in. Recently one of the farthermost galaxies ever discovered showed up as old not young, but the further out we see, the further back in time we are looking because light takes so long to reach us. So how could this extremely distant galaxy be old? This is a good question. No one has the answer right now; I think they are still all in a state of shock. The implications are that the red shift measurements may not be accurate for every galaxy, maybe a galaxy aged extremely fast for some reason, or maybe there are old galaxies way out there
I like the idea that there may be old galaxies near, what we think is the beginning of our universe. I like it because things may turn out completely different than we thought they were. Maybe we observed the tail end of an adjourning universe and we will find more old galaxies. Another thing, who says there is a law that states that there was only one big bang in one area? I know that Einstein said that the universe was curved and if a beam of light is sent out into space that it will eventually return to the point of origin due to this curve but it does make you wonder, doesn’t it? What is this barrier that won’t allow you outside the curve? Why couldn’t I take a spacecraft with a computer and chart a course that just keeps going straight out? I have a very hard time with this one.
Another thing that I wonder about is physics. Are the laws of physics the same throughout the universe? Maybe parts of the universe formed differently than other parts even though they look similar through a telescope. If I go onto a planet in another galaxy is it possible that gravity may work differently? I drop that apple from a tree and it travels sideways. Scientists would laugh at me for proposing this but I believe that they shouldn’t be too sure of things. There is so much out there that we won’t understand for a long time or maybe never. What if it turns out that the laws of nature are different in our galaxy than any of the others? That would be a shocker. We might even find life that is not carbon based.
When you think about the universe there is just so much to ponder. It truly makes you feel insignificant.
About the author:
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Ken is the webmaster of About Facts Net, an interesting, free Internet Magazine. The magazine is suitable for the entire family and many of the articles are accompanied by photographs, video and/or audio.
About Facts Net
Http://aboutfacts.net