Texas Hold’em has quickly become a staple on TV, in casinos, and in living rooms around the country.

You must know how to play, and how to play well. Whether you want to beat your friends in a friendly home game, or make some money playing online or at a brick and mortar casino, or compete in a tournament, the following tips will show you how you can begin a journey which can be fun and rewarding.

You can begin by…

PLAYING FOR FREE

Admittedly, playing poker free without anything at stake is usually boring and unrewarding.

However, the majority of online poker sites still offer the option to play poker using free money. Anyone who opens an account receives a small sum of play money he or she can use at the play money tables. There they can play in the same manner that the real money tables use.

Now clearly the level of competition and the quality of the strategies are not those you will usually find at a real money table. That is not to say that the free tables are not without purpose. Since the site will keep records of the amount of free money you win, there will be a steady increase in the level of play as you start entering into tables where the stakes are higher. For instance, if you were to start out with 1,000 dollars and slowly work your way up to a sum of 20,000 dollars, allowing you to enter into tournaments where the buy-in is 3,000 and up, then you would be playing against higher caliber opponents. As a result online poker for free does have its own level of competition and depth.

When you have mastered the play money tables, you can then begin playing at the real money tables. Take the time to play for free and think of the decisive advantages it presents:

Gain a knowledge of the best starting hands in Texas Hold em.
You learned to harness the power of position at the poker table.
You have grown in your understanding of betting and the various betting strategies
Grasped the ability to speak poker slang without looking like an idiot at the tables.
You understand there is a proper code of conduct known as poker etiquette.

So what are you waiting on? Do a search on online poker reviews and find the poker-client that best suits your needs. While you begin learning to play poker for free, you should…

BUY THE BEST POKER BOOKS

A large number of poker players find their introduction to the game of Texas Holdem through some of the best poker books.

With Texas Hold’em experiencing such a rapid growth in the past several years, there are more poker books than ever before, however you want in your possession the best poker books. Read poker book reviews and find the top poker books especially for beginning poker players. However, take the time to search the Internet for information on how to play poker and the different Texas Hold em starting hands before starting out.

Good poker books can help you improve techniques to your game that you may have not known or have ignored. You also might find that during a bad poker run, re-reading your favorite poker book can help you return to the essentials and point out some probable weaknesses in your game.

Do yourself a favor and read nothing but the best poker books that will help you to learn how to play poker. Now there is one other tip you should utilize if you want to learn how to play…

FIND A POKER COACH

If you are serious about learning to play poker and wanting to win money, you should consider a poker coach. You are aware every professional athlete has a “go to person.”

Hank Haney tutors the prolific Tiger Woods to keep him in check and perfect his swing. Heck, even Michael Jordan himself had a mentor. Every paid athlete regardless of the sport has a tutor or a trainer to maintain his or her discipline… Always helping with strategy and perfecting the game.

Poker is a people game and coaching is a people thing. A poker coach can see what you are doing wrong and immediately correct you. That is hard and perhaps impossible to do on your own.

If you’re serious about playing poker then you should take playing poker serious enough to find a good poker coach. Having someone to critique your play may save your bankroll down the road.

Learning to play poker takes a minute to learn and a life-time to master. With the aforementioned tips it will make learning to play easier. Good luck at the tables.

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Poker After Dark – Hard to Read (source: launchpoker.com)
All the players at Poker After Dark’s the Cash Game show admitted one thing: Durr was hard to read. In the $100k buy in event Phil Hellmuth, Allen Cunningham, Guy Laliberte, Mike Baxter, and David Peat were playing with a crafty player better known for his… (source: launchpoker.com) – RSS and News widget on Feedzilla.com

Poker Players Alliance to Raid the DNC (source: launchpoker.com)
When the Democratic National Convention for 2008 takes place around August 25th, the grassroots organization known as the Poker Players Alliance plans on being there. The PPA will hit the DNC on August 26th, and plans on bringing some big name firepower to… (source: launchpoker.com) – RSS feeds and Feed widget on Feedzilla.com

Poker After Dark – Durr Does It Again (source: launchpoker.com)
The $100k buy in event featured the best players out there, such as Phil Hellmuth, Tom Dwan, Allen Cunningham, Guy Laliberte, Mike Baxter and David Peat. It was Baxter and Dwar who mixed it up before, and were destined to do it again in this particular han… (source: launchpoker.com) – RSS news feeds and Widgets on Feedzilla.com

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Anybody who has not heard of the poker game? Anybody who has not played a round of poker game? I think not. Even celebrities nowadays participate in celebrity poker games. But who knows how poker came about? In truth, there is a dilemma as to who can lay claim for the birth of this card game. The French have it ‘poque’ which descended from the Germans’ ‘pochen’ which means “to knock”. However, it can be contested that it could have originated from the Persian game of ‘as nas’ that could have been taught to the French settlers by Persian sailors in New Orleans. However poker came about, everybody is playing it and loving the challenge. Poker rules therefore are extremely important since you might be betting your car keys already, for all you know. The poker rules guides the green horn on how to loose graciously the first few deals. Thus learning to play a good game of poker is expensive.

We need to know the basics on how to play poker, the poker rules according to the poker variant, poker etiquette and poker hands to be able to passably play. Winning is everything in poker since this is a mind game more than anything else.

First off, we need to clarify the different poker game variants to know which poker rules need to be in play. There are many variants to the poker game but the more universal poker game variants are: draw poker, stud poker, widow poker game, and miscellaneous poker games (which include Stud Horse poker, Oxford stud, Guts, and Blind Man’s Bluff). However, the most commonly played poker games for the first three variants are the five-card draw, seven-card stud, and the Texas hold ‘em.

Since this is the most played poker game variant, poker rules for the five-card draw are generally easy to remember. It is assumed that you basically know the general poker game play, the hand values and the betting system. Poker rules differ from the home-style games to the more formal games as played in the casinos. For formal games blinds are commonly used while for home games, it is more typical use an ante. Ante is where the first betting round starts from the player to the dealer’s left, then the second round betting begins with the player who opened or made the first non-zero betting in the preceding round.

A common house rule in playing five card draw in home or social games is that a player can not replace more than three cards, unless he holds an ace or a wile card so that the deck stub will not be easily depleted. Another common house rule is that the last card in the deck stub is not dealt anymore to ensure that anybody who might have seen it will not use that information.

In the seven card stud, poker rules are a bit more complex than the five card draw since two to eight players can play. The only poker rule to remember, (better make it your mantra) is two down, four up, one down. This is the lay of the cards and not meant to mean something else.

The third most commonly played poker game is the Texas hold ‘em. The poker rules here are the same with the first two but what makes this different is the introduction of lipstick cameras where spectators were able to view each player’s cards.

Definitely, we have seen that poker rules changes a bit depending on the game of poker being played. Now that we have learned the different poker rules, playing it like the pros would be as easy as pie. Good Luck!

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Draft California Poker Act Becomes Public
California’s proposed poker legalisation law is released into the wild. Read the full story at http://www.classicasinos.com/PokerNews/ns_01052009_215.html

Aussie Millions 2010 – Qualify at Ladbrokes Poker
Join some of the biggest names in poker by qualifying with Ladbrokes for as little as 4. Read the full story at http://www.classicasinos.com/Poker_Promotions/Aussie_Millions_2010_Qualify_at_Ladbrokes_Poker.html

PokerBot Site Offers $10k For Bot-Friendly Venue
A pokerbot site is inviting bot users to vote for the most bot-friendly site. Read the full story at http://www.classicasinos.com/PokerNews/ns_20062009_250.html

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The latest rage by poker aficionados and programmers is to create and use a poker bot that will automatically play online poker with little or no human interaction, with the ultimate goal of winning money. This recent craze has alarmed both online poker sites and players as the fear of a computer program with the capacity to win online poker will essentially be able to outsmart live thinking players of their hard-earned money and eventually rob the poker sites of quality players afraid to play against so many poker bots.

A recent industry study concluded that 12% of online poker players were apprehensive about or had completely stopped playing online poker in light of the recent poker bot craze. That essentially sends players offline rather than risk their money against these new computer-generated poker bots.

However, there are several ways to beat a poker bot in online poker, and knowing these methods will certainly give the human player back the edge against poker bots. One fact that makes a poker bot a better player is that they lack the human emotion or power of reasoning that a human must use when playing online poker. A poker bot is not apt to go on ’tilt’ or get angry when they are the victims of a bad beat.

In playing online poker, human players are up against two major advantages. One is the computer generated code created by the poker sites to determine shuffles, deals and outcomes of a hand, while the other disadvantage, just as dangerous to your bankroll, is the poker bot, that is pre-programmed with all the statistics and probabilities of the game.

Nevertheless, you can use the computer-generated codes of the poker sites and poker bots against them if you understand how they work. A poker bot is confined to making decisions based solely on the play of the game with regard to its statistical analysis of poker. In other words, a poker bot will only make decisions based on known patterns in the game.

Moreover, the online poker sites, which actively attempt to detect and thwart the efforts of poker bot programmers and users, have implemented a counter-measure to the poker bots, using the same known patterns. By implementing a counter measure to the poker bots, a poker site is able to ensure that a poker bot will not win since the poker bots actions are predictable and confined to a skill-set directly related to statistical odds and probability.

This, as confusing as it may seem, actually works to the advantage of the human player. While the poker site’s software is actively seeking the poker bot patterns and attempting to detect who is a human and who is a computer generated bot script, they also inadvertently implemented a flaw which allows a human player to take advantage of the online poker sites weakness.

In reality, this has resulted in a human player having the ability to not only beat the poker bot, but beat human opponents as well. By following a set pattern that the online poker sites are using, an advantage is created for anyone who is aware of that pattern. This pattern is known as a sequential algorithm and that algorithm dramatically has changed the poker game online to force wins and losses in a set, specific and predictable pattern.

It is not only plausible to beat a poker bot; it is easily accomplished by recognizing the patterns used by online poker sites. These patterns are simple to learn and require little skill by a human player. So the next time you think about playing poker online, consider using the codes and algorithms created by the poker site to your advantage. They are there to prevent the poker bots from winning, but not you!

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WSOP-C Hammond, Final Table: Steve Billirakis Caps Wire-to-Wire Run (source: pokernews.com)
In an impressive display, Steve ‘MrSmokey1′ Billirakis took the chip lead on Day 1 of the World Series of Poker Circuit Main Event at the Horseshoe Hammond and never let go, going wire to wire to take down the $208,885 first prize… (source: pokernews.com) – RSS feeds and Feed widget on Feedzilla.com

Poker Hall of Fame Adds Two Players (source: about.com)
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The genesis of poker:

The exact age people actually started playing poker is heavily disputed. This game has many variations. So it is possible that it was born in several different places. It is common belief, however, that poker was invented by the Chinese way back in the 10th Century A.D.

People believe that poker came from Chinese dominoes. It is said that Emperor Mu-Tsang of China played a game of domino cards, a possible ancestor of poker, with his wife a day before the 969 A.D. new year.

Some others feel that poker in fact has its roots in as-nas, a Persian game. This game which was first played in and around the 17th century was a 5 player game and was unique in the fact that it had only 25 cards in the deck with 5 different suits.

Some others claim that “poque”, a French card game was the true ancestor of poker. It was invented in 1480 by the French who settled in New Orleans. They used the normal deck of cards.

Dawn of the Era of Online Poker.

People invented games in the bygone era which resulted in poker. Now poker itself has reinvented itself into a new form -Online Poker. People are crazy about this game which offers many advantages over normal casino poker. This craze is spreading fast among all age groups and types of people.

Best Poker sites:

The best poker site is most probably one of those listed below. Novices can view these sites to find the site that suits him/her the best to improve his poker playing.

1) The forums on CardsChat.com

This is probably the best poker playing site online. It has a forum for exclusively poker and another for other card games. Poker players can read the various topics in the forums.

www.cardschat.com is the place to go if you want an active poker forum.

2) Learn Texas Hold’em

This is easily the best online pokers site for beginners. Here there are various write-ups on hold’em, advanced poker strategies and poker rankings. There are various poker tables, tips, and even a question and answer section in the site.

www.learn-texas-holdem.com is a must visit for beginners.

3) Celebrity Poker Showdown

It is the official site of the poker program on Bravo TV. It has complete videos of games and tip for gaming. It is the most famous poker site in the world wide web. If fame was everything, this site will win hands down.

It has an interactive flash animation on playing Texas Hold’em. It also features the poker great Phil Gorden

Play poker with the celebs at www.bravotv.com/Celebrity_Poker_Showdown

4) Poker Babes

It includes the profiles of prominent poker champions. You will be shocked to see the number of women champions in this man’s game

It is the best site for women poker players. It has many perks for women players and offers them a lot of priceless tips for excelling. After all, why should boys have all the fun?

All women poker players must visit www.poker-babes.com

5) Online Poker Guru

It is indispensable for poker rules, strategies, tips and tricks. It also runs down the memory lane by presenting the history of poker and poker vocabulary. It is among the best novice sites. This site is the true guru in teaching poker for novices.

Let the Guru teach you how at www.pokeronlineguru.com

6) Poker News

This site is a strong contender for the best poker site award. It offers unbiased reviews of other poker sites and helps users to join the poker room that suits them best. This is the place you need to be in if you want to stay in touch with poker and other poker players.

Get to know the latest in poker www.pokernews.com

7) Poker terminology glossary

This site has a comprehensive list of poker slang, definitions, terms and other must-knows for basic poker play. It cannot be done without for beginners. Even experts may have to cross check with this list at times.
Learn poker slang and terminology on www.conjelco.com/pokglossary.html
Low limit Omaha
This site stands out in providing novices the various possible starting hands of poker and also gives strategies for hi/lo split low limit Omaha games.

Check out these strategies at www.lowlimitomaha.com

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Online poker is a billion dollar business. The thrill of sitting at home and playing poker has become an everyday event for millions of people all over the world. The World Poker Tour and similar tournaments have made people rich playing poker and they opened the door for online poker sites to start their own version of poker tournaments. Beginners, as well as seasoned players are spending money and a lot of time to win jackpots worth millions.

Poker playing is a combination of skill, focus and intuition, blended with an initial stake and a desire to win. Age, race, education and economic status are not as important as taking the first step and learning how to play the game the right way. Thanks to relatively new poker technology any player can become a seasoned winning veteran quickly by purchasing software called a poker robot, which is better known as a poker bot. The poker bot hooks up to any online poker site and is programmed to bet, raise, call, bluff or fold at the appropriate time during a game. The player can adjust the program to suit playing styles and the style of other players. Everything a player needs has been programmed into the bot, all the player needs to do is pick the online site and start winning.

Winning is not guaranteed by poker bot companies, although some poker bot makers strongly advertise their winning capabilities. Poker bots are legal, but there are some poker sites that don’t allow players to use them. If a poker bot is detected on a site that does not allow their use, the site will confiscate all winnings, as well as any money deposited in the account and will ban the player from the site There are new poker sites popping up daily and many of them condone the use of bots and even pay companies a commission to sell them to players. Some poker sites use poker bots to keep the tables in play during slow times or to fill a table when there are just a couple of real players playing.

Most poker players who invest in a poker bot want to win and make money. Marketing companies that sell bots claim a player can go from rags to riches using a poker bot, but most of the inexpensive bots on the market are not worth the investment. In order to find the right bot to win money, the first step is to do some research. All poker bots are not created equal, after all, they are software programs and they are only as good as the information that was used to program them. Most programmers understand the game, but if they knew how to win big money consistently, they would be playing, not building programs. There are other programs that are worth the investment because they have been designed by groups of University students who have share knowledge about different aspects of the game. Those groups, as well as others are creating great poker bots that keep getting better every year. Poker bots are not far behind new backgammon and chess bots that are designed to win every game and are almost unbeatable.

Poker bots that think and reason have not been created yet, but a big advantage of a poker bot is it can not be intimidated. Players will back off from aggressive players, bots will not. The good poker bots are programmed to do whatever it takes to win. In order to win money using a poker bot, a player must be able to identify where and who to play. Veteran players and big money games are use to poker bots and can hold there own playing against them. Low limit games and new players don’t have the experience or the focus to play against a poker bot and that is where a player has the best chance of winning consistently.

It’s better to win 10 small pots of $20 over an extended period of play than it is to play in a big game. Winning small pots on a daily basis in low limit games is the best strategy when using a bot, especially if you’re new to a site or have just started to play. As long as a poker bot is not undermining the confidence of other players or winning becomes too obvious and causes the site to investigate, a player can develop a money making strategy using a bot. In fact if a player finds four or five low limit games on different online sites, the bot can play for a good portion of each day and the winnings increase substantially.

People are winning big when they develop a system that works for them. Any player can win money consistently using a poker bot if a strategy is developed that contains research, patience, knowledge and a strong desire to win. Poker bots are changing the way poker is being played on online poker sites. It’s not people vs people vs computer anymore, it’s computer vs computer vs people and it may even come down to computer vs computers unless the online sites develop new guidelines, terms and conditions. Until that happens the poker bot is man’s new best poker friend and winning partner.

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Six Characteristics of a Great Poker Player
First off Id like to express that I do not think I am a great poker player. I have been outplayed thousand of times, some of my opponents constantly outplay me. I tilt, play in bad games, gamble too much, drink too much and make countless other…

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