Adventures on the Poker Felt

Online poker just took a huge kick to the junk.  I haven’t been keeping up with my blogroll so I’m not sure if there has already been several posts about this.

Last month, Full Tilt and PokerStars banned French players from playing on their .com site.  They’ve since created a .fr online poker room available only to French players.  They’re completely segregated from the rest of the online poker world.  This restriction was required by the French Government so they could get license fees and a percentage of the rake.  It appears a similar law was introduced by Italy some time ago but wasn’t enforced.

I suspect more countries will follow suit making it that much harder to beat the rake and tougher online texas holdem fields.

Interestingly, Full Tilt froze French players accounts preventing withdrawals while the .fr site and client software was being developed.  PokerStars still allowed French players to withdraw their money.   I’m not sure how long French accounts were frozen by Full Tilt but, that’s just unacceptable.  Unfortunately, French player’s hands were tied.

If this leads to US regulations and our segregation from the rest of the world, say goodbye to online poker.  Only the best players will be able to beat the game and rake.

This is a terrible turn for online poker.