The 60 Minutes feature on the Absolute Poker and UltimateBet online poker cheating scandals earned a collective "meh" from the Entities.
Yeah it wasn't great for online poker but it could've been way, way worse. The final piece was far from the outright "hatchet job" we were told it would be.
Not everyone shares this opinion though. Taking a lot of heat right now is Todd "Dan Druff" Witteles for his closing comments:
"The people who did this were very greedy and very blatant. But the scary thing is there may be other accounts out there like this, maybe even on other sites that are not being done with the same sort of recklessness. And maybe this has been going on on more than Absolute Poker and UltimateBet, maybe it's going on in several other places, and maybe it's still going on on these sites."
Pretty legitimate concern (although we don't believe it is happening), especially if you were actually one of the people who was scammed, as Druff was.
But Druff is getting slammed on 2+2 (start reading here). Even Mason Malmouth went on a 2+2 podcast to use Druff's comments as an opp to smack down NWP and call for some weird "regulations" of sites within the poker industry.
The funny thing about this is Druff was one of the guy's who helped unearth the Absolute mess, doing the poker community a big service. Dude is getting no slip-up equity for that. And in the 2+2 podcast, it was also revealed that Druff even clarified his "controversial" statement that he did feel safe on other sites, but 60 Minutes didn't air it.
Anyway, more high school drama is sure to ensue. Listen to Mason's chat here.
Read more on NWP here. Druff to go on NWP Radio as well.
Watch the full 60 Minutes piece below for more perspective in case you did miss it.
Watch CBS Videos OnlineTagged as: 60 Minutes, Online Poker, Online Poker Cheating, Poker News, Todd Witteles
Absolute Douchebags: Potripper and other online poker cheaters were finally featured on 60 Minutes last night.
60 Minutes aired its online poker cheating story last night. Some initial thoughts:
- Could’ve been worse.
- Especially when Steve Kroft started it off by saying that you can simply access an on site by logging on to the “world wide web…” At least he didn’t go with “Information SuperhighwayTM.”
- Come on, Todd. You could’ve at least told them to refer to you as Todd “Dan Druff” Witteles. Nice NWP representing nonetheless.
- The Kahnawake Gaming Commission is absolutely useless.
- The fact that no criminal action has been brought against Russ Hamilton is disgusting.
We’re currently working on a major Russ Hamilton story, and like 60 Minutes, tried contacting him about a month ago and had similar results. We know of a few big name pros who Hamilton personally stole money from through a super-user account. The dude is a slimeball.
More to come…but read more on the scandals here, here, and here.
Tagged as: 60 Minutes, Online Poker, Poker News, Russ Hamilton
With the full Entity West Coast migration complete and recovery from Thanksgiving underway, let's catch up on some not just poker news from around the so-called "Internet." Back to full strength on Monday…
:: Can't forget we're just a day away from the 60 Minutes online poker hatchet job. [link]
:: With that in mind, here's Nat Arem's hierarchy of poker cheating. [link]
:: Players are criticizing the WSOP final table broadcast, but ratings were up 47% from last year. [link]
:: Phil Hellmuth's clothing line probably won't sell well in Northern Europe. [link]
:: Daniel Negreanu continues his big year, besting 690 to win the BC Poker Championship. [link]
And a final "thankful for…" before we become ingrateful for the next 360 days or so: Stripper 101 classes to teach girlfriends/fiances/wives how to swing from a pole.
Watch Fawnia's Move of the Week on RawVegas.tv
Tagged as: 60 Minutes, Daniel Negreanu, Online Poker, Phil Hellmuth, Poker News
Well it’s finally going to air.
After filming the piece at the WSOP this summer and supposedly set to air on November 9th (which they ended up delaying), CBS is ready to broadcast it’s online poker hatchet job (as we first reported) this Sunday.
The story is called “The Cheaters” and will obviously detail the Absolute Poker and UltimateBet scandals. Here’s the descript from the website:
60 Minutes and The Washington Post reveal how online poker players suspecting cheating were forced to successfully ferret out the cheaters themselves. That’s because managers of the mostly-unregulated $18 billion Internet gambling industry failed to respond to their complaints. Steve Kroft and The Washington Post’s Gilbert Gaul report.
Check out Dan Druff from NWP in the below clip.
(ironically, Michael Phelps will be on this show as well in a separate story)
Tagged as: 60 Minutes, CBS, Online Poker, Poker News
So our sources are telling us that 60 Minutes will not air it’s "hatchet job" (as first described to us here) on online poker sites Absolute Poker and Ultimate Bet on November 9th.
They may want to get more interviews, like one with Russ Hamilton (good luck with that). Or more likely, this Sunday is going to be all about Barack "BAM!" Obama.
Hopefully, it just doesn’t air. Bury that thing.
Developing…
Tagged as: 60 Minutes, Absolute Poker, Online Poker, Poker News, Russ Hamilton, Ultimate Bet
The long awaited 60 Minutes feature on the Absolute Poker online poker cheating scandal took a big step to hitting the small screen today. And Wicked Chops Poker is the only site with photos of the news event.
Anchor Steve Kroft, 62, interviewed Mark Seif (wearing an Absolute Poker jersey), Mike Sexton (not wearing a Party Poker one), Linda Johnson (why? was Shari Flanzer unavailable?), and Greg Raymer (wearing a Poker Stars shirt). The interviews took place in an empty Rio Amazon Room around 11am.
We overheard Raymer discussing the need for the U.S. American government to regulate online poker, and we can surmise because we’re smart-like-that that the rest of the messaging from the group was on point with the PPA’s platform. Raymer, a Libertarian, said he doesn’t see why the government should regulate his actions if they cause no harm to others. Johnson (why her again?) and Sexton both agreed with the need for regulation and taxation.
The wild card in this mix is that 2+2 poster and founder of the AbsolutePokerCheats.com website (here), Michael Josem, was also interviewed. How the stories weaved by Seif and Josem regarding the Absolute scandal will surely be a focal point of the piece and may eventually influence (ever so slightly) how legislators decide to handle the legality of online poker moving forward.
Unfortunately, word from our sources indicate that this 60 Minutes feature will be an outright "hatchet job" on the online poker industry. Although that’s really not much of a shocker. But it’s certainly not good news either.
More photos from the interviews below. The one of Josem with Seif in the background (second from left) is particularly great.
View the full 60 Minutes online poker scandal photo gallery here. If you swipe photos we appreciate the link back to WCP. And definitely re-watch Mark Seif’s interview on the Absolute scandal from last October here or view it in its entirety after the jump.
[click to continue…]
Tagged as: 60 Minutes, Absolute Poker cheating scandal, greg raymer, Mark Seif, Mike Sexton, Online Poker, Steve Kroft
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