[bmedwar]

I've played the TTHv5 demo for 10 minutes and 750 Poki hands (mostly 10 player table; some heads-up). The main thing that stands out is that Poki has a much nicer interface. It looks kind of like Paradise poker. The menu's and dialog boxes are easy to access and don't get in the way. And it is FAST. I was blazing through hands. I think this is important, b/c it helps you baseline different strategies quickly.

I am a novice poker player (have read some books, play weekly neighborhood game, on my last trip to Vegas I "survived" the 4-8 games at Binion's and Billigio).

Compared to free games on Paradise and Yahoo!, Poki is a much better learning tool, because it is faster, and the opponents are much better. I definitely noticed that the opponents maximized their winnings when they had the best hand while minimizing my winnings when I had the best hand. Now I've just got to figure out how to reverse that. You can't learn to slow play pocket Aces on Yahoo!; the other players are too wild.