[memphis57]

I've got a friend who started playing online poker the same time I did, last November, but quit after a month because it was "boring". Recently the topic has come up again, as he has been quizzing me on why I still spend time on it when I'm only making about $4 per hour at Party 0.50/1. I've tried to explain how interesting it is to me, and that my current play is educational and could pay off in the future with $50-100+/hr earnings at higher limits when I get good enough.

I really think my friend should try it again. How would you combat the "boring" argument?

My friend is a professional gambler who uses a very math-intensive approach to find positive plays on various casino games, principally Video Poker, but also slots and other games. As we all know, these games are negative EV in themselves, but the casinos are always offering promos to draw more business, and my friend finds ways to combine these promos with games that are 99% or so standalone, so that the combination is +EV. Lest some say this is impossible, as some have in other posts I've made referring to +EV Video Poker, I should add that my friend has wagered something around $10 million in the last 2 years and has netted something around 1% of that amount. (Prior to that, he bonus whored the online casinos for a year or so, long before any of us were into that, and I guess that's where he got his initial bankroll - he says he hit a total of 60-70 casinos for their signup bonuses at that time.)

So, here's this person who understands math, who has a bankroll to play almost any low or middle limit, who makes his living by gambling, who isn't afraid of the internet ... but he doesn't see the advantage of picking up online live poker. Worse, he finds it "mind-numbingly" boring - so boring that he would rather play a slot machine where he calcualtes that he has a 1% edge. Here's his answer to my latest email, when I tried to explain that it was FAR from boring to me:

[ QUOTE ]
Thanks for the poker comments. I didn't find the game itself mind-numbingly boring, but the slowness and solitude, and waiting forever for a playable hand. Also, the differential diagnosis of what opponents were holding got very repetitive, even over a single month.

[/ QUOTE ]

This guy really should be playing poker online. Help me persuade him. I'll send him this thread if I can get a few good answers.