If you're a FULL TIME professional, internet poker player...

recently completed my first month as a full time pro (dropped out of college despite having a full scholarship)

played about 50,000 hands, mostly at 15/30 (a lot of 10/20 the first 2 weeks)
finished up 30k for my first month as a pro... my 4th month playing poker

-THE_EN1GMA

[anduril]

stay in school

[POKhER]

[ QUOTE ]
recently completed my first month as a full time pro (dropped out of college despite having a full scholarship)

played about 50,000 hands, mostly at 15/30 (a lot of 10/20 the first 2 weeks)
finished up 30k for my first month as a pro... my 4th month playing poker

-THE_EN1GMA

[/ QUOTE ]

My jaw dropped.

if he ten tables =120k a month, he'd have to 12 table i suppose... Geee.

[MicroBob]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm reaching the conclusion that online poker is more like work than work was. For reference I was a programmer, and we had plenty of pre-release crunches. Even during those I worked less in a 12 hour day than I do in a 6 hour poker day. Way less.


[/ QUOTE ]


There is some truth to this of course.

Online-poker is not the end-all-be-all for me.
I enjoy it for the most part (compared to other options) and the money is reasonably decent so it's all okay.

I get to work when I want while watching the ball-game on TV. But it is still work of course.


If I won big-big-time and had $1-million or more stored up you can bet that I wouldn't play nearly as much since I would then be in a position where I wouldn't have to. maybe a little if hardly at all....just enough to continue to make some dough but that's about it.


I do not miss too much of the cameraderie of the work-place in some aspects (although the social-aspect can be pretty okay sometimes).

Having to turn-in requests for time-off 2 months in advance vs. taking your vacation for 1 day or 15 days whenever and wherever the hell you feel like it is pretty huge in my book.


My GF is a nurse at a hospital and she has some manager there who nobody really likes.
Stupid people in management are one thing.
Stupid people on power-trips in management are just obnoxious though.
I'm sure most of us are familiar with the type.

you could argue that dealing with party cust-support is similarly incompetent....but to me it just doesn't provide the same level of stress of a real power-hungry idiot-supervisor/manager hounding you about something.
I've mostly worked for people who I've gotten along with great (and still keep in touch as friends with a few)....but there are a couple of real TOOLS who have stuck-out along the way.


Anyway, GF goes around from room to room on her hospital floor literally cleaning people's poop (as well as dealing with blood and vomit....and setting up one IV after another) for 13 hours a shift yet she can handle all that.

It's the annoying manager-types who don't have a clue who either make working there miserable or tolerable.


Her 7a-7p shifts are really more like 6:45-8:00 and some days she doesn't eat because she simply never had time to take a break for lunch. (other days are less busy of course).


So while I do view online-poker as more of a 'job' as Rudbaeck observed....and I know what he's talking about in regards to the screwing-around in many work-situations...I am also very aware of how freaking easy I have it compared to many other people just from having learned to not completely suck at this silly game or at money-management.

[grinin]

[ QUOTE ]
Stupid people on power-trips in management are just obnoxious though.


[/ QUOTE ]
This really is one of the major reasons I like poker. My wife often comes home from work and tells me about the backstabbing and whining from her fellow coworkers, stupidity of middle management and the suck your soul mentality of upper management in the small corporation where she works. The funny thing is she likes what she does, but the stress from the extraneous crap is far worse than the stress from the job itself.

I play about 10-15K hands of 10/20 short per month and am happy to report that it is not yet a grind.

Been meaning to mention to you Bob, my son's mother in law is a recruiter for traveling nurses in Ft. Lauderdale, FL so when you want to do your world tour stop in Miami let me know and I will give you her contact info.

[Rudbaeck]

I agree. The fringe benefits and the total absence of moronic bosses is the main thing keeping me glued to the poker tables.

But the work part is very, very intense. I don't think people really appreciate just how much blood sugar that lump of grey matter consumes when it's running on full throttle for hours on end.

Surgeon is pretty much the only job I can think of that would be worse. But then it'd be worse by a fair margin.

And from reading this forum over the last year I am slowly forming the opinion that the single biggest threat to the proven online pro is burnout. Tilt, bankroll issues etc are midges to the giant of burnout.

[Python49]

[ QUOTE ]
It consists of 80% non-work. You talk to coworkers, idle at the coffee machine, and you're not facing a salary deduction if you take a loooong dump.

I'm reaching the conclusion that online poker is more like work than work was. For reference I was a programmer, and we had plenty of pre-release crunches. Even during those I worked less in a 12 hour day than I do in a 6 hour poker day. Way less.

[/ QUOTE ]
So if playing poker is so much work then go get a job then. Nobody's forcing you to play. There are alot of people who play because they know it beats the hell out of sitting behind a desk all day.

[soko]

Beat this, I get paid salary $10 an hour to sit at a computer and answer the phone, which consists of simply picking it up saying hello how can i direct your call then pressing the correct name on my phone, this happens maybe 50 times in an 8 hour work day, and takes less than 5 seconds per call, the entire time I am free to play poker.

[Subfallen]

I play ~30k hands/month, though I also work 50 hrs/week at a "real" job...should be quitting that soon however.

[soko]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
It consists of 80% non-work. You talk to coworkers, idle at the coffee machine, and you're not facing a salary deduction if you take a loooong dump.

I'm reaching the conclusion that online poker is more like work than work was. For reference I was a programmer, and we had plenty of pre-release crunches. Even during those I worked less in a 12 hour day than I do in a 6 hour poker day. Way less.

[/ QUOTE ]
So if playing poker is so much work then go get a job then. Nobody's forcing you to play. There are alot of people who play because they know it beats the hell out of sitting behind a desk all day.

[/ QUOTE ]

Wait, you want to play poker to get out of sitting behind a desk?