Welcome to Rec.Gambling.*!

Changes or additions to this section of the FAQ should be submitted to: jacobs@xmission.com.

Table of Contents

Section W: Welcome to Rec.Gambling.*!

W1 What is Rec.Gambling?

W2 What guidelines are there for posting to rec.gambling.*?

Section I: Information Sources

I1 Where can I find the latest FAQ list?

I2 What gambling information is available on the World Wide Web?

I3 Where is the gambling archive?

I4 Where can I get books about gambling?

I5 Where can I get discounts on gambling books/software?

I6 What other sources of gambling information are available?

Section H: History of Rec.Gambling

H1 A brief history of rec.gambling.

H2 What is WRGPT?

H3 What is BARGE?

H4 What is IRC Poker?

Section W: Welcome to Rec.Gambling!

Q:W1 What is Rec.Gambling?

A:W1 (Steve Jacobs)

The purposes of this message are:

• To provide guidelines for posting to rec.gambling.*

• To help you find the latest versions of the rec.gambling.* Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) lists, which should be read before posting questions to rec.gambling.* newsgroups.

• To help you find other sources of information about gambling, such as the rec.gambling archive and the World Wide Web home page for rec.gambling.

• To provide some of the history of rec.gambling, and the various events associated with the newsgroups, including:
  • WRGPT (World Rec.Gambling.Poker Tournament)
  • BARGE (Big Annual Rec.Gambling Excursion)
  • IRC Poker (online poker games against live opponents)

Q:W2 What guidelines are there for posting to rec.gambling.*?

A:W2 (Steve Jacobs)

Use appropriate subject lines in order to target your message to those who are most interested. Whenever practical, try to include one of the following keywords (or something similar) in the "Subject:" line in order to make it easier for readers who are only interested in one or two topics:

    POKER    BLACKJACK    VIDEO POKER    CRAPS    ROULETTE
    SLOTS    LOTTERY      RACES	         PONIES   DRIVEL

A few points of netiquette to keep in mind before posting to rec.gambling.*:

• Before posting, consider whether your post will be of general interest to the group. If your message is primarily targeted to one or two individuals, then use email instead.

• Appropriate topics for these groups: Gambling and wagering in all forms. Although the groups tend to focus heavily on games which permit the player to gain an advantage over the house, many games which are "unbeatable" are discussed here as well. Trip reports from recent visits to casinos are also welcome, and enjoyed by many readers (especially those who are unable to get to the casinos as often as they might like). Discussions often include some heavy mathematical analysis as it relates to gambling (especially combinatorics, probability/statistics, and game theory), and results of computer analysis and/or simulation of specific games.

• Try to stay on topic as much as possible. If the discussion strays to non-gambling topics, please consider moving the topic to a more appropriate forum or to email. An occasional stray discussion is OK, just don't get carried away.

• Before posting, check the FAQ to see if your question is already answered there. If you are unwilling (or too lazy) to check the FAQ first, then don't be surprised if the only answer you receive is "see the FAQ".

• It is a good idea to read the entire FAQ at least once (even if you don't have specific questions), and to "lurk" for a while before posting to the groups. If you are just stopping by to sell something, don't bother -- we've seen the "MAKE MONEY FAST" post and other scams before, and we don't appreciate them. We're primarily here for discussion of gambling topics, so if you won't be around to hold up your end of the discussion, then it is very unlikely that your post is appropriate for this group. Messages of the form "gambling is evil/stupid/unhealthy" are completely unwelcome here.

• If there is any question about the legality of your message, then you probably shouldn't post it. Although it is perfectly OK to talk about gambling here, we cannot actually _gamble_ here, and we cannot post messages which could be construed as assisting someone to perform wagering services of any kind.

• Advertisements are generally not welcome in USENET newsgroups, and rec.gambling is no exception. If you have something to sell, please use the appropriate .forsale newsgroup instead. However, some leeway may be permitted for software and books that are gambling related, especially if special discounts are offered to the rec.gambling community. Long ads are simply not appropriate. Frequent posting of ads is also not appropriate -- once a month is often enough.

Section I: Information Sources

Q:I1 Where can I find the latest FAQ lists.

A:I1 (Steve Jacobs)

The multiple posted (ASCII) parts of the FAQ are archived at rtfm.mit.edu (18.181.0.24) in the directory /pub/usenet/news.answers/gambling-faq. The files are: welcome, general, casinos, blackjack, poker, craps, sports, and misc. To obtain the files, first try ftp to rtfm.mit.edu and look under that directory. If ftp does not work from your site, then try the mail server:

send email to mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu with

send usenet/news.answers/gambling-faq/welcome

send usenet/news.answers/gambling-faq/general

send usenet/news.answers/gambling-faq/casinos

send usenet/news.answers/gambling-faq/blackjack

send usenet/news.answers/gambling-faq/poker

send usenet/news.answers/gambling-faq/craps

send usenet/news.answers/gambling-faq/sports

send usenet/news.answers/gambling-faq/other-games

The ASCII versions of the FAQ are also available from ftp.conjelco.com in the directory pub/faq.

Q:I2 What gambling information is available on the World Wide Web?

A:I2 (Steve Jacobs)

Chuck Weinstock has created HTML versions of all sections of the rec.gambling FAQ, and made them available at ConJelCo. The latest versions of these FAQ lists may be obtained via the World Wide Web at:

Rec.gambling FAQ http://www.conjelco.com/faq/

The following sites may also be of interest to gamblers:

Atlantic City http://pluto.njcc.com/~lemke/ac/ac.html

ConJelCo Home Page http://www.conjelco.com/

Foxwoods Maillist Homepage http://www.tc.cornell.edu/~jeg/r.g/fox/fox.html

Las Vegas Advisor http://www.infi.net/vegas/lva/

Las Vegas Online http://www.intermind.net/las.vegas.on-line/homepage.html

Maryland Casinos http://www.jaeger.com/~erich/marygamb.html

Reno Hilton http://www.sierra.net/Hilton/Reno/

Virtual Las Vegas http://www.infi.net/vegas/vlv/

Vegas.com Home Page http://www.vegas.com/

Q:I3 Where is the gambling archive?

A:I3 (Abdul Jalib M'Hall)

The archive is accessible via anonymous ftp to ftp.csua.berkeley.edu (128.32.43.51). (Type "ftp ftp.csua.berkeley.edu" or "ftp 128.32.43.51" and then "anonymous" when it asks for the name, followed by your email address when it asks for the password. Then "cd pub/rec.gambling".)

If you have some things you would like to contribute to the archive, contact ctl@csua.berkeley.edu.

Q:I4 Where can I get books about gambling?

A:I4 (Steve Jacobs, Mike Northam)

  Gambler's Book Club
  Box 4115
  Las Vegas, NV 89127
  (702) 382-7555
  (702) 382-7594 (FAX)
  (800) 634-6243 (orders only)

  Gamblers Bookstore
  99 N. Virginia St.
  Reno, NV  89501
  (800) 748-5797

Q:I5 Where can I get discounts on gambling books/software?

A:I5 (Chuck Weinstock)

Q:I6 What other sources of gambling information are available?

A:I6 (Martin Veneroso, John Murphy, Steve Jacobs)

Horse Racing

There is a mailing list for discussion of horse racing and handicapping. If you are interested in joining us, send a note to derby-request@inslab.uky.edu and be sure to include an Internet email address (i.e., a "@" address.).

Also see the newsgroup alt.sport.horse-racing.

Bay Area Poker List

The ba-poker mailing list is just a bunch of folks, mostly located in the San Francisco Bay Area, who like to read about poker as it is played in the Bay Area, and a few who like to write about it. We discuss both home and commercial (card room) poker, including who's doing what where, a smidgen of strategy, a few tall tales, and very little flaming (although a couple of battles have broken out in the past).

A fair estimate of the traffic probably would be ten or twenty messages a week, but they tend to be clumped around someone raising an issue. The list as gone a couple of weeks without distributing any messages, although that is becoming more rare as the number of subscribers climbs slowly -- we have about 150 now.

To subscribe, send a message to majordomo@best.com, with a message body of:

SUBSCRIBE ba-poker

or, for the digest version of the mailing list:

SUBSCRIBE ba-poker-digest

-- if you would like your message to be seen by a human rather than an automated server, send it to owner-ba-poker@best.com (which goes to Martin Veneroso).

Colorado Gaming Mailing List

Send email to ccbh-request@hpesjlm.fc.hp.com to join a mailing list for gaming in Colorado.

The Foxwoods Maillist

The Foxwoods Maillist consists of folks who like to indulge in a little poker, BJ, craps, roulette, etc., etc., even Bingo(!) at their favorite cardroom/casino,... in this case the Foxwoods Resort Casino located near Ledyard, CT. The maillist is used to trade trip report, discuss issues of game strategy, checkup on "ride-sharing", plan for get-togthers and special events (e.g. NETS tourney's), cry about "bad-beats", crow about those big wins, etc., etc. There are (as of 5/15/95) approximately 100 subscribers to the list, and not all are located in the Boston/Providence/Hartford/NYC area (there are even some CA rec.gamblers subscribed!).

A World Wide Web page is also available to FW Maillist subscribers as well as to the rec.gambling community in general, and contains information on "Where is Foxwoods?", "How do you get there?", "What about the hotels and restaurants at FW and in the surrounding area?", "What are the games, and the comps policies?", Special Events, a "Who's Who", an email archive, and a collection of FW trip reports. The URL for The FW Maillist Homepage is:

http://www.tc.cornell.edu/~jeg/r.g/fox/fox.html.

All maillist administrivia (e.g. subscription requests, "unsubscribes", etc.) should be sent to meta-fw-request@tc.cornell.edu. To send mail to the approx. 100 folks currently subscribed to this maillist, send to meta-fw-list@tc.cornell.edu.

Hotels

Questions about hotels and restaurants are often posted to rec.gambling.misc. Similar information about Las Vegas can be found in the newsgroup alt.vacation.las-vegas

Section H: History of Rec.Gambling

Q:H1 A brief history of rec.gambling.

A:H1 (Matt Wilding, Steve Jacobs, Selim Guncer)

During the early years (roughly 1990 and 1991), blackjack and craps were probably the most popular topics on rec.gambling. This was before there was a FAQ, and much of the focus was on card counting and computer simulations of blackjack games. Flame wars between blackjack players and craps players were popular. There was virtually no discussion of poker during this time. The first BARGE took place in Aug. 1991 (before it was ever called BARGE), and the Presto!/Irwin legend emerged at that time. The Frank Irwin Memorial Commode Ceremony also came from this BARGE trip. There were perhaps a dozen rec.gamblers at the first BARGE. The first rec.gambling FAQ was created late in 1991.

The first WRGPT was launched in early 1992, with Will Hyde acting as dealer. Poker discussions gained in popularity, partly as a result of this tournament. Traffic on rec.gambling probably averaged about 10 to 20 posts per day during this time.

A formal proposal to split rec.gambling we presented early in 1995, and passed by popular vote. The new newsgroups were created on June 5, 1995. The original rec.gambling group was superceded by rec.gambling.misc, and was scheduled to be rmgroup'ed on Aug. 7, (coincidently) right after BARGE '95.

[This section could use a lot of work -- any volunteers?]

Q:H2 What is WRGPT?

A:H2 (Steve Jacobs)

WRGPT1 started early in 1992 with 30 players. WRGPT1 was dealt by hand, with Will Hyde devoting much of his time to the task. Steve Jacobs won the tournament by eliminating Ken Butler and Bharat Rao on the last hand with K-T offsuit.

WRGPT2 attracted about 130 players, and began in the fall of 1992. This tournament, and those that followed, were dealt by Ron Duursma's excellent email poker server. Ed Baker took first place in this event, coming from behind to eliminate Jeff Jennings. Roy Hashimoto was 3rd.

WRGPT3 attracted about 200 players, and began in the fall of 1993. Roy Hashimoto won this event, becoming the second rec.gambler to win both WRGPT and BARGE titles. Marco Westerweel placed second in this even, and Kristofer Munn placed third, edging out fourth place Ron Duursma (to whom we all owe much thanks for writing the mail server that is used to deal WRGPT events).

WRGPT4 attracted 376 players, and was won Lee Jones, well known to rec.gambling as the author of "Winning Low Limit Hold'em". Can Lee win the BARGE '95 tournament to become the 3rd rec.gambler to win WRGPT/BARGE tournaments back-to-back?

Q:H3 What is BARGE?

A:H3 (Steve Jacobs)

BARGE stands for "Big August Rec.Gambling Excursion". This is the annual rec.gambling gathering, so far always in August (can you imagine a worse time to go to Vegas?), but if we go some other month we can change the "August" to "Annual" in order to preserve the acronym.

The first BARGE consisted of maybe a dozen people, mostly in Vegas to attend SIGGRAPH '91 (well, at least that's how they got their companies to pay the airfare). We met at the Frontier for breakfast, and at Gambler's Book Club to check out the latest periodicals. Several rec.gamblers pitched in to purchase a book to help launch Abdul Jalib M'Hall's blackjack career.

BARGE 2 had more attendees, about 20 in all, and included meetings at the Frontier, GBC, and a live poker tournament held in a hotel room. The main gathering took place at the Frontier coffee shop, where about a dozen rec.gamblers met for a midnight meal (thanks, Edmund). In keeping with rec.gambling tradition, Steve Jacobs won the first live BARGE poker tournament, becoming the first rec.gambler to win both an WRGPT event and a BARGE event.

BARGE 3 had about 30 attendees, of which about 20 participated in the live poker tournament held at the Rio. Special chips were created to commemorate BARGE 3, and were sold through rec.gambling to raise a prize fund (including a set of 300 chips as a trophy) for the winner of the tournament. Roy Hashimoto, who flew to Vegas especially for the tournament, took first place. Each attendee at BARGE 3 received a special limited edition purple BARGE chip, which have becoming highly prized collectors items.

BARGE 4 had about 90 attendees, of which 60 paid entry fees in advance for the live poker tournament at the Luxor. A calcutta was held the night before to auction off players from the poker tournament. Roy Hashimoto designed some fabulous poker chips for the BARGE 4 trophy, which went to Dave Hughes. Cash prizes were paid for 1st through 6th place, with teddy bears going to Jeff Jennings for placing 7th and to John Murphy for being the first player to bust out of the tournament. This year a live blackjack tournament was added to the agenda, attracting about 30 players and many spectators to a high roller suite somewhere on the world famous Las Vegas Strip. [Who won the BJ tournament? Who bought Dave Hughes to win the Calcutta?] An informal gathering for pot-limit Texas Hold'em was held later at the Luxor, and a bachelor party was held for Steve "Bozo" Blackstock at a location which might cause him undo grief if it were revealed here.

The early BARGE trips were mostly spontaneous events, with little advance planning and consequently little advance notice, so if you couldn't drop everything and fly to Vegas then you missed out. But, such spontaneity isn't too practical for large groups, so now we try to plan things a bit more. An email list has been created to help those interested in BARGE to plan for the trip. To be added to the mailing list, send email to BARGE-request@vmark.com. Messages to the mailing list itself should be sent to BARGE@vmark.com.

See http://www.conjelco.com/barge.html for the latest information on BARGE 95.

Q:H4 What is IRC Poker?

A:H4 (Steve Jacobs)