Mobile Poker Cheating Growing!

Source: blackjackchamp.com

While both Apple founder Steve Jobs and Google CEO have declared moratoriums on mobile gambling applications within the Apple App Store and the Android Market (respectively), software developers continue to create mobile poker apps.

Now, two more internet gambling firms have publicized new mobile poker applications which enable players to wager real money in as many days.

On January 19th, Austria-based Bwin, which may be merging with Party Gaming, launched what they are hailing as the first ever native iPhone gambling app that enables poker players to wager real money. While this poker app can currently only be bought from the Apple App Store by iPhone users in the United Kingdom or Austria, Bwin plans to release the poker application throughout the rest of Europe in the foreseeable future.

On January 20th, Microgaming software declared that their own real money Android poker app would be available by the end of this financial quarter. The application will provide access to all online poker rooms available within the Microgaming network. Lydia Melton, Microgaming’s head of poker, stated “For years now, industry experts have speculated on the mobile market’s possibilities for gaming…. The technology is ready, the software is ready, and we believe the players are ready as well. The future is here. We are extremely excited about this release.”

Even though mobile gambling has proven to be a growth industry for the past few years, progress porting real money wagering, especially for poker, to smart phones has been limited by legal and moral objections in some regions and confusion about the same in others. Additionally, mobile poker has more complicated technological requirements since more data is transferred and securing the applications to prevent cheating requires greater sophistication. Compounding the issues, the Apple App Store has long resisted gambling apps and recently Google declared real gambling is not allowed in the Android Market.

Despite all these obstacles, additional internet poker rooms and poker networks can be expected to join the mobile gambling market – the market hold too much potential for profit to be ignored.

Want To Buy a Special Poker Cheating Card Table?... Just Check Out This Poker Cheats Equipment Auction!

Throughout the 1970s, a Las Vegan by the name of Ray Carson was a dealer, floorman and pitboss at the fabled Horseshoe casino, which at the time was home to legendary poker cheats such as Johnny Moss, Amarillo Slim and Puggy Pearson. He later became a surveillance supervisor at Caesars Palace. But what Carson is well-known for in gambling circles was his ability to design and manufacture gambling cheating devices, especially cheating devices used to cheat poker games.

Carson died last year at 102, so he surely had a long life that revolved around lots of poker and casino cheating. His first cheating device was the famous blackjack prism card shoe, which allowed cheating blackjack dealers to peek at the next card in the shoe to be dealt, as well as give them the capability to deal the second card beneath it. However, his most notorious cheating device was the poker holdout table. You have probably heard of poker holdout devices that poker cheats used to pack and carry cards up their sleeves, but the poker holdout cheat table was really something special. It looked just like a regular poker table, but when the cheat sat at the ideal spot and applied pressure in a certain area of the table, it sucked up the card in his hand. Then when he applied pressure in another exact spot right next to the first, the table spit out the card the cheat had already hidden there. To camouflage the entire cheat operation, all the cheat had to do was lay his hands or cards and chips over the two spots, very easy to do without drawing suspicion.

One of Carson's prized holdout tables was a 32 by32-inch folding card table with a smooth wood top and felt inlay supported by plain metal legs. It was cheap and completely innocent looking. But it was the most functional holdout card table in the history of cheating at poker and gambling. It worked with a springboard hidden underneath the felt on the table. When the cheat pressed the exact spot, the spring pushed a card through the slot where the felt center bordered the wood. Well-known magician Jason England said, "The Carson table was most likely also used for gin. In gin, a single good card, like an ace, seven or eight, could be very useful. And if you’re playing in a big game, where twenty-five or fifty grand could change hands, a single good card could be really useful."

So, why am I writing about Ray Carson and his poker cheat tables? Because next week one of his special holdout cheat poker tables will be auctioned off at Potter and Potter Magic Memorabilia's auction house in Chicago, Illinois. It is expected to fetch up to five grand! I don't know if any perspective buyer is planning to use it to actively cheat poker games or if he could recoup the five grand if he did, but it sure is a handy piece of equipment to have around the house and show and tell. It would certainly generate some good poker cheat war-stories if the eventual buyer knows a thing or two about the history of card cheats.

Magic historian Gabe Fajuri, who is presiding over the auction of Carson's gaffed poker table, said, "Ray Carson definitely built this table for crossroaders--cheaters. But we're selling it for entertainment purposes only. It will probably go to a magician or to a collector who can show it off. It's not our goal to arm Legion of the Night with tools of their trade."

We will see about that!

Fajuri said that these type of poker cheat tables are not generally available to the public. "This stuff trades privately. It's rarely available by auction. You can count the number of times these things have come to auction on one or two hands." Did Fajuri mean "poker hands?"

When asked about the danger of the cheating device falling into the wrong hands, Fajuri said it was unlikely to happen, that "most magicians don't have the balls to be card cheats, let alone use a holdout table (this is true, the magicians I have met at gaming shows are ball-less)). If you secretly palm a card or do a shift or second deal and get caught, there’s no real evidence against you. But if you get caught using a holdout table, it'd be hard to deny."

My take: Heck, if you ain't gonna use it, don't buy it!!!

Humongous Online Poker Cheat Russ Hamilton Involved in Florida Brick and Mortar Poker Room Fracas!

Source: Poker News Daily

A recent sighting of 1994 World Series of Poker (WSOP) Main Event winner Russ Hamilton in a Florida poker room and a verbal altercation at the tables have sparked the ire of the poker community once again.

A poster on the TwoPlusTwo forum named “Slifdog” detailed a trip to Gulfstream Park’s $5/$10/$20 No Limit Hold’em tables on Tuesday evening. Slifdog and a friend allegedly sat down on each side of a player with “well over $10K” in front of him, only to realize that the mystery man was the alleged mastermind of the Ultimate Bet scandal, Hamilton. From that point, Slifdog and his partner decided to take a few potshots at Hamilton.

According to Slifdog, his partner dug into Hamilton about how he is “karmically screwed” over his actions at Ultimate Bet before the duo administered their coup de grace that set him off. After Slifdog bluffed the former WSOP Main Event titleholder in a hand, his friend commented, “(It’s) a tougher game when you cannot see your opponents cards.” Then, Hamilton erupted in fury.

“You are a f***ing d*ck… a f***ing d*ck,” Slifdog quoted Hamilton as saying. “If you believe everything you read, you are just stupid, just a stupid f***ing d*ck. You do not know what you are talking about; you were not there. You just read about it and think you know.” Soon after this tirade, the floor tried to gain control of the situation, which only seemed to prolong the disagreement.

Slifdog reported that the floor man, apparently in response to Hamilton’s status at the betting windows and on the felt of the Gulfstream Park facilities, came to the table and “[asked] Billy to stop tormenting this lard a**. Billy says loud so that most of the room can hear, ‘You let cheaters play here and then you make me stop talking when he screams at me?’ The floor says that Billy is going to have to leave if he does not settle down and Billy responds, ‘I don’t want to play anywhere that caters to this type of cheating scum.’ We pack up our chips and leave.”

Poker pro Jonathan “FatalError” Aguiar, who apparently was at Gulfstream as well on the night in question, confirmed the incident. On his Twitter account, Aguiar chirped, “Playing PLO in a Florida casino and Russ Hamilton is here walking around!” Several of Aguiar’s followers responded to his Tweet, including 2010 WSOP Player of the Year Frank Kassela, who added his insight regarding Hamilton: “You gotta be brave.”

Hamilton masterminded the $20+ million cheating scheme on Ultimate Bet and used a superuser program to empty the bankrolls of hundreds of players like top pros Brad “Yukon” Booth and Prahlad Friedman. The latter is now a sponsored pro of UB.com, which was formerly Ultimate Bet.

The resulting outrage over the involvement of Hamilton has earned him the scorn of the poker world. Because of the unregulated nature of the online poker industry, no charges were filed in any jurisdiction that could hear the case. Hamilton himself was excluded from the 2009 WSOP Champions Invitational, which featured all of the living WSOP Main Event champions, and the scandals on Ultimate Bet and Absolute Poker were chronicled in a feature on the CBS news program “60 Minutes.”

Not unexpectedly, the forums were overwhelmingly against Hamilton regarding the events of Tuesday night. On PocketFives.com, poster “iamthedeck ftw” said, “LOL well played. Can’t even believe this scumbag shows his face at a poker table still.”

At TwoPlusTwo, a ten-page thread had developed by this morning, once again with many the comments praising the duo for their efforts in Florida. Poster “Jetto” perhaps summed up the situation when he commented, “Thing is the guy is still out and about and many people still respect him. You could score one for the good guys. But he scored big against many.”

Minnesota Mystic Lake Blackjack Dealer Cheated His Casino To Attract Hot Women!

No doubt that casino action and hot women go together, and no doubt that cheating and cheating go together whenever there are hot women playing blackjack in casinos. I am talking about hot women cheating on their boyfriends and husbands and, of course, hot women involved in casino and poker cheating.

Jacob Christensen, a blackjack dealer at the Mystic Lake Casino in Prior Lake, Minnesota, must have been dealing blackjack with a constant hard-on watching those midwestern lovelies stroll across the casino floor. When a trio of them sat down at his table, Christensen got really excited and blew his load...or I should say "blew the casino's load." Without a word to them about what he was going to do, Christensen began paying their winning hands...as well as their losing hands and push (tie) hands, which is a very amateurish cheat scam. I guess he was trying to get into their pants by giving them a very lucky night in the casino, which turned into many lucky nights!

Casino surveillance eventually caught on to Christensen's shooting the casino's load and Minnesota State Police were notified. They conducted an investigation and busted the smitten dealer. Christensen immediately admitted cheating the blackjack table and explained he only did it because the women were good-looking and he wanted to impress them. He pleaded to fraud on January 6th.

It was determined that Christensen paid out a total of $3,875 to one woman, $9,500 to another (who happened to be the daughter of his landlord), and $5,075 to a third. The prosecutor entered into evidence a number of suspicious checks written by the landlord's daugheer to the dealer, which suggests to me that Christensen was at least getting something out of the blackjack cheat scam. However, the judge presiding agreed that Christensen's motive was his lust and not his greed, so she gave him a lenient sentence of eighty hours of community service and three years' probation. Christensen will also have to reimburse Mystic Lake Casino for $18,720, the amount he paid out to the women. He has also been placed in the Minnesota Casino Black Book, which bans him for life from all the state's casinos.

The women were not charged.

My take: Well, I hope the poor guy at least got laid for his casino-cheat efforts! At least by one of hot ladies if not two or all three! But I would bet my last dollar that he didn't get any sex, as that's the way it usually goes.

I was a casino dealer myself and cannot deny the temptation of all those big-titted, round-assed strutting their stuff through the casino, but the worst thing a dealer could ever do is get involved in a cheating scam with people he doesn't know--especially women!

Women will rat you out faster than casino security can get the handcuffs on you! Luckily for Christensen, the judge was a woman...who probably felt sorry for the poor chap.

Off-Duty Poker Dealer Caught Cheating Poker Game as Player and Subsequently Fired Loses Wrongful Dismissal Lawsuit

Rezi Ghadipasha had been employed as a poker dealer for 12 years, the last four of which he dealt at the Cascades Casino in Langley, British Columbia in Canada.

Back on January 11, 2009, Ghadipasha was playing in a high/low poker game at the Boulevard Casino in nearby Coquitlam after his shift at the Cascades Casino. He was accused of cheating in that poker game by way of
switching cards from his high poker hand to his low poker hand after the dealer had exposed his hand. The effect of this poker cheat move was getting a push (where the player wins one hand against the dealer and loses the other) instead of a loss, so there is no exchange of money. In some cases, that poker cheat move results in the player winning both the high and low hands.

When the dealer caught on to Ghadipasha's cheat move that resulted in a push and confronted him, Ghadipasha denied it and kept his original $500 bet instead of losing. But then surveillance at the Boulevard casino reviewed the video of the table and determined that Ghadipasha had indeed switched cards from one poker hand to the other. The poker-cheat dealer then admitted to having cheated and gave the $500 back to the casino, but he was banned from the Boulevard for one year.

Ghadipasha stated to authorities that he made a dumb mistake that he couldn’t explain, but perhaps it had something to do with his drinking heavily that night. In spite of his coming clean, the British Columbia Gaming Policy and Enforcement Branch terminated his work registration and he was fired from his poker dealing job soon thereafter.

He then filed suit and lost. "This is a very sad case," British Columbia Provincial Court Judge Jim Jardine declared. Jardine ruled that the Gateway Casino Corp., the owner of the Cascades Casino, had every right to terminate his employment based on his being convicted of a gambling offense.

My take: When I was a casino and poker dealer some 30 years ago, I witnessed many dealers get into trouble gambling away their tokes (tips) after their shifts. Some of them then resorted to cheating the games to get their money back so that they could pay their rent. Unfortunately this is a problem that occurs readily today as well, and I believe that casino and poker employees should not be allowed to gamble in their own casino or in other casinos in the same jurisdiction, which is the case in many gambling areas.

Poker Cheat and Casino Cheat Hall of Fame Lady Pleads Guilty to Masterminding Tran Organization Baccarat Scam!

The female co-founder of the criminal organization bearing her last name pled guilty in San Diego federal court yesterday to felony conspiracy in connection with her involvement in the biggest casino cheating scam ever to hit brick and mortar casinos. The key to the scam was recruiting baccarat dealers in dozens of US and Canadian casinos to join their huge scam, which relied on false shuffling to enable the baccarat cheats to scam millions of dollars from several large casinos including the two giant casinos in Connecticut, the Mohegan Sun and Foxwoods.

45-year-old Van Thu Tran, who has been inducted into the Casino and Poker Cheats Hall of Fame, admitted that in the summer of 2002, along with convicted co-conspirators Phuong Quoc Truong and Tai Khiem, she helped organize the Tran casino-cheating operation for the purpose of cheating casino baccarat tables in the two countries. She told the court that the cheating organization netted more than $7 Million from the huge baccarat scam (I believe the true figure is more like $20 Million). She agreed to forfeit various assets to the court, including cash, jewelry and cars. She will be sentenced on April 11 and faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. There will also be restitution to the casinos victimized (I don't know how much that will be and how it will be distributed). With Miss Tran's plea agreement, that makes the total number of baccarat cheats to have pled guulty in the scam forty-two.

Assistant US Attorney General Larry A. Breuer said of the latest Tran co-conspirator to go down, "Today's guilty plea by the co-founder of the Tran Organization marks the final chapter for a group that targeted as many as twenty-nine casinos in the United States and Canada in their card cheating scheme."

My take: Long live the Trans! What should they do upon their releases from federal prisons? Well, for starters...maybe change their last name! LOL

Seriously: This was the largest and most well-organized massive casino-cheat scam in history that involved inside help from casino employees. These kinds of casino-cheat scams involving so many people always end up getting busted, but I have to say it is miraculous that their cheat scam went on for five or six years before that happened.

Repeat Roulette Cheating Scam Busted at Delaware Park Casino!

Jhon Soriano-Alequin of New York apparently doesn't get the message that rinky-dink roulette scams just are not worth the trouble, even in rinky-dink casinos. Soriano-Alequin, who comes from New York and apparently has more street smarts than casino smarts, was arrested for the ages-old roulette cheat scam of buying in for low-value roulette chips at one table and then passing them off to accomplices who snuck them into another roulette game in the casino after having bought in for higher-value roulette chips of their own. Since roulette chips are non-redeemable at the casino cage and assigned values on the table according to players' wishes, this type of scam is possible, although it is quite known by virtually every casino roulette dummy supervisor on the planet. What makes this worse is that Soriano's three roulette cheat accomplices; Joe Diaz, Nelson Gonzalez and Robert Dominguez, all from New York, got busted for this same scam in another casino back in September 2009 and were out on bail awaiting trial when they got caught with this new scam--last July! That's right, this latest scam happened six months ago, which leads to a load of questions such as "What took so long for the casino to bust these guys?"

The cheat charges this time are conspiracy and cheating at gambling, and theft. Soriano, who wasn't in on the first bust, got bail while his roulette-cheat buddies are gonna have to sit in jail for awhile. They won't be able to go for strike-three while awaiting trial this time.

My take: There is a lot of idiocy and delinquency involved here. First of all, did Soriano know his roulette-cheat cohorts had already been busted for the same scam, or was he duped into getting involved? I sure hope for his sake that he was duped! If not, he is an idiot and will surely be nominated for Casino-Cheat Turkey of the Year next Thanksgiving.

As far as Delaware's Delaware Park casino is concerned: Why did it take six months to arrest these guys? Is there surveillance team so inept that they didn't catch on when it was going on? If so, then how DID they catch on? Sounds like it may have been a rat job with one of the cheats' girlfriends or something???

Another Casino Refusal to Pay Slot Machine Jackpot...Phony Cheating Allegations?

Ernőné Marics, a very sexy Hungarian woman, thought she won a €25,000 jackpot at Casino Sopron in Budapest Christmas Day. But she is still waiting for the casino to pay her jackpot. Why the wait? Same old story: Casino Sopron claims Miss Marics somehow cheated, and if not, then the slot machine was out of order.

Looking at the sexy Hungarian, about the only thing I can think of that she cheated on is either her husband or boyfriend, as casinos would be full of men eager to hit the jackpot with HER! I surely would have loved to have her on my casino-cheating team!

As for the cheating allegations, Miss Marics told a Hungarian newspaper, "I own Hungary's most expensive wine. Why would I need to cheat this casino?" She said she was very upset. She then said that when she went to collect her jackpot, the director of the Sopron said there wasn't sufficient cash in the casino cage to cover it. (Who seems like it's doing the cheating here? Then the casino had the audacity to tell Miss Marics that she would be paid the jackpot money no later than December 27. She was given a promisory note to that effect along with a bottle of wine. (Like she really needed the wine!)

But when she returned to the casino on the 27th to cash out she learned that her membership card to the casino had been revoked and she was officially being accused of having cheated the slot machine. Then when that didn't go over too well, casino officials said the machine she'd hit the jackpot on was new and not functioning properly, its random number generator hitting too many jackpots at random, whatever the hell that is supposed to mean. Finally, the casino said it would have the manufacturer examine the machine to determine if or not it was faulty, and if not they would pay Miss Marics the jackpot.

The woman said she'd been loyally playing at the casino for fifteen years and nothing out of the ordinary ever happened when she hit smaller jackpots on the Sopron's slot machines.

My take: For those of you who don't remember, the Casino Sopron was the original victim of the Hungarian cheat trio who scammed roulette tables using laser devices in cell phones to clock the spinning wheel. That same team then went on to scam the Ritz Casino in London for $3 Million, and got away with the cash when a British court ruled that they were not guilty of cheating. These roulette cheat incidents may have made the Sopron Casino paranoid about cheating, thus their negative reaction to paying a slot jackpot that seems to me rightfully won.

Online Poker Cheating and Casino Cheating Peek Into New Decade

For those of you who don't realize, we have just entered a new decade. As 2001 was the correct official year beginning the new millennium, 2011 is the correct year beginning the current new decade. Naturally casino and poker cheating evolves with the arrival of each new decade just like everything else in life does.

So what might we see in terms of new and advanced methods of poker and casino cheating in the years 2011 through 2020, both online cheating and brick and mortar cheating? Let's start with brick and mortar cheating. I imagine that most of you are familiar with roulette computers and scanners to predict in which quadrant the ivory ball will land. In the past decade, cell phones using digital chips and lasers became the state of the art equipment to do just that. But this decade might bring some higher-tech changes to roulette-ball-clocking, if you want to call it that. How 'bout lasers embedded inside pinky rings that emit low-enough beams to be undetectable to casinos' detection devices? Imagine a beautiful woman decked out in jewellery standing by the roulette table with a laser cell built into her diamond ring. The pit bosses would be too busy looking at her, even at her pretty hands, to suspect that she was clocking the wheel through her ring.

Better yet, how 'bout marking cards without marking cards? What I mean is actually seeing the faces of cards lying face-down on the table, without a single telling mark on their backs. What am I talking about? Well, it might be called "marking cards by MRI." That's right! I am suggesting performing magnetic resonance imaging on cards in the middle of a casino poker game. How's that for poker cheats? Or blackjack cheats spying the dealer's hole-card?

How could this be done? Well, I am not talking about walking into your local public poker room or cardroom with a giant tubular MRI tunnel into which you are somehow going to slip the cards without anyone else at the table noticing. Nor am I talking about some other clunking device that will produce the magnetic field necessary to image the faces of the hidden cards. What I AM talking about is a rapid MRI pencil shooter that will silently and magnetically beam the cards and reveal their frontal images onto a tiny screen your are wearing as a...you guessed it...finger ring! AND, you will be wearing special glasses that allow you to see the screen on your ring.

And what about cheating at craps? No MRIs here. Just state of the art remote control devices that let you control the dice as they fly out of your (or anyone else at the table's) hands and across the table layout. Talk about dice-control! Forget all that Frank Scoblete bullshit...this is the real deal!

And this entire blog entry is nothing more than a figment of my imagination. Hope it gave you a good laugh, though!!! LOL

UltimateBet Online Poker Cheat Victim--Now Front Man for UB.com, Prahlad Friedman Tells Why He Did It

Source: Bluff Magazine

For a little more than a week now the poker world has been dealing with rumors and speculation that Prahlad Friedman would be signing with online poker site UB.com. The reaction of the poker community has been shock and, in some cases, even anger. Friedman was the biggest victim of the UltimateBet Superuser Scandal having lost millions to Russ Hamilton and his now infamous cheating ring. When rumors first surfaced that Friedman would indeed be signing with UB many people questioned the positioning of Friedman’s moral and ethical compass. How, after rejecting all suitors up until this point, could he sign with poker site that cheated him out of millions of dollars?

With the signing now confirmed BLUFF sat down with Friedman to bring his side of the story to the discussion.

The poker community has responded with shock to your decision to sign with UB after you were a victim of the now famous UltimateBet Cheating Scandal. What do you say to those who are angry or disappointed in your decision?

I would say that’s their personal opinion and I’m fine with that. I’m kind of an outspoken guy myself so I understand why other people are outspoken, so I don’t really have a problem with their opinion, I just totally disagree. Just the fact that they’re so anti-UB I guess. I feel like they took care of me after the scandal. I feel like they didn’t have to pay people back and they did. It was amazing to find out I was going to get a hunk of money back. I have a good relationship with their team and their management and I feel like this is a totally different UB than anything associated with the scandal.

At any point in the last week have you reconsidered your decision?

No. Not at all. I talked to friends and family, just bascially all my loved ones and they all said go for it. I explained all the situation of everything and they said go for it. And these are a lot of real liberal people, a lot of down to earth people that I completely respect. When you have the support of all your friends and family it’s easy to have a change of heart.

At what point were you at peace with your decision?

There’s no specific time but it was a couple of weeks before Christmas. That’s when I was talking a lot with friends and family and they gave me a lot of good advice. They let me know you could be a good influence on the world and get your messages out there. As it’s been I’ve just been here in the dungeon, here in my house, just playing online poker. I reach out through Twitter and Facebook but I think this is a way for me to get out there and be a positive influence. There’s a big charity component with my deal and I’m really happy about that. I feel like I can do a lot of good.

One of the most outspoken people in the last week has been Daniel Negreanu. Have you spoken to Daniel and if so, what did you tell him?

Very briefly, through texts, but I’d rather not get into anything that we talked about. I respect the fact that he’s outspoken, so am I. We’re both fellow vegans, which is cool. I think it’s great to have a couple of vegans at the top of their respective sites. His opinions are his opinions and I guess mine are mine. I guess we just disagree on this one. We agree on a lot of other things.

When you sent out the Tweets on November 23 asking for feedback from your followers about signing with an online poker site, did you learn anything from that which influenced your decision?

I didn’t learn too much. Everyone kinda said ‘go for it’. I actually wasn’t specifically talking about UB. At that point I was just shopping around and I’d picked up an agent through PokerRoyalty. I was just kinda exploring my options, so a lot of people said ‘go for it’. My main influencers were just people close to me. I just put that out on Twitter to have fun with it and see what the responses were. I learned the most from people closest to me.

At that point how close were you to signing with UB?

At that time I was shopping around through my agent. Everything was through my agent, so I wasn’t specifically myself talking to any site. I was just letting my agent do his thing. At that point I didn’t even know if there were offers or anything.

Who else in the poker community did you talk to before making the decision to sign with UB?

I’m not going to name specific people, but just people that I’m close to or that I hang out with. There’s a lot of people in the poker community that I’m friendly with, but I don’t really hang out with them too much, don’t really talk on the phone too much. So a lot of those people I didn’t really reach out to. They’re just kind of associates, friendly associates or whatever. There are some poker players that I’m friendly with and I did talk to them and like I said, anyone that’s close to me gave their full support. It was easy for me to reconsider my years of not wanting to sign with a site ever. I just kind of held my own opinion and held tight with it. After talking to all the people close to me, they were like ‘hey, you can do a lot of good with this’. So it just convinced me.

When your agent told you that UB was interested what was your initial reaction?

I was happy because UB came at an angle of me having a lot of creative control and being a front-runner for the company. Whereas the other sites I’d just be like a pawn. The other sites have thousands of pros. I felt that with other sites I wouldn’t really get the forefront. I’ve always played basketball, been the point guard and always been the leader in most things that I do. I feel like I’m more of a leader than a follower so this is just a perfect fit for me.

Do you think any other big site would be able to realistically offer your the same amount of money that UB has? Was that a factor?

It wasn’t really a big factor, the money. People that know me well know that my life doesn’t revolve around money. I think the charity component involves some money and that’s what I was concerned with. I think UB is down to work with me on charities of my interest. With the deal I have there’s a good charity component. A lot of people are going to get helped. I’m going to be posting on Twitter if anyone has charities that they feel should helped, I’m going to check them out. I’m going to do a lot of research and a lot of good is going to come out of this so I’m real happy about that.

When you found out that both Annie Duke and Phil Hellmuth would be leaving UB, did that cause you any concern?

I’m friends with both of them. I respect both of them. It didn’t really cause me concern because they’re doing what’s best for them. I just see that UB is going in a new direction and while they did tons of good for their site I guess they just want to try something new. I’m sure Annie and Phil will have no problems with their future. I’m sure they’ll be successful. So it didn’t really raise concerns with me.

Did you ask UB management why the two biggest names would be leaving the brand?

I didn’t have any concerns about it. I didn’t assume anything bad happened. They’ve both been with the site a long time. People have a change of heart, just like I did.

Have you received all of your hand histories from the super-user scandal?

No, I haven’t. People might be shocked that I would do that but I didn’t really care too much to do that. I received an amount of money that I was extremely happy with and I felt like they totally took care of me. I didn’t feel like I needed to spend months or years or however long it was going to take to check every single hand history. I was ready to move on. I was extremely ecstatic to get a refund.

Was the refund close to what you lost?

I think it’s what I lost. It was such a good number that how could it be much more? I have a little bit different outlook than a lot of people, I kind of feel like karma takes care of things. I felt like I had good karma just to get that refund. I was happy and ready to move on rather than being all freaked out. That’s just not how I operate as a human.

What recourse do you have if further security issues arise? Would you considering walking away or leaving UB if further problems surface?

Yeah, I’d say that anyone that signs with a site, you can never really have a clear-cut if this happens or this happens. It would have to be a case-by-case basis I’d have to look at it and make a decision from there. I feel like I’m a smart enough person to make a good decision and do the right thing.

For so many years not only did you speak out against online companies, but all corporations in general. What part of your moral view changed?

I think talking to friends and family they convinced me that I can do more good than any pitfalls that I would see in the past of representing a corporation. Even Daniel responded on Twitter saying that ‘you need to reconsider because you can do a lot of good with charity with the money that you get’. So it’s kind of funny that Daniel would have a little bit influence on me. It’s mainly my friends and family that said the charity component is awesome.

I plan on putting my stamp on the poker community in terms of doing good for society as well. Not just poker, poker, poker. Poker and society, helping people. I just plan on continuing to be me. I’m not changing in any way. I’m going to continue to be a silly guy, a rapper, someone that likes to have fun and someone that likes to have fun and someone that’s kind of intense about his poker and also intense about helping the world. Nothing’s going to change. I just feel like I can reach a greater audience through more exposure. In the past I haven’t really been invited to too many shows and I never really understood why. I feel like I’ll probably be on a few more shows, I’ll probably have a little more exposure and I’ll just continue to be me which I feel is a good influence.

You’ve always seemed to stand for something, so much so, that you couldn’t be bought. Many in the poker community feel that by signing with UB, you’ve sold out. How do you explain choosing UB instead of another site?

UB is giving me the most creative control. At the other sites I’d just be one of hundreds or whatever. It just feels like they’ve already got their set team and I just don’t feel like I would have a very great influence on what they do. At UB it feels like I’m put in a position of having a lot of creative control whether it’s commercials or clothing lines or whatever it is. I just feel like that’s awesome. That was the biggest thing probably along with the charity component.

What is the charity component? How does it work?

It’s a good chunk of money that’s going to come out of my deal and go to whoever I feel it should go to. I’m already in the process of looking at charities that I’m interested in. Make sure the charity is solid and the money actually goes directly to people in need. I’m excited about it. I’m already got a lot of ideas from people, different charities and I’ve been researching and looking through it. I just can’t wait to get out there and help people.

Who brought up the charity angle? Was it you or UB?

It was important to me. That was the only way I was going to sign a deal with anyone was if there was going to be a charity component to it. I’m not doing this for money. Rather than being such an outsider of the world we live today, which I’ve been for many years, I guess I’m trying to be on the inside a little bit more. I’m trying to mix with society more because I feel a greater influence on more people. Rather than being on the outside and saying people shouldn’t do this or shouldn’t do that, I just feel like I can take away some of my judgements and work from the inside out.

Has it been hard the last week to not respond to forum threads or Twitter conversations?

No, not really. I have a pretty good amount of discipline. It was somewhat tempting to respond but I’m not trying to get into any kind of war. I just want to be about peace. Like with Daniel, we’re both vegan and a lot of our life we feel the same way. The fact that he’s so outspoken is all good with me and now that it’s out there that I’ve signed I’m sure I’ll have a conversation with him. I’ve got no hate for anyone. There’s been a few comments hating on me but I just feel like a lot of these people that are hating on me I don’t have a close relationship with anyways so it doesn’t really effect me at all.

My take: Well, regardless of what Prahlad Friedman says or doesn't say, his decision to join UB.com is all about one thing. Care to guess?... You're right...money. Friedman simply realized that signing up with UB.com, the online poker room that cheated him supposedly out of millions (I cannot vouch for this reported figure), will bring him more money in the long-run than if he didn't sign. He will surely recoup his losses on UltimateBet.com, whatever they may have been, and then some...and then some more!