Poker in the Daily Mail today........

[tikay]

Poker in the general Media is often cringe worthily bad. Even more responsible papers are guilty. This is hilarious:
http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2015/jan/08/online-poker-bot-cepheus-flaw

Just read the article, what is it that you find hilarious? Nothing particularly controversial from what I can see.

Cepheus is a bot which is the closest known approximation to a Nash Equilibrium out there. It's unbeatable basically.

The "poker journalist" talks about 400(!!!!!!!!!!) hands he played against this bot, and mentions that he stopped bluffing to exploit it.

It's nonsense basically. Thoroughly misleading and lazy journalism.

Morning Dan,

"Nonsense", "misleading", "lazy journalism"?

That seems a little unfair to me.

The Author had half a day to "test" the theory, & a few hundred words.

He regularly gets poker articles with a positive spin into the mainstream Media, which seems a good thing to me. He is an experienced poker player, & tries to promote poker for the better in these articles. Any subject with a positive spin which gets poker into the mainstream media is a good thing, imo. 

Here is a previous article by Chris.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/apr/25/poker-female-based-boom-victoria-coren-mitchell

Chris is not a Pro poker player, & did not claim to be. I know him well, & I'd say he was a break-even poker enthiusiast.

He makes his living from writing about poker. He currently Blogs & Updates for PokerStars, previously he did it for Full Tilt I believe, & he reports for PokerNews every year from the WSOP.

Prior to that, he was the "Live Updater" for blonde, for whom he has made over 22,000 Posts, which is a Top 15 Poster on blonde. (See "No Flops Homer").   

I'm not here to fly the flag for him, but I think your summing up of his piece was rather harsh. It's not easy to get decent poker Content into the Mainstream, & we need more people like Chris to promote poker to a wider audience. Poker's future is not about what we as poker players think - it's about those who have yet to play our wonderful game. They are the ones that matter, that we need to reach out to.   

I'm struggling to think of many poker players - Queen Vicky excepted - who can get positive poker articles into the mainstream media. I think he should be applauded for doing so.

[Jon MW]

...

Cepheus is a bot which is the closest known approximation to a Nash Equilibrium out there. It's unbeatable basically.
...

How do you know?

Have you studied it's programming? It's algorithms? (for example)

EDIT: and if you have - what are your qualifications to be able to judge it?

[ActionDanS]

...

Cepheus is a bot which is the closest known approximation to a Nash Equilibrium out there. It's unbeatable basically.
...

How do you know?

Have you studied it's programming? It's algorithms? (for example)

EDIT: and if you have - what are your qualifications to be able to judge it?

Hi,

Ok we ll I'm happy to apologise and defer to your judgement. Sorry.

I'll accept it's harsh.

MW, I haven't personally studies it's algorithms precisley because I'm not qualified to judge it. That said, I've read about the bot, and have listened to it's creators on the Thinking Poker Podcast. Their claims to have (very very nearly) solved the game are not refuted by those who are most qualified to judge, both in the poker world and the maths world.

If the above is true, which is what I was assuming when I commented on the aticle, then the article is somewhat incorrect. If it's a Nash equilibrium, then stopping to bluff is not exploiting it, for example. Iirc, Ike tweeted as much about it (which is actually what brought it to my attention).

On reflection perhaps I didn't consider the target audience enough, I'm certainly no journalist.

I certainly don't want to make enemies, and will apologise again for using some rather harsh descriptors. Especially if it's a guy who is known in this community.

I'd much rather focus my time on discovering the secret maths forumla to win multiple 80/20's on a DTD FT.

[tikay]

...

Cepheus is a bot which is the closest known approximation to a Nash Equilibrium out there. It's unbeatable basically.
...

How do you know?

Have you studied it's programming? It's algorithms? (for example)

EDIT: and if you have - what are your qualifications to be able to judge it?

Hi,

Ok we ll I'm happy to apologise and defer to your judgement. Sorry.

I'll accept it's harsh.

MW, I haven't personally studies it's algorithms precisley because I'm not qualified to judge it. That said, I've read about the bot, and have listened to it's creators on the Thinking Poker Podcast. Their claims to have (very very nearly) solved the game are not refuted by those who are most qualified to judge, both in the poker world and the maths world.

If the above is true, which is what I was assuming when I commented on the aticle, then the article is somewhat incorrect. If it's a Nash equilibrium, then stopping to bluff is not exploiting it, for example. Iirc, Ike tweeted as much about it (which is actually what brought it to my attention).

But I certainly don't want to make enemies, and will apologise again for using some rather harsh descriptors. Especially if it's a guy who is known in this community.

I'd much rather focus my time on discovering the secret maths forumla to win multiple 80/20's on a DTD FT.

Thanks Dan.

We must remember it was Heads Up LIMIT Poker, not a game which exercises us too much in the UK.

It would be a stretch to imagine it could do that same thing in, say, PL or NL Texas MTT's.

I guess my reply sounded like I was defending "one of our own", even though he has not posted on blonde for 18 months, but I just think he is generally the sort of person who deserves encouraging, as we see so little positive poker Content in the wider media, & I'd like to see more, not less.

[booder]

I guess my reply sounded like I was defending "one of our own", even though he has not posted on blonde for 18 months, but I just think he is generally the sort of person who deserves encouraging, as we see so little positive poker Content in the wider media, & I'd like to see more, not less.

Plus he has a really good beard.

[tikay]

...

Cepheus is a bot which is the closest known approximation to a Nash Equilibrium out there. It's unbeatable basically.
...

How do you know?

Have you studied it's programming? It's algorithms? (for example)

EDIT: and if you have - what are your qualifications to be able to judge it?

Hi,

Ok we ll I'm happy to apologise and defer to your judgement. Sorry.

I'll accept it's harsh.

MW, I haven't personally studies it's algorithms precisley because I'm not qualified to judge it. That said, I've read about the bot, and have listened to it's creators on the Thinking Poker Podcast. Their claims to have (very very nearly) solved the game are not refuted by those who are most qualified to judge, both in the poker world and the maths world.

If the above is true, which is what I was assuming when I commented on the aticle, then the article is somewhat incorrect. If it's a Nash equilibrium, then stopping to bluff is not exploiting it, for example. Iirc, Ike tweeted as much about it (which is actually what brought it to my attention).

On reflection perhaps I didn't consider the target audience enough, I'm certainly no journalist.

I certainly don't want to make enemies, and will apologise again for using some rather harsh descriptors. Especially if it's a guy who is known in this community.

I'd much rather focus my time on discovering the secret maths forumla to win multiple 80/20's on a DTD FT.

Quick PS, Dan.

Chris just tweeted this.....


"....only had 3.5 hours between getting assignment and deadline (inc playing hands). Parts also got cut......"

The Media works in peculiar ways, & so things do not always appear exactly as intended.

It's a big subject to test, & write about, in 3.5 hours.

[kinboshi]

I guess my reply sounded like I was defending "one of our own", even though he has not posted on blonde for 18 months, but I just think he is generally the sort of person who deserves encouraging, as we see so little positive poker Content in the wider media, & I'd like to see more, not less.

Plus he has a really good beard.

Haha, was about to post exactly the same!

[Jon MW]

It was the certainty which grated slightly.

In practice it's entirely possible that Cepheus is actually unbeatable. But for it to be unbeatable in theory would mean that they'd solved the game - rather than partially solved it, which seems to be what they've done. There are a number of times where poker players use mathematical terms but not quite in the same way that mathematicians do - variance is the most annoying one (a lot of poker players just use it as a synonym for luck)

This is a good article about Cepheus
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/game-theorists-crack-poker/

[tikay]

I guess my reply sounded like I was defending "one of our own", even though he has not posted on blonde for 18 months, but I just think he is generally the sort of person who deserves encouraging, as we see so little positive poker Content in the wider media, & I'd like to see more, not less.

Plus he has a really good beard.

Well that's sorted it, the case rests.

[ActionDanS]

It was the certainty which grated slightly.

In practice it's entirely possible that Cepheus is actually unbeatable. But for it to be unbeatable in theory would mean that they'd solved the game - rather than partially solved it, which seems to be what they've done. There are a number of times where poker players use mathematical terms but not quite in the same way that mathematicians do - variance is the most annoying one (a lot of poker players just use it as a synonym for luck)

This is a good article about Cepheus
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/game-theorists-crack-poker/

Again, sorry. Especially if author is lurikng.

MW: So far as I know, it's beatable by 0.01bb/100. The podcast is a good one  to listen to if you take an interest. (And a great podcast if you like poker in general. They've had some great UK guests as well in the past (Sam Grafton, Nick Wealthall) who all have interesting things to say. )

And definitely agreed that HU Limit is far from exciting. We have nothing to fear for a long time yet as poker players. NLHE is vastly more complex and won't "die" for a long time. CErtainly longer than some nay-sayers like to say.

[tikay]

It was the certainty which grated slightly.

In practice it's entirely possible that Cepheus is actually unbeatable. But for it to be unbeatable in theory would mean that they'd solved the game - rather than partially solved it, which seems to be what they've done. There are a number of times where poker players use mathematical terms but not quite in the same way that mathematicians do - variance is the most annoying one (a lot of poker players just use it as a synonym for luck)

This is a good article about Cepheus
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/game-theorists-crack-poker/

Again, sorry. Especially if author is lurikng.

MW: So far as I know, it's beatable by 0.01bb/100. The podcast is a good one  to listen to if you take an interest. (And a great podcast if you like poker in general. They've had some great UK guests as well in the past (Sam Grafton, Nick Wealthall) who all have interesting things to say. )

And definitely agreed that HU Limit is far from exciting. We have nothing to fear for a long time yet as poker players. NLHE is vastly more complex and won't "die" for a long time. CErtainly longer than some nay-sayers like to say.

Ha! No, he's not lurking.

He is probably somewhere overseas, doing 'Stars stuff I imagine. And trimming his beard.

Leeds lad, I believe, so he deserves a break. 

[ActionDanS]

It was the certainty which grated slightly.

In practice it's entirely possible that Cepheus is actually unbeatable. But for it to be unbeatable in theory would mean that they'd solved the game - rather than partially solved it, which seems to be what they've done. There are a number of times where poker players use mathematical terms but not quite in the same way that mathematicians do - variance is the most annoying one (a lot of poker players just use it as a synonym for luck)

This is a good article about Cepheus
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/game-theorists-crack-poker/

Again, sorry. Especially if author is lurikng.

MW: So far as I know, it's beatable by 0.01bb/100. The podcast is a good one  to listen to if you take an interest. (And a great podcast if you like poker in general. They've had some great UK guests as well in the past (Sam Grafton, Nick Wealthall) who all have interesting things to say. )

And definitely agreed that HU Limit is far from exciting. We have nothing to fear for a long time yet as poker players. NLHE is vastly more complex and won't "die" for a long time. CErtainly longer than some nay-sayers like to say.

Ha! No, he's not lurking.

He is probably somewhere overseas, doing 'Stars stuff I imagine. And trimming his beard.

Leeds lad, I believe, so he deserves a break. 

If that's where he is and what he's doing, then the joke is firmly on me!

[UgotNuts]

Not sure about the negative and sarcastic responses on here.... I understand that they may or may not have made themselves out to be something that they are not and all, But fair play to them for getting some media coverage on the game.

And we all know how much newspapers always like to report on things in a way which make people seem like a Dick!

[verndog158]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b050xdzr#auto

1hr 40min 40sec, follow on from this story!

[cambridgealex]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b050xdzr#auto

1hr 40min 40sec, follow on from this story!

Oh my days. Adrian Chiles. Was facepalming the entire way through. Not because of the family, but his questions and responses. CRINGE.