Poker In The Olympics?
By Earl Burton for POKER NEWS DAILY
Posted on January 01, 2009
An English gaming company has recently revived the idea that poker should be an official sport for Olympic competition, but admits that there are other sports which have much better grounds for admission than poker.
On December 27th, the U.K. gaming company CircusCasino.com announced that, after an aggressive internet campaign, it is trying to have poker added as an exhibition sport for the 2012 London Summer Olympics and achieve full medal status in time for the 2016 Summer Olympics, which will be held in either Chicago, Madrid, Rio de Janeiro, or Tokyo. The action came after an announcement in September by the U.K. Advertising Standards Authority that poker could be advertised as a sport. Peter Nolan at CircusCasino.com said, “Poker’s appeal is global. It transcends gender and age and is the fastest-growing sport in the world. It’s ripe for Olympic recognition.”
…Poker is also not officially recognized by the International Olympic Committee (IOC). While sports such as bridge, chess, polo, and even the physical education class game Tug of War have accreditation by the IOC as official sports, poker does not.
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The essentail point behind the popularity of Poker is its ease in learning the game.
The only way chess can come even close to competing is, if we could get rid of the Opening theory studt needed to play the game. GM Susan Polgar, I am afraid you have failed miserably ion promoting Fischer Random Chess, something you had promised some time back. I am deeply disaapointed. Perhaps this could be your New Year Resolution?
Happy New Year!
For someone who doesn’t understand much about chess, Fischer random chess is just more confusing.
I fail to understand your argument about the opening theory. Most people just don’t understand why some move is played (because of their low level of chess skills), and this is regardless of the phase of the game.
Also classical chess is not dynamic enough. Someone plays and understands something about chess (and also has an engine running) can appreciate it, but for all others is just as interesting as watching the paint dry.
Thats why chess will never be as popular as other sports. It’s just too complicated for average population of this world.