Table Chat Manners
Monday, December 22, 2008 - Annie Duke
What on earth is going on with chat lately? I don’t know if it is cabin fever or the general disintegration of manners in general but there has been some pretty awful chat lately online. I want to quote Rodney King on this one: “Can’t we all just get along?” So the first really bad incident happened to me at a stud 8 or better. I had a hand where I started with split Kings and I was against a 6 up. I made three Kings on 6th street and, it turns out, I was against rolled up sixes. Oops. Donkey escapes with the pot again.
Now, ironically, I had rolled up sevens only a few hands before and had jammed it on 3rd and 4th streets. I proceeded to lose against a straight flush! So there ya go. What goes around comes around. When I lost my hand I said, “vnh” in the chat box which seemed like an appropriate response.
What would you consider an inappropriate response? Would “you f***ing c**t” qualify? How bout if you said that like 5 times in the chat box? Would you be surprised if you got removed from the site after that? I mean come on guys…it is a hand of poker. A hand of poker! Not life or death. No real effect on you. You lost a hand. Get over it. And if that is going to be your reaction then you shouldn’t be playing and you should learn some manners anyway. I don’t care what you scream *at* your computer. But to say that in the chat box repeatedly is just beyond the pale. I am pretty sure that word should never be said to a woman even if you are hiding behind the anonymity of the computer screen.
What is weird is that only a couple of days later I won a hold’em hand on the site and had the same thing said to me. That person got barred, too. I will report anyone who says that to me or anyone else. I hope everyone playing on the site is there to have fun. What on earth could be the upside to that kind of behavior? It just goes against all human decency. Emily Post would be appalled.
UB is no fun if we aren’t all treating each other well. So let’s try that as a New Year’s resolution.
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Tags: manners, new years resolution, stud poker, table chat
December 22nd, 2008 at 9:31 pm
Civility at the tables is an important issue sure, but people are tuning in right now to see what you have to say about your software wrongly awarding huge pots to their sponsored pro.
And nobody wants to hear you put this down to hapless but good-hearted “knights” with “stinky breath, bad teeth, and body odor. “Cute” ain’t gonna cut it anymore.
December 22nd, 2008 at 9:34 pm
Annie
I would like to hear your comments on the issue of the pot getting shipped to your associate phil hellmuth when he had the worst hand?
Or please comment on the 2+2 thread
Thanks
December 22nd, 2008 at 11:58 pm
I guess that if you lose when you have the worst hand at showdown, then there’s not much to complain about.
December 23rd, 2008 at 11:24 am
Hey Annie,
Fascinating article about a problem which has always existed and always will.
You know what might have been even more topical? Your thoughts on Phil Helmuth getting shipped a pot with the worst hand, your COO admitting this in his blog but only giving people half the story (by avoiding referring to Phil for some reason – I wonder why!).
December 26th, 2008 at 7:53 am
Annie,
I play for fun 7 days a week at various times ,early morning right thru late nights here at UB. As it happens I have experienced players who continue to use really ugly and foul language repeatedly.
However, I am surprised that you encountered one “bad apple” at your table. So no one is immune to these “nuts”.
We must realize,unfortunately, there are many unbalanced and mentally ill people who play poker.We can report them and have them removed, thank goodness, in the meantime we can block their chat while at the table so that the rest of us normal players can enjoy our games.
There are many wonderful people who play here ,as I have met many who are such fun and a joy, and I look forward to “seeing ” them at the tables. You can always find your buddy on the list. A wonderful tool.
December 26th, 2008 at 10:03 am
Annie, you promoted the bad beat jackpot on UB. Can you tell us how it pays off to everyone?
January 3rd, 2009 at 6:26 am
Excellent New Year’s resolution! I’m all in Ms. Duke with your idea about more civil chat.
With respect to the repeated use of the specific expletive described with **** censored stars — I suggest considering a time out.
The offender might be suspended for a period of 2 days for a first offense, 5 days for a second, 30 days for a third and so on.
Thank you for an interesting post.
I wish you and yours a Happy Healthy New Year!
January 3rd, 2009 at 10:01 am
[...] Worst Use of XBox Live Every idiot teenager, ever. Seriously, if I suspected I was half as homophobic and a third as racist as these kids at that age, I’d go back in a time machine and beat myself to death with a crowbar, Jason Todd style. There’s a reason I don’t play in any ranked games; if I wanted to consort with foul-mouthed miscreants when I was trying to relax, I’d stick to the UltimateBet tables. (That’s a joke, but Annie makes some good points.) [...]