Poker Calculator Report: Holdem Pirate and Holdem Hawk Banned by Poker Stars.

Since the Party Poker collapse last fall, Poker Stars has emerged as the

indisputable leader in sheer numbers of online poker players. They have the

biggest tournaments, the most active tables, the biggest cash games, and the

quickest filling sit and go tournaments online. With that comes power - the

power to choose your partners, affiliates, and closer to our point;

acceptable software.

Long have I been recommending Holdem Hawk and Holdem Pirate (they are

actually the same) poker calculators as easy to use and visibly pleasing

poker calculators. Recently though, these products have pushed the boundaries

of acceptable use, at least in the view of Poker Stars, and hence have been

banned from use on that site. This is sad news, as a decent product, not

unlike some of the acceptable software allowed by Stars, is now virtually

grounded because the biggest poker site on the planet thinks it's too closely

related to an Operative Poker Calculator.

An Operative Poker Calculator is like a secret agent working for you,

collecting and mining player information that you can use against them later

on. The thing is, you don't have to be at the table for this to happen. The

software (database) is working all the time for you. For most poker sites,

that is over the line of fairness, just as in real life as well.

But Holdem Pirate and Holdem Hawk are actually Empirical Poker Calculators,

just the same as Holdem Indicator is. These types of poker calculators only

collect information on your opponents when you are at the table, just like

you were playing in a live situation.

So why the Poker Stars Smack? Here is an actual warning I received from Poker

Stars while running Holdem Pirate:

Upon a review of your account, we find that you are running an external

application known as Poker Sherlock, or its related applications, Poker Edge,

PokerBotPro, Holdem Hawk and Holdem Pirate......PokerStars shall be entitled

to take such action as it sees fit, including immediately blocking access to

the Games to such User, terminating such User's account with PokerStars and

seizing all monies held in the relevant Poker Stars "real money account".

Hey, did you notice the "seizing all monies" line? That's what you can do

when you are this big!

The "related applications" is the source of the problem. The company that

designed Hawk and Pirate also make Poker Edge and PokerBotPro, which are data

miners. In fact, I believe that Stars suspects Hawk and Pirate actually mine

data for these related products, while appearing like an Empirical Poker

Calculator on the surface.

So therein lays the crux of the problem. If you happen to play on Stars and

have Hawk or Pirate, you are out of luck, as I have tried to reverse this

ruling. I got a polite response from the staff at Poker Stars, but really,

it's not likely to change. The good news though is that Holdem Indicator has

been added to Poker Stars acceptable software list, and it is the only

empirical calculator to be approved by them.

WRITTEN BY    Marty Smith

About the Author

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