For a group of roughly 10 Dartmouth males, online poker is much more than a game -- it's an addiction.
Ever since Adam Patinkin '07 and Joseph Mannarino '07 won $35,000 playing a joint game a few weeks ago, much of their time has been spent in front of their computers in search of similar gains.
On any given day, money is being won and lost in their rooms on the second floor of Richardson Hall, to the chagrin of residence hall authorities. Just Monday, Mannarino played in a $200 buy in tournament and in less than an hour won an $800 profit.
"The guys here get pretty good. A lot win, and most wins are small, but some are really big," A.J. Chammas '07 said.
Their website of choice is Partypoker.com. The group began using other sites, but switched to Partypoker.com because its age limit is 18, whereas most websites have a 21 year-old cutoff. No Limit Texas Holdem' is almost exclusively their game of choice. In this game, players can bet as much as they have on the table at any given time.
Patinkin estimated that between the 10 regular players, they have won a total of approximately $50,000.
He also said that they have only lost a few hundred dollars. They play every day until the wee hours of the morning for at least $100 each time, Harris Chung '07 said.
"In general, we use [our winnings] for the next game, but when we have accumulated enough or after a big win, we take it out," Patinkin said. "For example, after we won the $35,000 tournament, I took out $16,000 and in a large part it is helping pay for tuition. However, I also left about $800 in my poker account, so I could keep playing."
After winning, profits are transferred electronically to their bank accounts, Patinkin added.
While these winnings may seem like a good thing, Community Director Fouad Saleet and Undergraduate Advisor Patrick McCarthy '04 do have their concerns.
"I didn't feel like sitting by and seeing them engaged in a potentially detrimental activity," Saleet said.
Saleet and McCarthy spoke with their residents to address their concerns and tell them that they know a problem exists. The men tended to agree, McCarthy said.
Missing classes, not experiencing what the College has to offer and getting themselves into serious debt are some of Saleet and McCarthy's concerns.
"Ultimately, my biggest concern is someone developing an addiction," Saleet said.
The poker craze began the last day of Fall term, Chammas said.
At first, they took the doors off the closets and used them as tables in their rooms, but shortly thereafter the group moved to the Richardson lounge.
During Winter term, Patinkin recognized an interest and organized a student-initiated poker tournament and tutorial. There were about 20 students present, and Patinkin said they could have gotten more.
The switch to online poker came when they saw the ease of playing, Chammas said.
"I think we are a lot more successful than other people," Patinkin said.
Chung and Mannarino had previous experience playing poker, and they taught everyone else.
The social aspect of poker is their main reason for playing. Poker teaches you to take calculated risks, Chung said. Chammas added that it builds confidence and turns your intellect into a commodity.
The benefits of poker extend into the professional world, Chung said.
He claimed it improves your ability to read people and how they act in social situations, and to think mathematically.
When asked if they are addicted, Chung said, "Yes we are. I have friends from home who play less than us, and they have gone to gambling counseling."
It is from a lack of other things to do, Chammas said. To counter his addiction, Patinkin said that he didn't play for four days. Everyone could stop if they really had a good reason to, Chammas said.
However, losing a lot of money is not an incentive to stop, Chung added, but failing classes or parental disapproval would be.
People think that they can win eventually, he said. Chung estimated about only 10 percent of people actually make money, but that a lot of people fool themselves about how much they lose.
"I think it is really a problem," McCarthy said. "They don't see it as gambling, which is kind of like denial."
