Ah, just the mentioning of the word brings tingles down my spine. The latest craze in the U.S. during the last two years has been poker. In 2003 ESPN introduced the World Series of Poker to most of the country by running the yearly championship series for the first time. Also during the same time the World Poker Tour on the travel channel was becoming a hit. During this time several internet gambling poker sites sprung up, and practically over night millions of people across the U.S. logged in to play poker in a virtual world, making the owners hundreds of millions of dollars. Every person who plays poker in today's world dreams of winning the main event championship at the horseshoe casino in Las Vegas but with the amount of entries now it is practically impossible to even make it in the money. In the past three years the number of entries in this one tournament has been increased by more than 20 fold. This only means that the true poker gods of Texas holdem like, Doyle Brunson or Phil Helmuth have a slim to none chance of ever seeing the championship bracelet again. The main increase of wannabe poker players are not playing in high stake tournaments or online, but in everyday household play. On any given week I can find about 14 games going on that only my friends are involved in. Casinos have found a large boost in profit taking 10 percent of every pot at normal tables. The local casino where I am has added 100 extra tables to the 50 that existed just to hold the new wave, and the only thing that keeps people playing is thinking that they will never loose.

Source: entertainment